I was a sophomore in college when I read A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man all the way to the last line for the first time. I was about the same age as Joyce’s hero Stephen Dedalus, though not nearly so well educated. I had working-class New Jersey to thank for that.…
Alan Cheuse's latest novel,
Song of Slaves in the Desert, came out last spring. It will appear in paperback in July 2012.