The James Joyce Tower 15 postcard set inspired by Ulysses: Episode One - Telemachus by Photographer Joe Sterling

A series of 15 black and white photographs by photographer Joe Sterling, depicting scenes from the famous Sandycove tower. In 1904, at the age of 22, James Joyce stayed in the tower with two friends of his, Oliver St John Gogarty, a medical student and aspiring poet, and Samuel Chenevix Trench. On Joyce’s sixth night, Trench woke up suddenly after dreaming of a black panther, and proceeded to get his revolver and shoot at the animal. Gogarty took the gun off him and let off a few rounds himself. A petrified Joyce left the Tower, never to return. A month later, he left Ireland for good to embark on a literary career on continental Europe. 

The tower is the setting for the opening episode of Joyce's best-known work, "Ulysses" (1922), in which he also references the black panther incident. Each of the 15 black and white photographs in this edition by Joe Sterling are accompanied by a quote from this first episode of Ulysses, 'Telemachus', and they are intended to be viewed chronologically in accompaniment with the text.

15118 mm155 mm4 mm