An observation on James Joyce's 'Ulysses' [UPDATED]

 

Aaron Gwyn (X.com photo)

I recently discovered writer and professor Aaron Gwyn on X.com, he has lots of opinions on books we've talked about here. Here he is on Joyce's Ulysses: "James Joyce’s ULYSSES isn’t an 'acquired taste.' It’s a novel that introduced a new way of tasting, seeing, smelling, and hearing to the World. That sensory revolution has affected almost every piece of media since 1922: it’s even affected mediators who are clueless to this fact."

Here is Gwyn's list of his ten favorite novelists:

1. William Faulkner (He says start with As I Lay Dying.)

2. Cormac McCarthy 

3. James Joyce

4. Vladimir Nabokov

5. Denis Johnson

6. Marilynne Robinson

7. Herman Melville

8. John Williams

9. Thomas Bernhard

10. Philip Roth

His ten favorite novels (link):

1. BLOOD MERIDIAN, McCarthy

2. ABSALOM, ABSALOM!, Faulkner

3. MOBY-DICK, Melville

4. ULYSSES, Joyce

5. LOLITA, Nabokov

6. THE SON, Philipp Meyer

7. MOLLOY, Beckett

8. GILEAD, Marilynne Robinson

9. TREE OF SMOKE, Denis Johnson

10. STONER, John Williams

Finnegans Wake thread. 

UPDATE: Advice for first time readers of Finnegans Wake.