Author Description

This extensive volume is an artistic testimony by the German painter Werner Schmidt (born 1953, lives in Oberkirch) of his life-changing fascination with Joyce's 1920 masterwork. With expert contributions from 22 Joyce enthusiasts on the theme of color and more, this polyphonic homage belongs into the shelf of Ulysses studies as well as into the art library. The first part documents Schmidt's analysis of Joyce's "coloration of language" with chromatic diagrams and coded strips of color, which he paints directly on the walls when exhibiting the project. Following are the artist's series of tonally inspired photographs from Dublin, the location of the novel, as well as his reflections on literary, linguistic, political and religious aspects of a book that has captivated him for over 40 years. The 5 chapters comprising the volume's second part (the structure evokes the works of Thomas Aquinas und Joyce) feature essays by the numerous scholars Schmidt invited to participate in his project about the "modern book of books." It is a novel, he says, that "in fact describes all of us, as universal humans, holding up the mirror and being aware of our limited abilities to think and act."