My ideal audience for this adaptation are people who always wanted to read Ulysses but felt daunted. They may be surprised to find that it remains a book about themselves and people they know. Audiences won’t leave knowing everything about Ulysses, no more than I’ll ever comprehend the fullness of Joyce’s vision, no matter how often I read his novel. But I hope they are sufficient engaged by its human dramas – Bloom’s subtle triumphs; Molly’s all too human contradictions and Stephen’s isolation – to once again begin to read this superb chronicle of our capital city: one of the greatest and truest novels of all time, whose author I salute and in front of whom I stand in awe.

Dermot Bolger