Sunbelt Celt

James Joyce’s Ulysses has topped poll after poll to be named the greatest novel of the 20th century, but according to Paulo Coelho, the book is “a twit”. Speaking to Brazilian newspaper Folha de S Paulo, Coelho said the reason for his own popularity was that he is “a modern writer, despite what the critics say”. This doesn’t mean his books are experimental, he added – rather, “I’m modern because I make the difficult seem easy, and so I can communicate with the whole world.” Writers go wrong, according to Coelho, when they focus on form, not content. “Today writers want to impress other writers,” he told the paper. “One of the books that caused great harm was James Joyce’s Ulysses, which is pure style. There is nothing there. Stripped down, Ulysses is a twit.”

Fans of James Joyce who were unable to attend the annual “Bloomsday on Broadway” readings at Symphony Space on Saturday – along with anyone who appreciates the sound of famous literature read aloud by trained actors – will want to sample the BBC Radio 4 production “James Joyce’s Ulysses,” currently accessible to American listeners on the BBC Web site. Broadcast on Saturday – June 16 being the day when the action of “Ulysses” takes place – this new radio adaptation consisted of segments scattered across the day’s schedule, at times roughly corresponding to the movements of Leopold Bloom and Stephen Dedalus across Dublin in the novel. The high-profile cast includes Stephen Rea as narrator, Andrew Scott (Moriarty in the BBC “Sherlock”) as Dedalus and Henry Goodman (“The Damned United,” “Notting Hill”) as Bloom. The nine segments totaling five and a half hours [are] available free on the BBC iPlayer site for two weeks … .