"The (im)possibility of realism in Chamber Music (1907)"

This paper deals with Chamber Music, the first work by Joyce to be published \u2013 Elkin Mathews, London, 1907. The core of the essay is developed around the idea that the stylistic structure of the thirty-six poems of this collection, together with setting motifs (thematically and expressively speaking) which will recur throughout Joyce\u2019s subsequent literary production, anticipates the \u201crealistic\u201d trends (objectivity, impersonality) then central within the Irish writer\u2019s prose. The point dealt with will be further elaborated through a series of direct references to the internal organisation of the poetic collection and to its textual dimension