Stephen Joyce

Dear Curious Readers,

You must be thinking Who or what is Stephen Joyce? Stephen Joyce is the grandson and heir to the literary estate of great Irish writer James Joyce (pictured right in 1904—photo courtesy of SUNY Buffalo). At the end of Chapter 1 in FOR THE LOVE OF LETTERS there is a story concerning these two. It is a fun fact that James Joyce wrote several sordid (I mean nasty) erotic letters to the love of his life, Nora. Although some of their sexual preferences are not my forte I still admire the passion present in these letters—James and Nora had been together for 5 years and had two children in December 1909 when these were written. And I thought what better way to close the erotic letter section of my book than with a letter written by the man considered by some to be the greatest writer of the 20th century.

Since James Joyce’s unpublished works are not in the public domain yet (they will be in 2012), I had to ask Stephen for copyright permission. After a few minutes of Google research, I got the feeling that I would spend an afternoon ice-skating in Hell before I was granted the rights to reprint any of these letters. Stephen does not make life easy for those who wish to reprint James Joyce’s work and does not allow letters to Nora to be reprinted at all. Now, I can understand it’s not easy to read erotica written from your grandfather to your grandmother, but these letters have been in print for the past 30 years (they can be found in THE SELECTED LETTERS OF JAMES JOYCE] and they’ll be copyright free 5 years from now. I believe Stephen needs to make his peace with their existence.

Despite my doubts, I had to give it a try. I wrote Stephen and asked if I could reprint one of the erotic letters in my book [read my request letter]. The answer was a resounding no (!), which I thought you might enjoy reading (below). Let me say that I do appreciate him getting back to me (with a handwritten letter nonetheless). Please note, I did not leave this letter out of the book to be annoying but rather to avoid a lawsuit (one of Mr. Joyce’s favorite pastimes). Once upon a time the erotic letters were posted in their entirety at www.arlindo-correia.com/joyce.html, but they are no longer there. I can’t help but wonder if young Stephen had anything to do with that. Now in order satisfy your curiosity, you’ll have to track down a copy of THE SELECTED LETTERS OF JAMES JOYCE. The erotic letters are written from December 2, 1909 - December 9, 1909. Enjoy!