“James Joyce in Zurich: A Guide represents an important step forward in addressing this gap in the biographical coverage. Fischer has combed through the existing biographies and several decades’ worth of scholarship and supplements his synthesis work with considerable original research in Zurich institutions to provide a timely and useful handbook to the Swiss Joyce … . The Guide will serve as an invaluable vade mecum for readers of the published volumes of Joyce’s correspondence … .” (Ronan Crowley, Archiv für das Studium der neueren Sprachen und Literaturen, Vol. 260 (1), 2023)
“Being a lover of books as physical artifacts, I will say this: the guide is physically pleasing to hold and behold. It is the height of a normal octavo … like a miniature coffee table book. Its smooth cover, which cradles nicely in the palm, displays Giedion-Welcker’s iconic picture of Platzspitz, with Joyce leaning against the railings as Zurich’s two rivers, the Limmat and Sihl, meet in the background. It is a book that belongs in your hands.” (Amanda Sigler, James Joyce Quarterly, Vol. 59 (3), 2022)
This book offers a comprehensive account of James Joyce and Zurich, one of the four cities (including Dublin, Trieste and Paris) in which he spent significant parts of his life. As a refugee during World War I, Joyce wrote a substantial part of Ulysses in Zurich and subsequently visited the city regularly during the 1930s. Finally, a refugee for the second time, he died there on 13 January 1941 and is buried in Fluntern Cemetery. This guide is conceived both as a book that may be read in its entirety or consulted selectively for specific information. An introduction and three chapters, Joyce in Zurich, Zurich in Joyce and Zurich after Joyce, are followed by sixty alphabetically ordered articles on people, places, institutions and events relevant to Joyce during his time in Zurich. Linked by cross-references and an index, they provide a rich, kaleidoscopic view of Joyce’s Zurich.
