Making the case that legal issues are central to James Joyce's life and work, international experts in law and literature offer new insights into Joyce's most important texts. They analyze Dubliners, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, Giacomo Joyce, Ulysses, and Finnegans Wake in light of the legal contexts of Joyce's day.

Topics include marriage laws, the Aliens Act of 1905, laws governing display and use of language, minority rights debates, municipal self-government, and regulations on alcohol consumption and licensing. This volume also highlights Joyce's own fascination with law and legal inquiry, his use of a trademark visual and linguistic style, the obscenity cases brought against Ulysses, and how copyright has affected publication of Joyce's work. These discussions show how reading Joyce alongside the law enriches both legal studies and literary scholarship.