Summary

In Chapter 7, Sylvia was dismayed when Ezra Pound told her that Ulysses was facing censorship in the United States. She had seen James Joyce early and could not understand why he had withheld this crushing news. Later that day, when he visited Shakespeare and Company, she expressed her desire to help him, but he said that she had already done enough “by providing [his] favorite diversion in Paris” (86). Later on, she and Adrienne visited the salon of Gertrude Stein. The acclaimed author confided her concern that Sylvia had started a friendship with Joyce and decried his novel Ulysses.

The censorship, and banning, of Ulysses continued to dictate the conversations in Sylvia’s social scene in Chapter 8. As the legal battle against Joyce’s book continued to intensify, Sylvia felt compelled to help the wayward artist. She knew that the book could have...