Ulysses (1922) by James Joyce is a landmark of modernist literature. Set in Dublin on June 16, 1904, the novel chronicles a single ordinary day in the lives of three characters: Leopold Bloom, a Jewish advertising canvasser; his wife Molly; and the young artist Stephen Dedalus. Loosely paralleling Homer's Odyssey, it maps the epic journey of ancient Greece onto the mundane details of urban life. Joyce pioneered the stream-of-consciousness technique, with each chapter experimenting with radically different prose styles. Though initially banned for obscenity, Ulysses is now widely regarded as one of the greatest and most influential novels ever written.
