James Joyce and the Modern Scots

The essay examines the literary networks and historical contexts surrounding the reception of James Joyce’s work in Scotland. In October 1931, the preeminent Scottish journal The Modern Scot (1930–36), “The Organ of the Scottish Renaissance,” as its subtitle proclaimed, published a crucial assessment of Joyce’s oeuvre that placed his work within the contexts of Scottish cultural nationalism. Joyce’s Scottish reception is important because of the consistencies and exchanges between Scottish and Irish independence movements, their cultural politics, and their vexed relationship towards England’s central role in the British Empire.