The Sameness of Difference: Joyce’s Kaleidoscopic Odyssey(s) throughout Europe

This collection of twenty-nine essays devoted to exploring the reception of James Joyce in different territories of Europe is compiled in two volumes accordingly subtitled “Germany, Northern and East Central Europe” and “France, Ireland and Mediterranean Europe.” Elinor Shaffer, the series editor, explains in the preface that the collection is the result of a larger research project published by Continuum Books which aims to study the reception of British authors in Europe inspired by the noble—yet questionable—idea of “considering the history and culture of Europe as a whole, rather than as isolated national histories with a narrow national perspective” (viii). As we move on into the twenty-first century and the European constitution is rejected by the citizens of the founding members of the European Union, its geographic frontiers disputed and its cultural identity contested, the idea of a homogeneous Europe presents itself as highly problematic. Since it could not be otherwise, therefore, the essays contained in the study demonstrate that the reception of Joyce in the diverse cultures of Europe and his subsequent influence on the various literary scenes followed strikingly divergent paths. In this respect—and even if each individual chapter is created following different conceptions of structure and style—the work stands as a gripping analysis of the kaleidoscopic responses to Joyce throughout Europe’s communities across numerous historical and political periods. Although Shaffer claims that each volume “necessarily” adopts a different selection of regions depending on the given author (x), one is tempted to think that, in the case of this particular study on Joyce, there may have been other reasons to devote an individual chapter, for example, to Joyce in Catalonia, whereas references to other linguistic communities of the Iberian Peninsula, where Joyce has traditionally been regarded as a literary role model, are simply incorporated within the two general chapters on Joyce in Spain. Equally disappointing