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Exiles
The only extant play by the great Irish novelist, Exiles is of interest both for its autobiographical content and for formal reasons. In the characters and their circumstances details of Joyce's life are evident. The main character, Richard Rowan, the moody, tormented writer who is at odds with both his wife and the parochial Irish society around him, is clearly a portrait of Joyce himself. The character of Rowan's wife, Bertha, is certainly influenced by Joyce's lover and later wife, Nora Barnacle, with whom he left Ireland and lived a seminomadic existence in Zurich, Rome, Trieste, and Paris. As in real life, the play depicts the couple with a young son and, like Joyce, Rowan has returned to Ireland because of his mother's illness and subsequent death.
One can also detect hints of Joyce's interest in Nietzsche in Rowan's flawed pursuit of total individual freedom despite the stifling morals of Irish society. Though wrestling with guilt over his own infidelities, Rowan insists on this personal liberty, not only for himself but for his wife as well, who he knows is tempted by his cousin's amorous overtures.
Joyce's decision to express himself in the form of a play no doubt reflects his long admiration of the Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen. In the tense dialogue, the largely interior drama focused on the characters' relationships, the undertones of guilt, and the longing for freedom one sees similarities with Ibsen's themes. Also the spare, understated writing style - so unlike Joyce's exuberant, playful, and experimental use of language in his novels - shows the influence of Ibsen's "naked drama" (as Joyce described Ibsen's style in a published review). Above all, Joyce emulated the Scandinavian master in making the central issue of his drama the conflict between individual freedom and a demanding, judgmental society. In Exiles the protagonists struggle with the choice between living in defiance of the rigid conventions of Irish society or exile from their homeland.
Though lesser-known, Exiles, written after Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and while Joyce was working on Ulysses, provides interesting insights into the development of the creative gifts of a literary genius.
One can also detect hints of Joyce's interest in Nietzsche in Rowan's flawed pursuit of total individual freedom despite the stifling morals of Irish society. Though wrestling with guilt over his own infidelities, Rowan insists on this personal liberty, not only for himself but for his wife as well, who he knows is tempted by his cousin's amorous overtures.
Joyce's decision to express himself in the form of a play no doubt reflects his long admiration of the Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen. In the tense dialogue, the largely interior drama focused on the characters' relationships, the undertones of guilt, and the longing for freedom one sees similarities with Ibsen's themes. Also the spare, understated writing style - so unlike Joyce's exuberant, playful, and experimental use of language in his novels - shows the influence of Ibsen's "naked drama" (as Joyce described Ibsen's style in a published review). Above all, Joyce emulated the Scandinavian master in making the central issue of his drama the conflict between individual freedom and a demanding, judgmental society. In Exiles the protagonists struggle with the choice between living in defiance of the rigid conventions of Irish society or exile from their homeland.
Though lesser-known, Exiles, written after Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and while Joyce was working on Ulysses, provides interesting insights into the development of the creative gifts of a literary genius.
154 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1914
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About the author
James Joyce
1,935books9,003followersA profound influence of literary innovations of Irish writer James Augustine Aloysius Joyce on modern fiction includes his works,
Ulysses
(1922) and
Finnegans Wake
(1939).
Sylvia Beach published the first edition of Ulysses of James Augustine Aloysius Joyce in 1922.
People note this novelist for his experimental use of language in these works. Technical innovations of Joyce in the art of the novel include an extensive use of interior monologue; he used a complex network of symbolic parallels, drawn from the mythology, history, and literature, and he created a unique language of invented words, puns, and allusions.
John Stanislaus Joyce, an impoverished gentleman and father of James Joyce, nine younger surviving siblings, and two other siblings who died of typhoid, failed in a distillery business and tried all kinds of other professions, including politics and tax collecting. The Roman Catholic Church dominated life of Mary Jane Murray, an accomplished pianist and his mother. In spite of poverty, the family struggled to maintain a solid middle-class façade.
Jesuits at Clongowes Wood college, Clane, and then Belvedere college in Dublin educated Joyce from the age of six years; he graduated in 1897. In 1898, he entered the University College, Dublin. Joyce published first an essay on When We Dead Awaken , play of Heinrich Ibsen, in the Fortnightly Review in 1900. At this time, he also began writing lyric poems.
After graduation in 1902, the twenty-year-old Joyce went to Paris, where he worked as a journalist, as a teacher, and in other occupations under difficult financial conditions. He spent a year in France, and when a telegram about his dying mother arrived, he returned. Not long after her death, Joyce traveled again. He left Dublin in 1904 with Nora Barnacle, a chambermaid, whom he married in 1931.
Joyce published Dubliners in 1914, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man in 1916, a play Exiles in 1918 and Ulysses in 1922. In 1907, Joyce published a collection of poems, Chamber Music .
At the outset of the Great War, Joyce moved with his family to Zürich. In Zürich, Joyce started to develop the early chapters of Ulysses, first published in France because of censorship troubles in the Great Britain and the United States, where the book became legally available only in 1933.
In March 1923, Joyce in Paris started Finnegans Wake, his second major work; glaucoma caused chronic eye troubles that he suffered at the same time. Transatlantic review of Ford Madox Ford in April 1924 carried the first segment of the novel, called part of Work in Progress. He published the final version in 1939.
Some critics considered the work a masterpiece, though many readers found it incomprehensible. After the fall of France in World War II, Joyce returned to Zürich, where he died, still disappointed with the reception of Finnegans Wake.
Sylvia Beach published the first edition of Ulysses of James Augustine Aloysius Joyce in 1922.
People note this novelist for his experimental use of language in these works. Technical innovations of Joyce in the art of the novel include an extensive use of interior monologue; he used a complex network of symbolic parallels, drawn from the mythology, history, and literature, and he created a unique language of invented words, puns, and allusions.
John Stanislaus Joyce, an impoverished gentleman and father of James Joyce, nine younger surviving siblings, and two other siblings who died of typhoid, failed in a distillery business and tried all kinds of other professions, including politics and tax collecting. The Roman Catholic Church dominated life of Mary Jane Murray, an accomplished pianist and his mother. In spite of poverty, the family struggled to maintain a solid middle-class façade.
Jesuits at Clongowes Wood college, Clane, and then Belvedere college in Dublin educated Joyce from the age of six years; he graduated in 1897. In 1898, he entered the University College, Dublin. Joyce published first an essay on When We Dead Awaken , play of Heinrich Ibsen, in the Fortnightly Review in 1900. At this time, he also began writing lyric poems.
After graduation in 1902, the twenty-year-old Joyce went to Paris, where he worked as a journalist, as a teacher, and in other occupations under difficult financial conditions. He spent a year in France, and when a telegram about his dying mother arrived, he returned. Not long after her death, Joyce traveled again. He left Dublin in 1904 with Nora Barnacle, a chambermaid, whom he married in 1931.
Joyce published Dubliners in 1914, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man in 1916, a play Exiles in 1918 and Ulysses in 1922. In 1907, Joyce published a collection of poems, Chamber Music .
At the outset of the Great War, Joyce moved with his family to Zürich. In Zürich, Joyce started to develop the early chapters of Ulysses, first published in France because of censorship troubles in the Great Britain and the United States, where the book became legally available only in 1933.
In March 1923, Joyce in Paris started Finnegans Wake, his second major work; glaucoma caused chronic eye troubles that he suffered at the same time. Transatlantic review of Ford Madox Ford in April 1924 carried the first segment of the novel, called part of Work in Progress. He published the final version in 1939.
Some critics considered the work a masterpiece, though many readers found it incomprehensible. After the fall of France in World War II, Joyce returned to Zürich, where he died, still disappointed with the reception of Finnegans Wake.
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April 29, 2021
"Richard: ¿Me tiene confianza? ¿Siente que me conoce?
Beatrice: (de nuevo con timidez) Es difícil conocer a alguien aparte de uno mismo."
“Los grandes escritores siempre escriben su obra de teatro� me dijo un amigo que además de escritor, también ha publicado las suyas.
Esto es verdad, porque se pueden enumerar muchos casos de autores que aún siendo novelistas o cuentistas, escribieron obras de teatro y James Joyce no fue la excepción.
Esta pieza está influenciada, aunque lejanamente por uno de los mejores dramaturgos de fines del siglo XIX que se llamó Henrik Ibsen.
“Exiliados� posee los condimentos propios de Joyce con un pequeño giro a la complejidad de las relaciones humanas entrelazadas en un triángulo perfectamente amoroso y equilátero entre los personajes principales, es decir Richard, Robert y Bertha. Dejamos a Beatrice, la pareja de Robert un tanto relegada por no terminar de darse cuenta en qué enredos cayeron los otros personajes.
Toda la trama gira alrededor del adulterio, del deseo carnal y la traición. Se centra en Robert deseando a Bertha, la esposa de Richard, ambos recién llegados a Dublín desde el exterior con su pequeño hijo Archie.
Robert quiere poseer a Bertha, Bertha accede y Richard sabe de este juego y lo que es más evidente: lo acepta. Todos logran “jugar� en cierto modo con la persona que más buscan y de ahí surgen las complicaciones del drama.
La calidad argumental de Joyce para mantener hilados a todos los personajes en una misma hebra es impecable.
Richard, atento a la posibilidad de que Bertha sucumba ante la persuasión de Robert, lo reflexiona a modo de enseñanza hacia su hijo: “¿Tú entiendes lo que es dar una cosa? Mientras tengas una cosa, pueden quitártela. Pero una vez que la has dado, la has dado. Ningún ladrón puede quitártela. Es tuya para siempre una vez que la has dado. Eso es dar.�
Hasta este punto puede llegar Richard ante la inminente posibilidad de que Robert acceda a una noche con su esposa. Si Robert lo logra, no podemos saberlo hasta el tercer acto, en el cual se genera un interesante contrapunto entre los personajes.
Adulterio, traición, aceptación, sometimiento y duda son los ejes centrales de esta obra de teatro diseñada a la perfección por James Joyce.
Una vez le preguntaron a Joyce cual era la potencia máxima para mantener a la gente unida, si la fe total o la duda y Joyce le contestó: “No, la duda es la cosa. La vida está suspendida en la duda como el mundo en el vacío. Puede encontrar eso tratado en cierto sentido en Exiliados.�
Indudablemente esa es la esencia principal que regula esta amena obra de teatro.
Beatrice: (de nuevo con timidez) Es difícil conocer a alguien aparte de uno mismo."
“Los grandes escritores siempre escriben su obra de teatro� me dijo un amigo que además de escritor, también ha publicado las suyas.
Esto es verdad, porque se pueden enumerar muchos casos de autores que aún siendo novelistas o cuentistas, escribieron obras de teatro y James Joyce no fue la excepción.
Esta pieza está influenciada, aunque lejanamente por uno de los mejores dramaturgos de fines del siglo XIX que se llamó Henrik Ibsen.
“Exiliados� posee los condimentos propios de Joyce con un pequeño giro a la complejidad de las relaciones humanas entrelazadas en un triángulo perfectamente amoroso y equilátero entre los personajes principales, es decir Richard, Robert y Bertha. Dejamos a Beatrice, la pareja de Robert un tanto relegada por no terminar de darse cuenta en qué enredos cayeron los otros personajes.
Toda la trama gira alrededor del adulterio, del deseo carnal y la traición. Se centra en Robert deseando a Bertha, la esposa de Richard, ambos recién llegados a Dublín desde el exterior con su pequeño hijo Archie.
Robert quiere poseer a Bertha, Bertha accede y Richard sabe de este juego y lo que es más evidente: lo acepta. Todos logran “jugar� en cierto modo con la persona que más buscan y de ahí surgen las complicaciones del drama.
La calidad argumental de Joyce para mantener hilados a todos los personajes en una misma hebra es impecable.
Richard, atento a la posibilidad de que Bertha sucumba ante la persuasión de Robert, lo reflexiona a modo de enseñanza hacia su hijo: “¿Tú entiendes lo que es dar una cosa? Mientras tengas una cosa, pueden quitártela. Pero una vez que la has dado, la has dado. Ningún ladrón puede quitártela. Es tuya para siempre una vez que la has dado. Eso es dar.�
Hasta este punto puede llegar Richard ante la inminente posibilidad de que Robert acceda a una noche con su esposa. Si Robert lo logra, no podemos saberlo hasta el tercer acto, en el cual se genera un interesante contrapunto entre los personajes.
Adulterio, traición, aceptación, sometimiento y duda son los ejes centrales de esta obra de teatro diseñada a la perfección por James Joyce.
Una vez le preguntaron a Joyce cual era la potencia máxima para mantener a la gente unida, si la fe total o la duda y Joyce le contestó: “No, la duda es la cosa. La vida está suspendida en la duda como el mundo en el vacío. Puede encontrar eso tratado en cierto sentido en Exiliados.�
Indudablemente esa es la esencia principal que regula esta amena obra de teatro.
August 3, 2019
دوستانِ گرانقدر، نمایشنامۀ «تبعیدی ها» داستانِ بازی با عشق است.. داستانِ آزمایش کردنِ خواسته هایِ درونیست... داستان ِشجاعت در بیانِ خواسته هایِ دلدادگیست و صدالبته داستانِ از خودگذشتگی برای دیگری
داستان در موردِ نویسنده ای به نامِ «ریچارد» و همسرش «برتا» میباشد... ریچارد دو دوستِ قدیمی دارد... یکی روزنامه نگاری است که «رابرت» نام دارد و دیگری دختر داییِ رابرت، یعنی «بئاتریس»...... ریچارد سالیانِ سال است که دلباختۀ بئاتریس است.. ولی با این وجود با برتا ازدواج کرده و تنها دلخوشی اش زمانی است که بئاتریس هفته ای یکبار برایِ آموزشِ پیانو به پسرِ ریچارد یعنی «آرچی» به منزلِ آنها می آید... از سویِ دیگر.. رابرت نیز از نه سال پیش که ریچارد و برتا ازدواج کرده اند، دلباختۀ برتا بوده است.... رابرت تصمیم میگیرد تا این عشق را با شجاعتِ تمام، به برتا اعلام کند.. بنابراین به برتا میگوید که به او علاقه دارد... ولی برتا هرآنچه رابرت برایِ او گفته است را برایِ شوهرش ریچارد تعریف میکند!!! حتی به او میگوید که رابرت او را به خلوتگاهش دعوت کرده است.... ریچارد این موضوع را به رویِ دوستش می آورد و میگوید که از ربطۀ او و برتا آگاه است ... ولی از سویِ دیگر، به همسرش اجازه میدهد که به خلوتگاهِ رابرت رفته و به عشقِ رابرت پاسخِ مثبت بدهد... چه مردی ممکن است، همسرش را بدونِ رقابت و جنگ به رقیبِ دیگری ببازد؟!!! عزیزانم، بهتر است خودتان این داستان را خوانده و از سرانجامِ آن آگاه شوید
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امیدوارم این ریویو در جهتِ آشنایی با این کتاب، کافی و مفید بوده باشه
«پیروز باشید و ایرانی»
داستان در موردِ نویسنده ای به نامِ «ریچارد» و همسرش «برتا» میباشد... ریچارد دو دوستِ قدیمی دارد... یکی روزنامه نگاری است که «رابرت» نام دارد و دیگری دختر داییِ رابرت، یعنی «بئاتریس»...... ریچارد سالیانِ سال است که دلباختۀ بئاتریس است.. ولی با این وجود با برتا ازدواج کرده و تنها دلخوشی اش زمانی است که بئاتریس هفته ای یکبار برایِ آموزشِ پیانو به پسرِ ریچارد یعنی «آرچی» به منزلِ آنها می آید... از سویِ دیگر.. رابرت نیز از نه سال پیش که ریچارد و برتا ازدواج کرده اند، دلباختۀ برتا بوده است.... رابرت تصمیم میگیرد تا این عشق را با شجاعتِ تمام، به برتا اعلام کند.. بنابراین به برتا میگوید که به او علاقه دارد... ولی برتا هرآنچه رابرت برایِ او گفته است را برایِ شوهرش ریچارد تعریف میکند!!! حتی به او میگوید که رابرت او را به خلوتگاهش دعوت کرده است.... ریچارد این موضوع را به رویِ دوستش می آورد و میگوید که از ربطۀ او و برتا آگاه است ... ولی از سویِ دیگر، به همسرش اجازه میدهد که به خلوتگاهِ رابرت رفته و به عشقِ رابرت پاسخِ مثبت بدهد... چه مردی ممکن است، همسرش را بدونِ رقابت و جنگ به رقیبِ دیگری ببازد؟!!! عزیزانم، بهتر است خودتان این داستان را خوانده و از سرانجامِ آن آگاه شوید
----------------------------------------------
امیدوارم این ریویو در جهتِ آشنایی با این کتاب، کافی و مفید بوده باشه
«پیروز باشید و ایرانی»
November 3, 2019
Exiles is a wonderful play, it really is. The Ibsen influences are obvious and for the most part welcome. Refreshingly liberal and open in its ideas, Exiles is a play that is well worth the reading. With some changes, Exiles could have had been a masterpiece, but it is pretty impressive as it is. What changes you might ask? It is hard for me to put a finger of it, but this play did feel a bit unfinished. Perhaps it just needed more work and thought. Exiles has the potential without doubt, it has some wonderful dialogues but I feel something is missing. It may be that Joyce's talent was principally that of a novelist. Drama needs tragedy, confrontation and you know 'drama'. Even in its more modern forms, drama needs a conflict, a moment of intensive feeling.
The Ibsen influence in drama is obvious and as I said, for most part it is handled well. However, it is not natural in sense that it completely fits the story. By that I mean that the feminist issues are a bit unfinished. Ibsen did a better job with female characterization that Joyce. I do not mind Joyce looking up to Ibsen but he should have worked on his dramatist skills a bit more or offered a more complete view of his principal female character in this play. Joyce is autobiographical in this one, not something that can be completely merged with Ibsen influences, taken they were not a single individual.
Moreover, Exiles is a play about a great many things. There are many themes in Exiles, perhaps too many: liberation, feminism, Ireland, religion, autobiographical things, morality. The list goes on. in my opinion, Joyce is too analytic to be a really great dramatist. He is a wonderful writer, but he didn't realized his true potential in this play. Perhaps he just needed more writing practice, for this play is quite strong, even with its flaws. Joyce did a great job writing this one, he infused it with a great many interesting ideas and thoughts, but something is still missing. A dramatist should not explain, he should show. That being said, I believe that anyone who is a fan of Joyce will look besides things like that and be attracted to the subtle meaning behind Joyce words.
I cannot picture it on stage, but that does not bother me, I've loved many "only to read" plays. Perhaps with some editing and rewriting Exiles could have been really great. ( Here I go with the maybes: If it had been a great success would it have been edited and improved? Ah, questions, questions). I cannot help wondering what it was that the critics of the time resented to this play. Could it have been the liberal ideas? Although there is nothing shocking about Exiles for today’s standards, there are lines that will make moralist dislike it, such as:
ROBERT: I am shore that no law made by man is sacred before the impulse of passion. Who made us for one only? It is a crime against our won being if we are so. There is no law before impulses. Laws are for slaves�
To me, Exiles was quite an enchanting read, even if I did not understand the characters all the time, even if I had to read it more than once to sort of understand what was going on, even if there are some faults in it. There are lines in the play that are so good that the reading of the play can be justified even if the rest was utter rubbish- and it is not. Joyce is not afraid to criticize himself in Richard. The character of Richard is so clearly biographical (and in that sense similar to Stephen and other semi-autobiographical characters Joyce created) that I have to wonder has he reproached himself with words he put in Bertha’s mouth:
BERTHA : � All is to be for you. I am to appear false and cruel to everyone except to you. Because you take advantage of my simplicity as you did- the first time.�
There are parts in the dialogue between Richard and Stephen where the influence of Ibsen is obvious such as:
ROBERT: There are moment of sheer madness when we feel an intense passion for women.
We see nothing. We thing of nothing. Only to posses her. Call it brutal, bestial, what you will.
RICHARD: I am afraid that longing to posses a women is not love.
However, there are dialogues that are more true to Joyce, that in other words raise difficult questions, cruel truths and make you think. Ah, those thoughts that make his writing wonderful, I don't even mind the fact that I'm feeling sad when and after I read them. The exiles is not without pathos, it is not a play that should have not been a play but rather a play that could have been better. Nevertheless, it is well worth a read. I'm sure any lover of literature would appreciate it, for it is a fine piece of writing.
The Ibsen influence in drama is obvious and as I said, for most part it is handled well. However, it is not natural in sense that it completely fits the story. By that I mean that the feminist issues are a bit unfinished. Ibsen did a better job with female characterization that Joyce. I do not mind Joyce looking up to Ibsen but he should have worked on his dramatist skills a bit more or offered a more complete view of his principal female character in this play. Joyce is autobiographical in this one, not something that can be completely merged with Ibsen influences, taken they were not a single individual.
Moreover, Exiles is a play about a great many things. There are many themes in Exiles, perhaps too many: liberation, feminism, Ireland, religion, autobiographical things, morality. The list goes on. in my opinion, Joyce is too analytic to be a really great dramatist. He is a wonderful writer, but he didn't realized his true potential in this play. Perhaps he just needed more writing practice, for this play is quite strong, even with its flaws. Joyce did a great job writing this one, he infused it with a great many interesting ideas and thoughts, but something is still missing. A dramatist should not explain, he should show. That being said, I believe that anyone who is a fan of Joyce will look besides things like that and be attracted to the subtle meaning behind Joyce words.
I cannot picture it on stage, but that does not bother me, I've loved many "only to read" plays. Perhaps with some editing and rewriting Exiles could have been really great. ( Here I go with the maybes: If it had been a great success would it have been edited and improved? Ah, questions, questions). I cannot help wondering what it was that the critics of the time resented to this play. Could it have been the liberal ideas? Although there is nothing shocking about Exiles for today’s standards, there are lines that will make moralist dislike it, such as:
ROBERT: I am shore that no law made by man is sacred before the impulse of passion. Who made us for one only? It is a crime against our won being if we are so. There is no law before impulses. Laws are for slaves�
To me, Exiles was quite an enchanting read, even if I did not understand the characters all the time, even if I had to read it more than once to sort of understand what was going on, even if there are some faults in it. There are lines in the play that are so good that the reading of the play can be justified even if the rest was utter rubbish- and it is not. Joyce is not afraid to criticize himself in Richard. The character of Richard is so clearly biographical (and in that sense similar to Stephen and other semi-autobiographical characters Joyce created) that I have to wonder has he reproached himself with words he put in Bertha’s mouth:
BERTHA : � All is to be for you. I am to appear false and cruel to everyone except to you. Because you take advantage of my simplicity as you did- the first time.�
There are parts in the dialogue between Richard and Stephen where the influence of Ibsen is obvious such as:
ROBERT: There are moment of sheer madness when we feel an intense passion for women.
We see nothing. We thing of nothing. Only to posses her. Call it brutal, bestial, what you will.
RICHARD: I am afraid that longing to posses a women is not love.
However, there are dialogues that are more true to Joyce, that in other words raise difficult questions, cruel truths and make you think. Ah, those thoughts that make his writing wonderful, I don't even mind the fact that I'm feeling sad when and after I read them. The exiles is not without pathos, it is not a play that should have not been a play but rather a play that could have been better. Nevertheless, it is well worth a read. I'm sure any lover of literature would appreciate it, for it is a fine piece of writing.
July 25, 2018
The Heart flutters. Fill it to brim with love and it still flutters at the corners for freedom. Dump in a handful of greed and it continues to flutter in the remaining space for ablution. Allow peace to be its sole tenant and it still flutters at the bottom for silent passion.
What do you do of the adamant, furtive heart? One who doesn’t know bowing, doesn’t recognize rules, doesn’t believe in silence, doesn’t belong to society? What can you possibly make it understand when all the understanding roots from its depths and all the dilemmas are its doing too? Oh! You thought your mind was an experienced superior who could discipline the meek junior heart? Oh no, Sir; this little student takes no taming. It’s the only student that is forever the teacher, in essence.
Take a leaf from the genius� mind and rectify your note. Disentangling the heart maze prove too dear for him too.
In the aptly titled Exiles , a middle-aged couple, Richard and Bertha, find their moral allegiances tested by the coyly subdued Beatrice and charmingly passionate Robert respectively. It doesn’t help that Richard and Robert are college friends and Beatrice, Robert’s cousin. Richard’s taut mind often doubles up as a fierce battleground where his morality takes on its nemesis, who creeps up from the tunnels of heart and hurls abuses, recklessly. And Bertha’s heart is in the middle of this whirlpool, armed only with its chastity which gets regularly attacked by heated waves of mercurial independence. Both are cajoled in active ways and passive, to break the pungent shackles and outpour their muted emotions. But does the societal pedestal, that has elevated them to their envious, distinguished positions, also bind them to its rigorous chains, rooted in tradition and inelasticity? Can they burrow their existence to retrieve an arm, potent enough to sever the society watch gates and impart freedom to the heart bird? Do they even know if the heart is not a migratory bird, who in its frenzy, can take them to an alien land, only to abandon it in the next season of life?
Often quoted as an attempt by Joyce to depict his own life through the thinking and conflicting Richard, this play assumes a certain autobiographical garb, which in itself becomes a fascinating journey into the mind-boggling interior alleys of one of the most revered writers we have come to know of. His Imaginative Mind vs His Belligerent Heart reinforces the age old battle of the two entities that alone navigate man, giving twopence to his own biases.
I imagine Joyce cut his heart into two, sealed each with his past and present saps and assumed the two halves would continue beating, insulated to each other’s existence. But he soon watched, dumbfounded, the saps, melting at the divide and fluttering greedily in future union. Sigh…The Heart flutters.
What do you do of the adamant, furtive heart? One who doesn’t know bowing, doesn’t recognize rules, doesn’t believe in silence, doesn’t belong to society? What can you possibly make it understand when all the understanding roots from its depths and all the dilemmas are its doing too? Oh! You thought your mind was an experienced superior who could discipline the meek junior heart? Oh no, Sir; this little student takes no taming. It’s the only student that is forever the teacher, in essence.
Take a leaf from the genius� mind and rectify your note. Disentangling the heart maze prove too dear for him too.
In the aptly titled Exiles , a middle-aged couple, Richard and Bertha, find their moral allegiances tested by the coyly subdued Beatrice and charmingly passionate Robert respectively. It doesn’t help that Richard and Robert are college friends and Beatrice, Robert’s cousin. Richard’s taut mind often doubles up as a fierce battleground where his morality takes on its nemesis, who creeps up from the tunnels of heart and hurls abuses, recklessly. And Bertha’s heart is in the middle of this whirlpool, armed only with its chastity which gets regularly attacked by heated waves of mercurial independence. Both are cajoled in active ways and passive, to break the pungent shackles and outpour their muted emotions. But does the societal pedestal, that has elevated them to their envious, distinguished positions, also bind them to its rigorous chains, rooted in tradition and inelasticity? Can they burrow their existence to retrieve an arm, potent enough to sever the society watch gates and impart freedom to the heart bird? Do they even know if the heart is not a migratory bird, who in its frenzy, can take them to an alien land, only to abandon it in the next season of life?
Often quoted as an attempt by Joyce to depict his own life through the thinking and conflicting Richard, this play assumes a certain autobiographical garb, which in itself becomes a fascinating journey into the mind-boggling interior alleys of one of the most revered writers we have come to know of. His Imaginative Mind vs His Belligerent Heart reinforces the age old battle of the two entities that alone navigate man, giving twopence to his own biases.
I imagine Joyce cut his heart into two, sealed each with his past and present saps and assumed the two halves would continue beating, insulated to each other’s existence. But he soon watched, dumbfounded, the saps, melting at the divide and fluttering greedily in future union. Sigh…The Heart flutters.
July 5, 2020
Not my favorite Joyce.
December 13, 2015
You may then know in soul and body, a hundred forms, and ever restlessly, what some old theologian, Duns Scotus, I think, called a death of the spirit.
There is a muddy dip of uncertainty surrounding this piece. I have been addled by overwork for over a month and having found this paperback a few weeks back I kept it in reserve: circumstances rewarding portability have grown common. My expectations for Exiles were of a bridge, another route to Ulysses and the Wake. The opening act appeared to anticipate just such a Bloom/Molly dynamic. Things then went haywire, an akimbo drift into a fencing of manners where perhaps Heidegger held a key. I found this uncanny as I recently viewed Kazan's Baby Doll and found the introduction of Eli Wallach's character a perfect foil to a tale of Southern decline. Here in Exiles the betrayed character refuses to condemn nor employ violence. Such matters are beyond him, as if the epistemological limits preclude a definite stand. Is this a ruse, perhaps to condone his own infidelity? Is there hope or despair in his heart? The closest literary equivalent I considered was Tolstoy's The questions of identity and propriety within a relationship are ultimately extrapolated into the duty to one's land and one's faith. Any scurrying outside of such and ambiguity and relativism are brought to bear. For all the play's emotive combustion, Joyce yields a worthy lesson in understatement.
There is a muddy dip of uncertainty surrounding this piece. I have been addled by overwork for over a month and having found this paperback a few weeks back I kept it in reserve: circumstances rewarding portability have grown common. My expectations for Exiles were of a bridge, another route to Ulysses and the Wake. The opening act appeared to anticipate just such a Bloom/Molly dynamic. Things then went haywire, an akimbo drift into a fencing of manners where perhaps Heidegger held a key. I found this uncanny as I recently viewed Kazan's Baby Doll and found the introduction of Eli Wallach's character a perfect foil to a tale of Southern decline. Here in Exiles the betrayed character refuses to condemn nor employ violence. Such matters are beyond him, as if the epistemological limits preclude a definite stand. Is this a ruse, perhaps to condone his own infidelity? Is there hope or despair in his heart? The closest literary equivalent I considered was Tolstoy's The questions of identity and propriety within a relationship are ultimately extrapolated into the duty to one's land and one's faith. Any scurrying outside of such and ambiguity and relativism are brought to bear. For all the play's emotive combustion, Joyce yields a worthy lesson in understatement.
November 23, 2017
Uzun zamandır tiyatro oyunu okumuyordum, eğer Joyce olmasaydı mevzubahis muhtemelen bunu da es geçecektim. Ancak herhangi bir Joyce eseri olunca akan sular duruyor.
Joyce'un portre ve Ulysses öncesi yazdığı bu oyunda sonradan derinleştireceği bazı dertlerini ruşeym halinde görmek, İrlandalılık, sürgün, mezhep sorunları ve Joyce'un ailevi ve kişisel problemlerini satır aralarında okumak olası. Ancak temel eserlerini okumayanlar için bu eserin çok önem teşkil etmesini beklemiyorum. O nedenle bu kitabı Joyce tutkunları dışında kimseye önermiyorum. Joyce meftunları " el mahkum" okuyacaklardır zaten.
Diğer eserlerden bağımsız oyuna gelirsek; sahnede nasıl durur bilmiyorum ama alter ego mr richard'ın oğlu ile kendinde olanı vermek ve eşiyle sevgi ve aidiyet üzerine yaptığı tartışmalar kitabın güçlü yanlarıydı, aslında salt ilişkiler üzerine de okunabilecek ve bu yanıyla da tat alınabilecek bir kitap. Neyse Joyce sevgimden mütevellit biraz daha konuşursam övmelere doyamıyacağım için uzatmıyor ve huzurlarınızdan ayrılıyorum.
Joyce'un portre ve Ulysses öncesi yazdığı bu oyunda sonradan derinleştireceği bazı dertlerini ruşeym halinde görmek, İrlandalılık, sürgün, mezhep sorunları ve Joyce'un ailevi ve kişisel problemlerini satır aralarında okumak olası. Ancak temel eserlerini okumayanlar için bu eserin çok önem teşkil etmesini beklemiyorum. O nedenle bu kitabı Joyce tutkunları dışında kimseye önermiyorum. Joyce meftunları " el mahkum" okuyacaklardır zaten.
Diğer eserlerden bağımsız oyuna gelirsek; sahnede nasıl durur bilmiyorum ama alter ego mr richard'ın oğlu ile kendinde olanı vermek ve eşiyle sevgi ve aidiyet üzerine yaptığı tartışmalar kitabın güçlü yanlarıydı, aslında salt ilişkiler üzerine de okunabilecek ve bu yanıyla da tat alınabilecek bir kitap. Neyse Joyce sevgimden mütevellit biraz daha konuşursam övmelere doyamıyacağım için uzatmıyor ve huzurlarınızdan ayrılıyorum.
Read
May 24, 2020I'm not really excited about the theater plays, when it comes to reading them, but, it just happens to hit one in my hand, and really to enjoy it, at the beginning.
"Exiles" - is a little book which you go through quickly, but which leaves you with a certain sense of frustration, in the end.
Here is a tangled love-story, with a loving quadrangle, in which none of the four characters knows indeed what he wants. They are crushed by consuming passions, which grind on them, but no one does anything to materialize them, or to extinguish them, for ever.
They do not act, but only dream about.
After all, the book doesn't have much action, but it intrigues you ; ( you want to know if Bertha loves Robert, if Richard stays with Beatrice, and so on...A bit sappy, isn't ? )
You're left hanging, for that the ambiguity that floated from the beginning on the text , - does not disappear until the end. Eh, Joyce's style...
Beyond the amorous problems that consume the protagonists, however, we also see many things that, generally, concern Joyce, in his writing : the artist's struggles with his own demons, the exile, ( the writer himself living this).
Although, it is not a text that wipes you out, " Exiles" - remains, finally, a book to read, especially for Joyce's fans.
"Exiles" - is a little book which you go through quickly, but which leaves you with a certain sense of frustration, in the end.
Here is a tangled love-story, with a loving quadrangle, in which none of the four characters knows indeed what he wants. They are crushed by consuming passions, which grind on them, but no one does anything to materialize them, or to extinguish them, for ever.
They do not act, but only dream about.
After all, the book doesn't have much action, but it intrigues you ; ( you want to know if Bertha loves Robert, if Richard stays with Beatrice, and so on...A bit sappy, isn't ? )
You're left hanging, for that the ambiguity that floated from the beginning on the text , - does not disappear until the end. Eh, Joyce's style...
Beyond the amorous problems that consume the protagonists, however, we also see many things that, generally, concern Joyce, in his writing : the artist's struggles with his own demons, the exile, ( the writer himself living this).
Although, it is not a text that wipes you out, " Exiles" - remains, finally, a book to read, especially for Joyce's fans.
September 4, 2020
Exiles is the only play written by Jame Joyce. He was so inspired by the Henrik Ibsen's plays and is said to have written is as a tribute to that great Norwegian playwright. The play did not receive well. In fact, Exiles is considered as the least successful out of all the published works by James Joyce.
The story of the play is to some part modeled on the author himself. The story begins with the arrival of Richard Rowan and his common-law wife, Bertha in Dublin after a long self-imposed exile, just like the author who lived in self-imposed exile with his partner time to time making his sojourn in Dublin.
The plot is somewhat complex for a short play. Joyce's unorthodox views on free human relationships play a key theme here. And the accompanying themes of love, passion, jealousy, isolation, and separation which are the natural consequences of all human relationships play a vital part. These themes are exposed very subtly through the relationship between Richard and Bertha. Richard who believes in open and free human relationships encourages Bertha to respond to Robert's seductive advances. Bertha is disturbed, for she in her body and soul is devoted to Richard. Richard's rather cool acceptance that they should be open and free in their relationship and his non-insistence on Bertha's fidelity, makes Bertha feel isolated and separated from Richard. But can Richard really be indifferent? How will Bertha act? What will be Robert's place between the husband and wife? All this drama takes place in this "three cat and mouse acts".
Critics have taken many views on the play. It is said that the play had "neither the enchantment of A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man nor the richness of Ulysses . And its dramatic aptness is considered lacking for a theatrical performance. It may be so, but I believe the main reason for its negative reception is Joyce's views on open and free marriages which allow each partner free to pursue physical intimacies elsewhere, which by all means too wild and ahead of his time.
The title "Exiles" have been interpreted as the physical separation from one's own country, and also as spiritual isolation. All that may be right. But I would like to interpret it as the isolation and separation of man and woman in a relationship, whether open and free as the case here, or otherwise. The constant doubts and jealousies, the difference of characters, the general dissatisfaction in life alienate one from the other and make them strangers. I would like to think that is what Joyce's "Exiles" is all about.
I've not read James Joyce extensively to truly appreciate him as an author. I have only read Dubliners of which I have mixed feelings. But that his works are thought-provoking is undoubtedly true. Perhaps Exiles has not enough drama and theatrical qualities to suit it for theatre performances, but it nevertheless is a stimulating read, and worthy of the reading time.
The story of the play is to some part modeled on the author himself. The story begins with the arrival of Richard Rowan and his common-law wife, Bertha in Dublin after a long self-imposed exile, just like the author who lived in self-imposed exile with his partner time to time making his sojourn in Dublin.
The plot is somewhat complex for a short play. Joyce's unorthodox views on free human relationships play a key theme here. And the accompanying themes of love, passion, jealousy, isolation, and separation which are the natural consequences of all human relationships play a vital part. These themes are exposed very subtly through the relationship between Richard and Bertha. Richard who believes in open and free human relationships encourages Bertha to respond to Robert's seductive advances. Bertha is disturbed, for she in her body and soul is devoted to Richard. Richard's rather cool acceptance that they should be open and free in their relationship and his non-insistence on Bertha's fidelity, makes Bertha feel isolated and separated from Richard. But can Richard really be indifferent? How will Bertha act? What will be Robert's place between the husband and wife? All this drama takes place in this "three cat and mouse acts".
Critics have taken many views on the play. It is said that the play had "neither the enchantment of A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man nor the richness of Ulysses . And its dramatic aptness is considered lacking for a theatrical performance. It may be so, but I believe the main reason for its negative reception is Joyce's views on open and free marriages which allow each partner free to pursue physical intimacies elsewhere, which by all means too wild and ahead of his time.
The title "Exiles" have been interpreted as the physical separation from one's own country, and also as spiritual isolation. All that may be right. But I would like to interpret it as the isolation and separation of man and woman in a relationship, whether open and free as the case here, or otherwise. The constant doubts and jealousies, the difference of characters, the general dissatisfaction in life alienate one from the other and make them strangers. I would like to think that is what Joyce's "Exiles" is all about.
I've not read James Joyce extensively to truly appreciate him as an author. I have only read Dubliners of which I have mixed feelings. But that his works are thought-provoking is undoubtedly true. Perhaps Exiles has not enough drama and theatrical qualities to suit it for theatre performances, but it nevertheless is a stimulating read, and worthy of the reading time.
March 7, 2024
If I died this moment, I am yours.
James Joyce only wrote this one play and that is a small mercy. "Exiles" is a tedious slog, crammed with four talking heads who all sound the same: anguished, neurotic, conflicted, and over-wrought.
I have wounded my soul for you � a deep wound of doubt that can never be healed.
The four main characters in "Exiles" struggle with overlapping attractions and waves of indifference. It may have seemed modern in 1916 but today, reading between the lines, comes across as being about open marriage, polyamorous inclinations, "swinging" etc. but there was no language at the time to talk about such things � or at least not openly. Jealousy and monogamy are the default emotions and nothing else exists. The ideas are all embryonic, struggling to be born � the process is cryptic, painful and unrewarding. Ultimately, nothing but pain.
I have rarely been so horrendously bored so two stars for that achievement.
James Joyce only wrote this one play and that is a small mercy. "Exiles" is a tedious slog, crammed with four talking heads who all sound the same: anguished, neurotic, conflicted, and over-wrought.
I have wounded my soul for you � a deep wound of doubt that can never be healed.
The four main characters in "Exiles" struggle with overlapping attractions and waves of indifference. It may have seemed modern in 1916 but today, reading between the lines, comes across as being about open marriage, polyamorous inclinations, "swinging" etc. but there was no language at the time to talk about such things � or at least not openly. Jealousy and monogamy are the default emotions and nothing else exists. The ideas are all embryonic, struggling to be born � the process is cryptic, painful and unrewarding. Ultimately, nothing but pain.
I have rarely been so horrendously bored so two stars for that achievement.
September 19, 2019
RICHARD: Listen. She is dead. She lies on my bed. I look at her body which I betrayed � grossly and many times. And loved, too, and wept over. And I know that her body was always my loyal slave. To me, to me only she gave...[He breaks off and turns aside, unable to speak.]
June 26, 2017
Oof, oh boy. Yeah, Joyce wrote a play. That's why he didn't write two plays. This isn't a case like his poetry, which is unremarkable but acceptable and goes down easy; no, Exiles is more or less a failure. The biggest issue with it is dialogue, James, what happened to ye? It has neither the lively full bodied character dialogue of works like Ulysses, and it doesn't have the low key nigh-realistic dialogue of Dubliners. It's either bafflingly didactic or shamelessly mechanical. The entire play is mechanical, characters interact for reasons no less shallow than "it's time for us to have dialogue together now." Not only that but Joyce litters the page with so many directions that are either needlessly controlling or just plain needless because anyone would have picked up on it. All of the flaws in this essentially boil down to Joyce not knowing how to work in this medium.
And on top of all this, the actual substance of the play is a really uncomfortable airing of all Joyce's dirty laundry, a confessional of all his weird neuroses through an actual cuck/counter-cuck incident in his life. To be sure, there is nothing here that isn't in his other works, but since he's inept at writing a play it doesn't have that separating film of the artistic filter. So he's putting really awkward sensitive material into the lines of people who would never say the things they're saying to anyone (in both content and form), which is intended to be pronounced under bright lights in front of public crowds. In literature, similar ideas with the right execution make the Circe episode shine. Here in a play, it's difficult to read let alone watch. It's like if DFW wrote a TV pilot in which the main character who is very transparently himself does drugs and throws chairs at his girlfriend before getting on a payphone and calling long distance to propose to a fan he met last year. Why would anyone want this? In Joyce's notes he has all these pseudo-philosophical ideas behind the characters, so while there are definitely ideas and symbols being used in the play, it may bode even worse that they aren't coherently communicated in any way.
The trouble with writing this is I'm actually making it sound more interesting than it actually is. Not only does it not work, it's just boring most of the time. I would have trouble recommending it to anyone, because if you're reading it out of curiosity it won't take you further than 10 pages, and while I read it mostly for completion's sake I recognize that's more my fault than anything. But, if there's one bit of worth I got out of it, it's the massive laugh I got from Joyce's note saying that his self insert character is supposed to be modeled after the "On Women" incarnation of Schopenhauer. Not Recommended.
And on top of all this, the actual substance of the play is a really uncomfortable airing of all Joyce's dirty laundry, a confessional of all his weird neuroses through an actual cuck/counter-cuck incident in his life. To be sure, there is nothing here that isn't in his other works, but since he's inept at writing a play it doesn't have that separating film of the artistic filter. So he's putting really awkward sensitive material into the lines of people who would never say the things they're saying to anyone (in both content and form), which is intended to be pronounced under bright lights in front of public crowds. In literature, similar ideas with the right execution make the Circe episode shine. Here in a play, it's difficult to read let alone watch. It's like if DFW wrote a TV pilot in which the main character who is very transparently himself does drugs and throws chairs at his girlfriend before getting on a payphone and calling long distance to propose to a fan he met last year. Why would anyone want this? In Joyce's notes he has all these pseudo-philosophical ideas behind the characters, so while there are definitely ideas and symbols being used in the play, it may bode even worse that they aren't coherently communicated in any way.
The trouble with writing this is I'm actually making it sound more interesting than it actually is. Not only does it not work, it's just boring most of the time. I would have trouble recommending it to anyone, because if you're reading it out of curiosity it won't take you further than 10 pages, and while I read it mostly for completion's sake I recognize that's more my fault than anything. But, if there's one bit of worth I got out of it, it's the massive laugh I got from Joyce's note saying that his self insert character is supposed to be modeled after the "On Women" incarnation of Schopenhauer. Not Recommended.
April 16, 2011
I'm not a fan of Joyce, which probably explains why I really liked this play. Exiles is much more straightforward than any of his novels, and far more dramatic and interesting than any of the short stories in The Dubliners. I decided to give it a try after hearing that it was by far his most "conventional" work, a term which appeals to me in respect to authors like James Joyce and William Faulkner. If you like stories where you have to wrestle with every sentence in order to appreciate their subtext and hidden meaning, then you might find this work a bit shallow in comparison with Ulysses or Finnegan's Wake. However, I found it to be one of the most original takes on romantic drama I have ever come across, with an ending far more satisfying and hopeful than I would have ever expected coming from Joyce. The story centers on the folly of trying to approach romantic relationships in any kind of enlightened, sophisticated way. Joyce demontrates how attempting to purify one's romantic love for someone by removing all jelousy and selfishness from the relationship only serves to kill the passion that makes romance so appealing in the first place. Also, is doing the "noble thing" (such as giving your partner the complete freedom to make all their own decisions) in reality a form of mental torture? The writing style of Exiles may be straightforward, but the ideas that Joyce puts forth provide as much food for thought--for my money, anyway--as his more celebrated works.
February 16, 2013
I was going to start this with a 'Joyce is to English and world literature what x is to y...' but, I'll go one better and just say that Joyce just IS literature. The man embodied so much of what's great and horrible about writers, about the craft, about the simplicity of telling a story versus the herculean nonsense that is the extracting of meaning, new, old, completely invented or absolute truth, from that writing. Joyce was brilliant and revolutionary. He completely shifted the course of English and, by extension, world literature with his high modernist works daring the world to unravel or cut the Gordian knots he was presenting. The only author I can compare him to based on the scope of his achievement would be Shakespeare. But he also, from what I've been able to glean, may have been an insufferably pompous and even self-hating possibly self-torturing ass. He was as great as he was greatly flawed. He was, in short, a man.
I picked this up in a used bookshop in Tel Aviv along with Faulkner's Light in August from a bookseller anxious to close. It was not long before I left Israel and the title and the presumed content and my own life history all coalesced into me picking up the book with a mixture of melancholy and slight, god help me, exaltation.
Going into this play I had a host of expectations based on what I've read from and about Joyce in the past. I wasn't expecting the magnitude of Ulysses or the internal maze wandering that was Portrait of the Artist, not having read too many plays recently (save Faust a year ago and Ibsen a little before that). Maybe something more along the lines of Dubliners but, to be honest, I had in my mind this image of a play about an Irish expatriate returning to 'the homeland' after an extended stay abroad, only to be confronted by everything that has happened while he was gone; this confrontation would be epitomized by the returnee facing his opposite, the Irishman who stayed behind that, while denying himself the riches and despair of knowing the rest of the world, would set himself up as the moral superior to the returnee and, attempt, to shame the returnee about his absence and possibly attempt to shift him to his own way of thinking. The conclusion to this in my mind would be, from what little I've shaped together resembling assumptions regarding Joyce, both characters secure in their choices yet internally destroyed by the confrontation.
This isn't what I read. And I'm glad because what's there is good. But I'm a bit disappointed at wasn't there or just barely alluded to. The play itself is a good story with wonderful details and visual clues suffused throughout but, with my edition, it was the author's copious notes and elaborations on his characters and general story that really disconcert with those three dreadful words: what could've been. In the end I'm reminded of what Charles Bukowski once said about Truman Capote, that the latter never actually wrote, only ice-skated on the surface of things, never good enough, smart enough, perhaps writer enough to go deeper.
More than worth it for the Joyce completionists out there, and certainly the work is loaded down with his talent, but not quite enough. Read it as a promise of the paradigm shifting to come, the moment between the cannon being lit and the wall coming down.
I picked this up in a used bookshop in Tel Aviv along with Faulkner's Light in August from a bookseller anxious to close. It was not long before I left Israel and the title and the presumed content and my own life history all coalesced into me picking up the book with a mixture of melancholy and slight, god help me, exaltation.
Going into this play I had a host of expectations based on what I've read from and about Joyce in the past. I wasn't expecting the magnitude of Ulysses or the internal maze wandering that was Portrait of the Artist, not having read too many plays recently (save Faust a year ago and Ibsen a little before that). Maybe something more along the lines of Dubliners but, to be honest, I had in my mind this image of a play about an Irish expatriate returning to 'the homeland' after an extended stay abroad, only to be confronted by everything that has happened while he was gone; this confrontation would be epitomized by the returnee facing his opposite, the Irishman who stayed behind that, while denying himself the riches and despair of knowing the rest of the world, would set himself up as the moral superior to the returnee and, attempt, to shame the returnee about his absence and possibly attempt to shift him to his own way of thinking. The conclusion to this in my mind would be, from what little I've shaped together resembling assumptions regarding Joyce, both characters secure in their choices yet internally destroyed by the confrontation.
This isn't what I read. And I'm glad because what's there is good. But I'm a bit disappointed at wasn't there or just barely alluded to. The play itself is a good story with wonderful details and visual clues suffused throughout but, with my edition, it was the author's copious notes and elaborations on his characters and general story that really disconcert with those three dreadful words: what could've been. In the end I'm reminded of what Charles Bukowski once said about Truman Capote, that the latter never actually wrote, only ice-skated on the surface of things, never good enough, smart enough, perhaps writer enough to go deeper.
More than worth it for the Joyce completionists out there, and certainly the work is loaded down with his talent, but not quite enough. Read it as a promise of the paradigm shifting to come, the moment between the cannon being lit and the wall coming down.
September 11, 2022
Foi uma enorme surpresa "descobrir" esta peça de James Joyce uma vez que desconhecia que o autor havia escrito teatro 😮
Amplificou-se de imediato o meu interesse pelo exemplar que tinha em mãos e tornou-se impossível deixá-lo ficar na banca de feira onde o encontrei. Por esses dias a obra de James Joyce já não me era totalmente desconhecida, uma vez que já tinha lido "Dublinenses" e "Ulisses" (por esta ordem) e entusiasmava-me a perspectiva de a continuar a "desbravar" agora num dos meus géneros diletos 😊
A experiência de leitura acabou contudo por não se revelar das mais marcantes. Densamente impregnada do ego do autor (não fosse ela uma obra essencialmente autobiográfica), pareceu-me não ter sido o teatro o melhor veículo para trabalhar os temas apresentados. Julgo que esta história se adequaria melhor ao "formato romance" e que neste formato perde um pouco do seu potencial.
Não deixou no entanto de ser uma boa leitura, bastante interessante até, que me levou a "experienciar" (ou pelo menos julgar que experienciei) um pouco mais do denso e inquieto mundo nuclear de Joyce e do seu nublado íntimo. Desta vez sem o humor e as metamorfoses de Ulisses para balancear, nem os "espaços abertos" dos Dublinenses para arejar, fica-nos uma leitura bem espessa e carregada, que nem o formato "peça" consegue atenuar.
Se num primeiro momento se aparentou a uma peça como qualquer outra, em breve me apercebi que o verdadeiro conteúdo não estava tanto na acção, comportamento ou mesmo falas dos personagens, como no que encobriam e sonegavam nas suas camadas mais profundas.
Mas se desta peça conseguí realmente retirar algo e continuar a percorrer a obra de Joyce acumulando algum valor acrescentado, valeu-me sem dúvida a preciosa ajuda do prefácio de autoria de João Palma-Ferreira (também tradudor desta edição). Apesar de usualmente ser contra a leitura dos prefácios/introduções antes da leitura da obra em si mesma, desta vez sinto quase como dever afirmar que a leitura antecipada deste prefácio poderá melhorar a leitura do texto que se lhe segue.
No geral e tal como me tem acontecido com todas as obras de James Joyce que li, gostei mas não adorei. Não me arrependo de ter lido nenhuma delas e espero sinceramente que o Retrato do Artista Enquanto Jovem ainda venha a cruzar a minha vida de leitora. O Finnegans Wake ocupa já um lugar na minha estante mas tenho sérias dúvidas que algum dia me encha da coragem suficiente para o ler...
Entretanto este meu exemplar que está cá em casa desde Fevereiro, cheio de carisma e com marcas já dos vários proprietários que teve antes de chegar às minhas mãos, seguirá viagem amanhã para outra casa onde espero que venha a ser melhor e devidamente apreciado por outro leitor.
Amplificou-se de imediato o meu interesse pelo exemplar que tinha em mãos e tornou-se impossível deixá-lo ficar na banca de feira onde o encontrei. Por esses dias a obra de James Joyce já não me era totalmente desconhecida, uma vez que já tinha lido "Dublinenses" e "Ulisses" (por esta ordem) e entusiasmava-me a perspectiva de a continuar a "desbravar" agora num dos meus géneros diletos 😊
A experiência de leitura acabou contudo por não se revelar das mais marcantes. Densamente impregnada do ego do autor (não fosse ela uma obra essencialmente autobiográfica), pareceu-me não ter sido o teatro o melhor veículo para trabalhar os temas apresentados. Julgo que esta história se adequaria melhor ao "formato romance" e que neste formato perde um pouco do seu potencial.
Não deixou no entanto de ser uma boa leitura, bastante interessante até, que me levou a "experienciar" (ou pelo menos julgar que experienciei) um pouco mais do denso e inquieto mundo nuclear de Joyce e do seu nublado íntimo. Desta vez sem o humor e as metamorfoses de Ulisses para balancear, nem os "espaços abertos" dos Dublinenses para arejar, fica-nos uma leitura bem espessa e carregada, que nem o formato "peça" consegue atenuar.
Se num primeiro momento se aparentou a uma peça como qualquer outra, em breve me apercebi que o verdadeiro conteúdo não estava tanto na acção, comportamento ou mesmo falas dos personagens, como no que encobriam e sonegavam nas suas camadas mais profundas.
Mas se desta peça conseguí realmente retirar algo e continuar a percorrer a obra de Joyce acumulando algum valor acrescentado, valeu-me sem dúvida a preciosa ajuda do prefácio de autoria de João Palma-Ferreira (também tradudor desta edição). Apesar de usualmente ser contra a leitura dos prefácios/introduções antes da leitura da obra em si mesma, desta vez sinto quase como dever afirmar que a leitura antecipada deste prefácio poderá melhorar a leitura do texto que se lhe segue.
No geral e tal como me tem acontecido com todas as obras de James Joyce que li, gostei mas não adorei. Não me arrependo de ter lido nenhuma delas e espero sinceramente que o Retrato do Artista Enquanto Jovem ainda venha a cruzar a minha vida de leitora. O Finnegans Wake ocupa já um lugar na minha estante mas tenho sérias dúvidas que algum dia me encha da coragem suficiente para o ler...
Entretanto este meu exemplar que está cá em casa desde Fevereiro, cheio de carisma e com marcas já dos vários proprietários que teve antes de chegar às minhas mãos, seguirá viagem amanhã para outra casa onde espero que venha a ser melhor e devidamente apreciado por outro leitor.
November 10, 2012
Originally published on my blog in May 2001.
Of all Joyce's mature writing, his only play is probably the least well known. It is also one of his least successful pieces, never having had much success on the stage. Displaying an unusual lack of confidence, it shows its influences strongly.
The Exiles manages to simultaneously be dull enough to seem longer than it is and unsatisfying enough to seem shorter. This is because Joyce gives all the real character to the part of Richard; neither he nor any of the others are interested in understanding anyone except himself. But even with Richard we do not come to understand the motivation behind his encouragement of his wife's potential infidelity, the principal dramatic content of the play; hints are made that it springs from some kind of misogynistic impulse, but that is not really a proper explanation (where did the impulse come from?).
The main model for the style of the play is , as refracted through 's commentary and 's translations. The introduction in this edition cites as a particular model, but I found it quite hard to see parallels between the two plays - especially as politics is extremely important in one and hardly mentioned in the other. The main aspects of the play which are copied from Ibsen are the ways in which characters interact (those these are less successful dramatically) and frankness about controversial issues in home life.
Joyce's preoccupation with the relationship of the Irish to Ireland is muted here, but is the reason for the title; the background event of the play is the Rowan family's return to Ireland from life abroad. Perhaps a drama more reflecting his other concerns as a writer would have drawn out more of his genius; as it is, The Exiles is probably his most disappointing work.
Of all Joyce's mature writing, his only play is probably the least well known. It is also one of his least successful pieces, never having had much success on the stage. Displaying an unusual lack of confidence, it shows its influences strongly.
The Exiles manages to simultaneously be dull enough to seem longer than it is and unsatisfying enough to seem shorter. This is because Joyce gives all the real character to the part of Richard; neither he nor any of the others are interested in understanding anyone except himself. But even with Richard we do not come to understand the motivation behind his encouragement of his wife's potential infidelity, the principal dramatic content of the play; hints are made that it springs from some kind of misogynistic impulse, but that is not really a proper explanation (where did the impulse come from?).
The main model for the style of the play is , as refracted through 's commentary and 's translations. The introduction in this edition cites as a particular model, but I found it quite hard to see parallels between the two plays - especially as politics is extremely important in one and hardly mentioned in the other. The main aspects of the play which are copied from Ibsen are the ways in which characters interact (those these are less successful dramatically) and frankness about controversial issues in home life.
Joyce's preoccupation with the relationship of the Irish to Ireland is muted here, but is the reason for the title; the background event of the play is the Rowan family's return to Ireland from life abroad. Perhaps a drama more reflecting his other concerns as a writer would have drawn out more of his genius; as it is, The Exiles is probably his most disappointing work.
Read
June 16, 2023‘Exiles� is the only play Joyce produced and was, upon its release, derided as filth and rejected by theatres at home and abroad, as well as by esteemed literary and theatre figures like George Bernard Shaw and WB Yeats. Having been familiar with Joyce only through his collection of stories, ‘The Dubliners�, ‘Exiles� proved somewhat of a departure, and a disappointing one at that. The protagonist is clearly a self-projection of Joyce, and he and his wife’s exile to Rome clearly mirrors that of Joyce’s own departure for Trieste with Nora Barnacle, in reaction to an increasingly parochial Ireland. However, the semi-autobiographical overtures fail to make this piece any more interesting. The dialogue is, in turns, both didactic and mechanized to the point of lassitude. Perhaps I lack the dramatist-like insight necessary to see how this would translate beautifully to the stage but I fail to see how prose as monotonous as this could ever take any sort of compelling form.
August 2, 2017
Meh, it would probably be better to see this performed. Nonetheless, I have read it. Must finish the Wake now.
April 8, 2025
ENGLISH: This is the first time I have watched this play by Joyce, in the RTVE archive. Richard Rowan, an anti-establishment (anti-Catholic) writer, returns to Ireland with Bertha, his wife by natural law, and their son. He also brings his (other) lover, his son's piano teacher. In Ireland, he meets his best friend, Robert, who is in love with Bertha and tries to seduce her, but Bertha informs Richard about the affair, and Richard manipulates Bertha, leaving her alone in Robert's home, telling her that that's the way to be free. I did not like the characters nor the story. And I found the ending, when she turns her hatred for Richard back into love, too abrupt and unjustified.
ESPAÑOL: Esta es la primera vez que he visto esta obra de Joyce, en el archivo de RTVE. Richard Rowan, escritor antisistema (anticatólico) vuelve a Irlanda con Bertha, su esposa por la ley natural, y con su hijo. Se trae también a su (otra) amante, la profesora de piano de su hijo. En Irlanda encuentra a su mejor amigo, Robert, que está enamorado de Bertha e intenta seducirla, pero Bertha informa a Richard del asunto, y Richard manipula a Bertha, dejándola sola en casa de Robert, diciéndole que esa es la forma de ser libre. No me gustaron los personajes ni el argumento. Y el final, cuando ella convierte su odio por Richard de nuevo en amor, me pareció demasiado brusco e injustificado.
ESPAÑOL: Esta es la primera vez que he visto esta obra de Joyce, en el archivo de RTVE. Richard Rowan, escritor antisistema (anticatólico) vuelve a Irlanda con Bertha, su esposa por la ley natural, y con su hijo. Se trae también a su (otra) amante, la profesora de piano de su hijo. En Irlanda encuentra a su mejor amigo, Robert, que está enamorado de Bertha e intenta seducirla, pero Bertha informa a Richard del asunto, y Richard manipula a Bertha, dejándola sola en casa de Robert, diciéndole que esa es la forma de ser libre. No me gustaron los personajes ni el argumento. Y el final, cuando ella convierte su odio por Richard de nuevo en amor, me pareció demasiado brusco e injustificado.
March 23, 2024
"Not that fear. But that I will reproach myself then for having taken all for myself because I would not suffer her to give to another hat was hers and not mine to give, because I accepted from her her loyalty and made her life poorer in love. That is my fear. That I stand between her and any moments of life that should be hers, between her and you, between her and anyone, between her and anything. I will not do it. I cannot and I will not. I dare not." (55)The long introduction was, unfortunately, more interesting than the play itself, which only provided a few moments during which I experienced something like captivation.
January 15, 2008
I am recommending this for two reasons.
The first is that the introduction is by Conor McPherson, a playwright whose works (among them THE SEAFARER, which is currently on Broadway) take a cue from Joyce and Yeats.
The second reason is that this volume contains a twelve-page set of notes by Joyce himself.
It's handy to have EXILES by itself. I've only noticed it previously contained in THE PORTABLE JOYCE, which, I think, has gone out of print. [It hasn't. It's even been corrected to show dashes instead of quotation marks in DUBLINERS and PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST AS A YOUNG MAN. Note written January 15th, 2007 -- Fred]
Now I'm going to recommend the publisher's webpage: .
This edition coincides with a 2006 revival of EXILES at the National Theatre in London.
Actors will love this series. At the front of this book is a full-page list of many plays published by Nick Hern Books. The list even tells us which works are modelled after other playwrights' works. For example, after Caryl Churchill's THYESTES, it says "after Seneca." I find this amusing.
This book also points out that EXILES actually was performed in New York in Joyce's lifetime. (It was at The Neighborhood Playhouse in February, 1925.) Joyce wasn't there. THE NEW YORKER magazine premiered that month. I'm curious to know if they reviewed it.
Someday, I'll do more than listen to radio performances of ULYSSES (after Homer) every June 16th. For now, I've just re-read DUBLINERS and am amazed at how wise the book has grown since I first read it. (Joke after Mark Twain.)
The first is that the introduction is by Conor McPherson, a playwright whose works (among them THE SEAFARER, which is currently on Broadway) take a cue from Joyce and Yeats.
The second reason is that this volume contains a twelve-page set of notes by Joyce himself.
It's handy to have EXILES by itself. I've only noticed it previously contained in THE PORTABLE JOYCE, which, I think, has gone out of print. [It hasn't. It's even been corrected to show dashes instead of quotation marks in DUBLINERS and PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST AS A YOUNG MAN. Note written January 15th, 2007 -- Fred]
Now I'm going to recommend the publisher's webpage: .
This edition coincides with a 2006 revival of EXILES at the National Theatre in London.
Actors will love this series. At the front of this book is a full-page list of many plays published by Nick Hern Books. The list even tells us which works are modelled after other playwrights' works. For example, after Caryl Churchill's THYESTES, it says "after Seneca." I find this amusing.
This book also points out that EXILES actually was performed in New York in Joyce's lifetime. (It was at The Neighborhood Playhouse in February, 1925.) Joyce wasn't there. THE NEW YORKER magazine premiered that month. I'm curious to know if they reviewed it.
Someday, I'll do more than listen to radio performances of ULYSSES (after Homer) every June 16th. For now, I've just re-read DUBLINERS and am amazed at how wise the book has grown since I first read it. (Joke after Mark Twain.)
September 15, 2022
Exiles is Joyce's sole contribution to the play format. It is a deceptively simple, but definitive take on the ethos of spiritual virginity and the love triangle; the triangle here exists in itself as an analysis of the love triangle in other media, but also as the relation of ideals through culture. The relation of these ideals, particularly of progressive versus traditional ideals, is contrasted by the characters of Robert and Richard, and the sought but unattainable union represented by Bertha. I recommend getting a version that contains Joyce's notes on the play, as those are the highlight. At first glance, this play doesn't seem like it adds anything new to the literature canon, but there is much more to it than it first seems. It has a mundane quality to it, similar to Dubliners, but the thrust behind its conception is as precise and full of meaning as anything else in Joyce's oeuvre.
December 2, 2017
"It is not in the darkness of belief that I desire you. But in restless, living, wounding doubt."
-Richard
Don’t read this play too fast.
If you take the time to parse lines such as the one above, instead of skating over their vague emotion, your brain will squirm, bend, and morph as it tries to evolve into a more skillful mechanism. This is the classic Joycean headspace -- or at least the best junior version of it that can be mustered on the predominantly extroverted medium of the Stage.
It is fascinating that while the primary theme of the play is Freedom, the characters in the play are bogged down by oppressive stage directions from the playwright. Every hand movement and pause is carefully dictated by Joyce himself. This is a classic dramatic effect that Joyce stole from Ibsen- whom he was obsessed with at the time. In Ibsen’s first great feminist play A Doll’s House the CHARACTER Nora longs to be free from the domineering hand of men & society. However, at some point during the play, a keen observer will note that Nora the ACTRESS is subservient to the will of the male playwright all along. Nora’s quest for freedom is an illusion. She is a doll within a doll house within a doll house. When the viewer becomes aware of this nested Russian doll effect, the audience’s reaction is elevated from basic emotional sympathy to pure awe. This is the “grand effect� that Joyce praised Ibsen for, and it is the type of thing that Joyce is gunning for in Exiles. And it works. Mostly. If you are willing to put in the effort.
Many readers have said that the characters in Exiles seem mechanical or unrealistic. Based on Joyce’s own notes, I would argue that this is a purposeful effect. Just as the characters have been exiled physically from their homeland, and are moral exiles from the Catholic Church due to their progressive views on marriage, Joyce exiles his characters from their own emotions. Joyce was a huge fan of Schopenhauer, who if you aren’t familiar with, was a philosopher who advocated Disassociation, Serenity, and Self-Awareness as the only way to ever escape being a slave to one’s immediate emotional experience. Joyce treats his characters as Schopenhauer puppets. He nearly comes out and says as much in his accompanying notes to the play. The characters are exiled from their own emotions just as much as they are exiled in more tangible ways: morally and nationally. Joyce, as always, is primarily interested in demonstrating a new way of thinking, at least more than he is interested in the silly business of toying with your emotions for an hour or two.
If nothing else, Exiles definitely serves as an excellent advertisement for Ibsen to English-speaking audiences. Reading Exiles gave me new enthusiasm to dive back into Ibsen, and maybe this time wrestle through the bad translations and all the distracting sentimentality to see if there are underlying philosophical bombshells and “grand effects.�
-Richard
Don’t read this play too fast.
If you take the time to parse lines such as the one above, instead of skating over their vague emotion, your brain will squirm, bend, and morph as it tries to evolve into a more skillful mechanism. This is the classic Joycean headspace -- or at least the best junior version of it that can be mustered on the predominantly extroverted medium of the Stage.
It is fascinating that while the primary theme of the play is Freedom, the characters in the play are bogged down by oppressive stage directions from the playwright. Every hand movement and pause is carefully dictated by Joyce himself. This is a classic dramatic effect that Joyce stole from Ibsen- whom he was obsessed with at the time. In Ibsen’s first great feminist play A Doll’s House the CHARACTER Nora longs to be free from the domineering hand of men & society. However, at some point during the play, a keen observer will note that Nora the ACTRESS is subservient to the will of the male playwright all along. Nora’s quest for freedom is an illusion. She is a doll within a doll house within a doll house. When the viewer becomes aware of this nested Russian doll effect, the audience’s reaction is elevated from basic emotional sympathy to pure awe. This is the “grand effect� that Joyce praised Ibsen for, and it is the type of thing that Joyce is gunning for in Exiles. And it works. Mostly. If you are willing to put in the effort.
Many readers have said that the characters in Exiles seem mechanical or unrealistic. Based on Joyce’s own notes, I would argue that this is a purposeful effect. Just as the characters have been exiled physically from their homeland, and are moral exiles from the Catholic Church due to their progressive views on marriage, Joyce exiles his characters from their own emotions. Joyce was a huge fan of Schopenhauer, who if you aren’t familiar with, was a philosopher who advocated Disassociation, Serenity, and Self-Awareness as the only way to ever escape being a slave to one’s immediate emotional experience. Joyce treats his characters as Schopenhauer puppets. He nearly comes out and says as much in his accompanying notes to the play. The characters are exiled from their own emotions just as much as they are exiled in more tangible ways: morally and nationally. Joyce, as always, is primarily interested in demonstrating a new way of thinking, at least more than he is interested in the silly business of toying with your emotions for an hour or two.
If nothing else, Exiles definitely serves as an excellent advertisement for Ibsen to English-speaking audiences. Reading Exiles gave me new enthusiasm to dive back into Ibsen, and maybe this time wrestle through the bad translations and all the distracting sentimentality to see if there are underlying philosophical bombshells and “grand effects.�
September 8, 2021
بعد از خوندن تعدادی از بهترین داستان کوتاهها� دنیا، بزرگترین اثر ادبیات مدرن و سختتری� رمان تاریخ از جویس، من برده� این نویسنده شدم. خوندن نمایشناما� که خیلی مورد توجه قرار نگرفته، بعد از بقیه آثارش، شاید چندان کار درستی نبود. اما خودم بسیار راضیم.
تصور من اینه که این بیتوجه� به Exiles به خاطر این هست که از نویسنده یولیسیس و فینیگانز ویک، یک اثر دیوانهوا� دیگه تصور میره. اما این نمایش چنین اثری نیست.
فرمی ساده و داستانی خطی شاید برای جویس کمی معمولی به نظر بیاد، اما محتوای Exiles بشدت خاص و پر جزئیات بود برای من. داستان روابط عاشقانه و زناشویی که در آثار قرن 18 و 19 به وفور دیده میشه، به شکلی نو توسط جویس به تصویر کشیده میشه.
بسیاری از ما ممکنه چنین روابطی رو نتونیم بپذیریم، شاید تصمیمات شخصیته� برای ما عجیب باشه و حتی اشتباه. اما جویس تونست از چندین زاویه به این مساله نگاه کنه و ما رو دعوت به تماشای چنین روابط انسانی کنه.
و مهمتر از اون، شک و تردیدی که نیمه دوم نمایش رو دربرمیگیر�...چنین حس تعلیقی برای همچین داستان ساده و معمولی واقعا غیرمنتظره بود. جویس برای من تعیین تکلیف نکرد. صرفا یک تجربه رو ارائه داد و منِ خواننده رو در این تردید رها کرد... و برای همین، از خوندن اثر واقعا لذت بردم.
درسته. این نمایش به شاهکاری یولیسیس نیست (اگه راستش رو بخواین، هیچ کتابی به شاهکاری اون نیست). اما باز اثری بسیار ارزشمنده از این نویسنده بزرگ ایرلندی
تصور من اینه که این بیتوجه� به Exiles به خاطر این هست که از نویسنده یولیسیس و فینیگانز ویک، یک اثر دیوانهوا� دیگه تصور میره. اما این نمایش چنین اثری نیست.
فرمی ساده و داستانی خطی شاید برای جویس کمی معمولی به نظر بیاد، اما محتوای Exiles بشدت خاص و پر جزئیات بود برای من. داستان روابط عاشقانه و زناشویی که در آثار قرن 18 و 19 به وفور دیده میشه، به شکلی نو توسط جویس به تصویر کشیده میشه.
بسیاری از ما ممکنه چنین روابطی رو نتونیم بپذیریم، شاید تصمیمات شخصیته� برای ما عجیب باشه و حتی اشتباه. اما جویس تونست از چندین زاویه به این مساله نگاه کنه و ما رو دعوت به تماشای چنین روابط انسانی کنه.
و مهمتر از اون، شک و تردیدی که نیمه دوم نمایش رو دربرمیگیر�...چنین حس تعلیقی برای همچین داستان ساده و معمولی واقعا غیرمنتظره بود. جویس برای من تعیین تکلیف نکرد. صرفا یک تجربه رو ارائه داد و منِ خواننده رو در این تردید رها کرد... و برای همین، از خوندن اثر واقعا لذت بردم.
درسته. این نمایش به شاهکاری یولیسیس نیست (اگه راستش رو بخواین، هیچ کتابی به شاهکاری اون نیست). اما باز اثری بسیار ارزشمنده از این نویسنده بزرگ ایرلندی
June 3, 2021
I'm reading Joyce for uni because my final essay has to be on a Joyce short story and I want to familiarise myself with his writing, and this was surprisingly interesting? I've never been particularly interested in reading plays but the dynamic between the characters was quite interesting. the thought of the men being so open with their relationships and their love was definitely not what I expected from a play published in 1915, but on the other hand I was not a fan of how the women were portrayed as being immediately vicious towards one another. idk it was alright but I dont think I'll read any other Joyce plays once I'm done with the essay
May 26, 2015
Picture a strong Ibsen influence, yet more autobiographical, more unique and with a happy end. It sure gets you thinking, after all it's more than a complex triangle. It's about the implications of love and commitment, of life and freedom. You manage to empathize with some of the characters even if you'd never would do this game of self damage.
April 20, 2015
Worst JJ book is better than everybody else's best!
edit-
On second thought this is good but pretty forgettable. Fun for JJ fans, tho!
October 3, 2018
a confused play supposedly based on Joyce's fear/expectation of what would happen if he returned to Ireland after his years living abroad. not worth your time
October 17, 2020
no one understands like joyce does
May 10, 2022
„it is only james joyce‘s towering genius as a novelist that has led to the comparative neglect of his […] sole surviving play� - j. c. c. mays
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