Exiles: "Paradox Lust" and "Lost Paladays"

Abstract

Between the completion of his Portrait and the inception of Ulysses James Joyce undertook to create the only extant drama of his literary career, the enigmatic play entitled Exiles. No Greek maiden between two Norse gods, Exiles is more often thought to be a strange Norse maiden between Grecian gods, an Ibsenesque interlude between Joyce's Icarian-Daedalian and Odyssean transplantations; yet in innumerable ways it bears the indelible imprint of the Irish master and serves a vital function in any critical plotting of the Joycean graph. Oddly enough, the play's significance was most highly rated by Joyce's most important commentator, Joyce himself, who took pains to treat his lesser piece with particular care; like the parent of an unfortunate child he favored it with special attention, yearned for its stage production and worried over its translation into other languages. Richard Ellmann records the instances of Joyce's paternal concern: in 1915 Joyce hoped for an Abbey Theatre production of Exiles and a French version in Geneva, and asked WV. B. Yeats and William Archer for their aid, as well as commenting on a Russian translation; in 1916 he offered it to the Stage Society in London, sent a typescript to New York, hoped for an Italian production in Rome or Turin and a production in Zurich or Bern; in 1918 he had the play published in England and America; in 1919 he was sending out press notices to Harriet Weaver, writing to Carlo Linati about an Italian translation, and brooding over the failure of the Munich production; in 1920 he was attempting to get it performed in Paris; in 1925 he was expressing delight over the New York production's 41 performances; in 1926 he was urging London friends to see the Stage Society's version and forcing the play upon friends in Paris, asking, Is it as good as Hauptmann? '> 2