Stephen Hero

novel by Joyce

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July 20, 2026

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Stephen Hero is an early, unfinished novel by James Joyce. It was a precursor to his autobiographical novel, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, which was published in 1916. Stephen Hero was written in a more traditional narrative style, unlike Joyce's later experimental works that utilized stream of consciousness. The novel follows the early life of Stephen Dedalus, a character who also appears in Joyce's later masterpiece, Ulysses. The manuscript of Stephen Hero was lost for many years before being rediscovered and published.12

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James Joyce
Early life
…writing a lengthy naturalistic novel, Stephen Hero, based on the events of his own life, when in 1904 George William Russell offered £1 each for some simple short stories with an Irish background to appear in a farmers’ magazine, The Irish Homestead. In response Joyce began writing the stories published…
Read More
…writing a lengthy naturalistic novel, Stephen Hero, based on the events of his own life, when in 1904 George William Russell offered £1 each for some simple short stories with an Irish background to appear in a farmers’ magazine, The Irish Homestead. In response Joyce began writing the stories published…
Read More