The First International James Joyce Symposium: A Personal Account

Abstract

The extracts that follow are from the journal I typed up and edited shortly after returning home in the summer of 1967 from the First International James Joyce Symposium. Reading over pages written thirty-five years ago, I sometimes feel that I recall the author less clearly than the events he describes. Who is this fellow who calls women “ladies” and “girls,” refers to my late friend Berni Benstock as “Bernard,” and—with a straight face—reports “gay parties” on Bloomsday? With horror, I find that he drinks too much and smokes cigarettes; with chagrin, I find his knowledge of Joyce generally shallow and sometimes in error, as you will discover if you read on. Well, the journal is his, not mine, so I pass on a text considerably reduced but otherwise essentially as written those many years ago.