“He (Joyce) acted on the brazen assumption that his book would not defer to the current taste of the public but serve to invent a new sort of reader, someone who after that experience might choose to live in a different way. He wanted to free people from all kinds of constriction, among them the curse of passive readership. ”

“Although Ulysses is a book of privacies and subjectivities, an astounding number of its scenes are set in public space – libraries, museums, bars, cemeteries and most of all the streets. Its characters enjoy the possibilities afforded by those streets for random, unexpected meetings. ” Ulysses and Us. Declan Kiberd