Friends of Shakespeare and Company read Ulysses by James Joyce

About Friends of Shakespeare and Company read Ulysses by James Joyce

To celebrate a hundred years since Sylvia Beach published James Joyce’s Ulysses, and to encourage readers to engage (or re-engage) with this spirited, funny, life-changing book, Shakespeare and Company, Paris—in partnership with Penguin Classics and Hay Festival—created an ensemble recording of the unabridged text, released as a free podcast between the centenary of the publication on 2nd February 2022 and Bloomsday on June 16 2022. Read by more than a hundred writers, artists, comedians and musicians from all over the world— including Sally Rooney, Margaret Atwood, Stephen Fry, Pete Buttigieg, Kae Tempest, Ben Okri, Ali Smith, Eddie Izzard, Joanna Lumley and many, many more... (full cast list below)—Friends of Shakespeare and Company read Ulysses is a polyphonic and diverse celebration of this Modernist masterwork. Also featuring Bloomcast. A deep-dive into the text with Adam Biles, Alice McCrum and Lex Paulson, as well as other bonus episodes. Conceived and produced by Adam Biles, Literary Director at Shakespeare and Company, Paris Discover more about Shakespeare and Company here: https://shakespeareandcompany.com Buy the Penguin Classics official partner edition of Ulysses here: https://shakespeareandcompany.com/d/9780241552636/ulysses Find out more about Hay Festival here: https://www.hayfestival.com/home Featuring (in order): Will Self Jeanette Winterson Paul Murray Ishion Hutchinson Caoilinn Hughes Eddie Izzard Lola Peploe Nathan Englander Joe Dunthorne Kate Stables Jarred McGinnis Nicholson Baker Richard Barnett Amy Sackville Chigozie Obioma Erica Wagner Patrick Marber Claire-Louise Bennett Aleksandar Hemon Ryan Van Winkle Cressida Brown Holly Pester Adam Thirlwell Catherine Lacey Ciaran Farrell Lauren Elkin Andrew Hankinson Conor Horgan Andy Miller Preti Taneja Salena Godden Sinéad Gleeson Luke Kennard Sophie Gorman Nicole Flattery John Freeman Aysegul Savas Daniel Levin Becker John Butler John Mitchinson Sigrid Rausing Max Porter Eimear McBride Keith Ridgway Philip Hoare Deborah Landau Karthika Nair Cerys Matthews DBC Pierre Katharina Volckmer Mark O’Connell Marcel Theroux Sylvia Whitman & David Delannet Lenny Kaye Sarah Churchwell Olivia Laing Katie Kitamura Ali Smith Keri Walsh Lesley Blume Patrick Hastings Ben Okri Colm Toibin Chloe Aridjis Stephen Fry Douglas Stuart Pete Buttigieg Tara Mulholland Paul Muldoon S&Co Table Readers (Anne Bielec, Ben Brown, Amanda Dennis, Linda Fallon, Heather Heartley, Octavia Horgan, Conor Lee Bourke, Lex Paulson, Kate Poston, Francesca Reece) David Keenan Tom McCarthy David Szalay Jesse Ball Carter Bays James Gregor Will Burns Declan McCavana Greg Proops Jennifer Canada Sam Jordison Eloise Millar Hollie McNish Michael Pedersen Jonathan Safran Foer Sasha Foer Ethan Hawke Rob Doyle Roisin Kiberd Lucy Sante Caitlinn O Keefe Deborah Levy Meena Kandasamy Joanna Lumley Susan Philipz Sylvia Whitman Bonnie Greer Emilie Pine Margaret Atwood Kae Tempest Lou Doillon Sally Rooney Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy (https://acast.com/privacy) for more information.

Publisher

Shakespeare and Company

Category

arts · fiction · history

Language

en

Explicit

No

First episode

18 Jan 2022

Latest episode

15 Jun 2026

Latest episodes

1 of 124 episodes have a transcript.

1. 

   15 Jun 2026TRANSCRIPT

   BLOOMCAST: 🎬Ulysses Movie Watch-along Special🎬

   Adam Biles and Lex Paulson offer a live commentary on the Ulysses film adaptation, exploring its history and Joyce's enduring legacy in this interview.

2. 

   13 Jan 2025

   Bloomcast Holiday Special: Watt by Samuel Beckett, Episode 2

   Alice McCrum, Lex Paulson, and Adam Biles explore how Samuel Beckett's Watt challenges conventional narrative, language, and meaning in this spirited conversation with Claire-Louise Bennett and Foad Dizadji-Bahmani.

3. 

   6 Jan 2025

   Bloomcast Holiday Special: Watt by Samuel Beckett, Episode 1

   Happy Joycension Day! For this year’s Bloomcast Holiday Special, Alice, Lex, and Adam reunited for a lively discussion of Watt by Samuel Beckett, asking: How does Beckett’s minimalist, disintegrative style compare to James Joyce’s expansive, celebratory storytelling? What makes this novel so uniquely absurd and profound? And why does Watt feel both so playful and deeply unsettling? Is Watt a meticulously structured puzzle or an exercise in unraveling structure itself? What does Watt tell us about Beckett’s influence on modern literature? Setting this enigmatic work against the context of Beckett’s wartime experiences, they also explore how it challenges conventional ideas of narrative, language, and meaning. What is Watt’s lasting impact on readers and thinkers alike? As always, our Bloomcasters invite listeners into a spirited and thought-provoking conversation that bridges literary analysis, philosophical inquiry, and personal reflections…before topping of the conversation with a game so contrived it would make Blazes Boylan blush. * Alice McCrum is a Ph.D. student in the Department of History at Princeton University. Before starting her graduate work, Alice lived in Paris, where she taught at the Sorbonne, studied public policy at Sciences Po-Paris, and directed cultural programming at the American Library in Paris. Lex Paulson is Director of Executive Programs at the UM6P School of Collective Intelligence (Morocco) and lectures in advocacy and human rights at Sciences Po-Paris. Trained in classics and community organizing, he served as mobilization strategist for the campaigns of Barack Obama in 2008 and Emmanuel Macron in 2017. He served as legislative counsel in the 111th U.S. Congress (2009-2011), organized on six U.S. presidential campaigns, and has worked to advance democratic innovation at the European Commission and in India, Tunisia, Egypt, Uganda, Senegal, Czech Republic and Ukraine. He is author of Cicero and the People’s Will: Philosophy and Power at the End of the Roman Republic, from Cambridge University Press, and is co-editor of the Routledge Handbook of Collective Intelligence for Democracy and Governance. Adam Biles is an English writer and translator based in Paris. He is Literary Director at Shakespeare and Company. In 2022, he conceived and presented Friends of Shakespeare and Company read Ulysses—an epic, polyphonic celebration of James Joyce’s masterwork. Feeding Time, his first novel, was published by Galley Beggar Press in 2016. It was published by Editions Grasset in France in 2018 to great critical acclaim. His second novel, Beasts of England, was published in September 2023 by Galley Beggar Press, and will be published in 2025 by Editions Grasset. It was selected as a "2023 highlight" by The Guardian. A collection of his conversations with writers, The Shakespeare and Company Book of Interviews, was published by Canongate in October 2023 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy (https://acast.com/privacy) for more information.

Inside a recent episode

BLOOMCAST: 🎬Ulysses Movie Watch-along Special🎬

Published 15 Jun 2026 · Transcript excerpt

[…] The partners were persuaded. The next question was Joyce's share in the profits. Since he had no capital risk, he could scarcely expect an equal share. On the other hand, for initiating the scheme and for giving up his work in Trieste to open the cinema, he seemed entitled to 10% of the profits. LAUGHTER The ingredient, drawn up probably by Vidakovich, who was also a lawyer, was signed by all five partners, and Joyce was off. Now, Joyce was a very good salesman to sell the sales pitch about opening a movie theater, but apparently not as good a manager. So the movie theater opened to some reasonable success in its first month, the Volta Theater in Dublin, but closed nine months later for basically the absentee management that Joyce had given the place because he said he didn't want to move back to Dublin. […]

Who has been a guest on Friends of Shakespeare and Company read Ulysses by James Joyce

Names identified in recent episode analyses. Showing up to five guests.

• Adam Biles
• Lex Paulson
• Claire-Louise Bennett
• Foad Dizadji-Bahmani

Reach and audience

Public platform figures. Ratings count people who left a rating, not total listeners.

Apple Podcasts (US)

4.7 / 5

46 ratings

Spotify

4.8 / 5

33 ratings

Podcast Authority Score: 44 / 100

A composite of feed quality, social presence, YouTube performance and engagement. Read the methodology.

Quality

67

Social presence

0

YouTube

0

Engagement

51

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Guest appearances

Does not typically book guests

Based on episode analysis; this does not confirm that the show is currently accepting guests.

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