Brain Snacks: Tasty Tidbits of Knowledge
Portrait of the Artist was adapted from a hefty early work, originally titled Stephen Hero, that Joyce wrote, tried to publish, and eventually abandoned. It was eventually published in 1944, a few years after Joyce’s death. (Source)
Though the book was received well by critics on the whole, some of the first responses to it reveal a time with very different standards than our own. Looking back, some of these comments are actually pretty funny: our favorite comment was probably the Manchester Guardian’s tut-tutting at the novel’s "astounding bad manners." (Source)
The title has inspired many knock-offs, including but not limited to Welsh writer Dylan Thomas’s Portrait of the Artist as a Young Dog, Catch-22 novelist Joseph Heller’s Portrait of the Artist as an Old Man, and an episode of the animated series King of the Hill, "Portrait of the Artist as a Young Clown," in which Bobby attends clown college. (Source)
Interestingly, Joyce’s grandson (and only living heir to the Joyce estate) is named Stephen James Joyce. (Source)