With the title “International Joyce”, twenty-one posters were put up to tell stories about one of the world’s greatest writers of the 20th century, whose works include “Ulysses” (1922), “Dubliners” (1914), “A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man” (1916) and “Finnegans Wake” (1939). These books influenced other authors such as Salman Rushdie, Thomas Pynchon, Margaret Attwood and Mario Vargas Llosa.

The exhibition provided visitors with information and stories about Joyce’s family and school, his travels across Europe from Dublin to Trieste, Paris, Rome and Zurich.

Nguyen The Vinh, a Vietnamese scholar of Joyce, is the translator of Joyce’s “A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man”. 

“I was dazzled by the Irish author’s stories and I translated “A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man” with my own experiences as the novel illustrated the matters of family, friends, belief and internal struggles that we encounter in our real lives,” Vinh said.

He added that he has high expectations for cooperating with the Irish Embassy in Vietnam to establish groups of Joyce’s readers in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City.        

“All of Joyce’s work is deeply autobiographical and intensely human: all intimate human experiences, from sexual behaviour, religious beliefs or bodily functions are captured in his work,” said the Irish Ambassador to Vietnam, Maeve Collins.

She also expressed her hope that the exhibition will bring Joyce to a wider audience who will savour his understanding of the humour and tragedy of everyday life.