The Irish Literary Times

In 2000, the Irish novelist Edna O’Brien wrote a biography of the famed Irish writer James Joyce.

Had he ever allowed himself to be the equal of what was required by the excess of literary talent that had been bestowed on him? Had he lived up to his own austere demands, which he set out so dogmatically, despite the lightness of expression, in the preface to Dorian Gray and “The Decay of Lying”? Certainly the plays are great, in their way—Salomé in particular shows him for the subversive artist he could have been, had he had the nerve for it—but somehow they are not quite enough, not quite the fulfilment of his genius. He had, throughout his life, talked away too much of his talent; as one observer put it, “He wasted himself in words.”