1882-1941. Born in Dublin, Ireland, into a family of ten children, Joyce showed singular intelligence and a gift for writing from an early age. After leaving University College Dublin with a degree in modern languages, Joyce emigrated to Europe, living in Italy, Zurich and Paris. A string of short stories, including Dubliners, were followed by his first novel, Portrait of an Artist in 1916, and then the controversial but very successful Ulysses in 1922, a work in which he perfected his stream-of-consciousness style and made his name as a great literary figure. Joyce died in Zurich in 1941, two years after the publication of Finnegans Wake, his long-awaited follow up novel which earned him further honours.