Anniversary Joyce: Introduction

This introduction to the special issue on "Anniversary Joyce" is concerned with memory and commemoration in Joyce. The issue includes a selection of essays that were originally presented at the Twenty-Fiftth International James Joyce Symposium in London. With its focus on commemoration and recollection, the issue adds a new voice to the discussion of Joyce and cultural memory. As Joyce's writings amply demonstrate, Ireland has a rich and interesting legacy in cultural commemorations of significant historical events, beginning with the centenary celebrations of 1898 through the 2016 commemoration of the Easter Rising. Joyce's own legacy has become part of this long history of commemoration too in the form of annual Bloomsday celebrations worldwide and his central place in Ireland's literary heritage. It is opportune, therefore, to look more closely at a culture of commemoration and legacy within the critical sphere of cultural memory and psychogeography, as it pertains to Joyce's life and works, and their reception. This introduction traces some of the new connections, synchronicities, and iconographies in relation to Joyce's concern with anniversaries and commemorations; the legacies and heritage of his life and writings; and the psychohistorical and psychogeographical explorations of his work that are treated in this special issue.