Völlig zu Recht nennt Kevin Birmingham seine literaturgeschichtliche Studie The Most Dangerous Book: The Battle for James Joyce’s “Ulysses”. Darin geht er der peinlichen Publikationsgeschichte dieses großen Romans nach. Wie sehr ich das Buch schätze, kann man in meiner Ulysses-Notiz nachlesen. Eine kenntnisreiche Rezension der Neuerscheinung liefert The Economist:

Mr Birmingham’s descriptions of the fight between these moral crusaders and the people defending Joyce’s work are thrilling. Joyce came under pressure to finish the book, in part because of the looming threat of legal action against it. With the eye of a novelist Mr Birmingham enlivens his story with details about these forgotten characters: how the judge who ultimately overturned the ban in America wore a tie when playing tennis and how the British lawyer who declared that the novel was “filthy, and filthy books are not allowed to be imported into this country” disliked cars, even as late as the 1950s.