Author(s): James Joyce

Poetry & Plays

2012 Reprint of 1927 Edition. Pomes Penyeach is a collection of thirteen short poems written by James Joyce. It was written over a twenty-year period from 1904 to 1924 and originally published on 7 July 1927 by Shakespeare and Co. for the price of one shilling (twelve pennies) or twelve francs. The title is a play on "poems" and "pommes" (the French word for apples) which are here offered at "a penny each" in either currency. It was the custom for Irish tradesxpeople of the time to offer their customers a "tilly" (in Irish, tuilleadh) or extra serving - just as English bakers had developed the tradition of the "Baker's dozen", offering thirteen loaves instead of twelve. The first poem of Pomes Penyeach is entitled "Tilly" and represents the bonus offering of this penny-a-poem collection. (The poem was originally entitled "Cabra", after the district of Dublin where Joyce was living at the time of his mother's death.) The poems were initially rejected for publication by Ezra Pound. Although paid scant attention on its initial publication, this slender volume (the collection contains fewer than 1000 words in total) has proven surprisingly durable, and a number of its poems (particularly "Tilly", "A flower given to my daughter", "On the beach at Fontana", and "Bahnhofstrasse") continue to appear in anthologies to this day.