Welcome to the Ulysses Obsenity Trial of 1921!
Most western readers are familiar with James Joyce's modernist classic novel Ulysses, which is included in many class syllabi and reading lists around the world. What is less known, however, is the story of the novel's initial publication as a serial within the grassroots literary magazine The Little Review, and the 1921 obsenity trial which resulted.
This archive attempts to showcase this trial, the individuals involved in both sides of the courtroom, and the now-classic novel which was then considered too lewd to be distributed. In the following pages you will find introductions to the novelist, magazine editors, attorneys, and vigilantes who were central players in the drama, a synopsis of the legal background and outcome of the trial itself, and digitized pages of Ulysses Episode XIII - the episode which caused the upheavel - from The Little Review itself.
This project was created as part of the requirements of SI 580 Understanding Records & Archives at the University of Michigan School of Information for the Fall 2020 semester.