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Rating: 
Summary: Joyce rued this collaboration.
Review: According to Richard Ellman's Joyce biography Joyce felt that the book by Gilbert was an "advertisement for Ulysses," and he rued the collaboration. Perhaps this shows how clear the book renders Ulysses, but it also shows that Ulysses is better read without consulting second texts so that it echoes in the unconscious as oppossed to being deciphered and merely understood.
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Summary: Joseph Campbell says the best reference for Ulysses
Review: During my initial reading happened to bump into this book in the university library; subsequently learned that Joseph Campbell considered it THE best reference for ULYSSES. My readings of exegetical references for ULYSSES since confirms his opinion.Gilbert apparently was a close friend of Joyce, and was a mouthpiece for him in explaining the many dimensions and symbolic layers of the text. A definite must-have reference for reading ULYSSES. Personally, have enjoyed it very much. Would also recommend Hugh Kenner's later commentaries.
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Summary: Essential reading
Review: Gilbert has written a classic analysis of Ulysses . This book provides both the initiate and the fanatic with a broad basis for comprehension of Joyce. It include historical documentation of the settlement of Ireland, connections of Troy and Ireland, an interesting view of Viking/ Greek parallels, aspects of occult knowledge. Failure to read this and you will not get 1/3 of the intricacy of Joyces works.
Rating:
Summary: Essential reading
Review: Gilbert has written a classic analysis of Ulysses . This book provides both the initiate and the fanatic with a broad basis for comprehension of Joyce. It include historical documentation of the settlement of Ireland, connections of Troy and Ireland, an interesting view of Viking/ Greek parallels, aspects of occult knowledge. Failure to read this and you will not get 1/3 of the intricacy of Joyces works.
Rating:
Summary: A way in to Ulysses
Review: Gilbert provides insight into Ulysses which it is extremely doubt the reader can get alone. He provides the overall plan of the work, the diagram of each sentence and how it coordinates with all the categories which Joyce combined in constructing his encyclopediac work. Stuart was at one point close to Joyce and has much of his information from the master himself. I do not know if there is a better guide, but this as the first is a very good one. It helped me understand at least the outline of the work and its basic structure.
Rating: 
Summary: An excellent companion piece
Review: I am still digesting "Ulysses." I read it while walking around Dublin a few years ago. It was marvelous to trace the steps of Leopold and Molly, and to see what they "saw," but the novel remains a distant pleasure to the reader. I must admit it is not the most accessible book ever written, but it gets four stars for its intent ... and that it is better than "Finnegan's Wake." Be warned: This novel is not for the casual reader. This is one of several excellent accompaniments to "Ulysses" and well worth the price and the time to compare against Joyce.
Rating:
Summary: You should probably read this.
Review: I suppose it is pretty hard to add anything to this monstrous string of reviews. But I will comment because (obviously like so many others) I found this book to be very important. The fact that so many reviews exist shows that this book has effected a lot of people (enough to expend their precious energies writing about it). As you can see, not many really ride the middle ground about it. People seem to love it passionately or they hate it passionately. This should be enough to recommend it to anyone. We all should be after books that are going to change us, challenge us, effect our lives and loves. This is a book that has done that for a great many people. If you have not read it, take the time. I do not think that you'll sit in your easy chair and say 'well, it was okay,' and flip on the television.
Personally, I found the book to be lively and entertaining. It was also challenging and arduous. Sometimes I couldn't put it down and sometimes I couldn't pick it up. Sometimes I thought it was a stupid book and sometimes I thought it was the best work of fiction that I had read. Ulysses is overall 'real.' It discusses truth, it changes a lot, like life. All the characters can be seen as stable in their lives, yet metaphysically sort of lost and wandering. That is like Ulysses. It is also a lot like you and I. There are jarring events, changes of style, unexpected devices and layers and layers of erudition. There are also normal everyday joes going about life as usual, to which we can all relate. It was not easy, and that is like life, also. Like life, it has a lot to teach you. And you can come back to this book many times and still find it fresh. It probably will seem an entirely new beast when you return.
Unlike some of the reviewers, I wouldn't recommend annotations. Trust yourself and trust Joyce in undertaking the work. Perhaps you'll miss things here or there. That is okay. You'll still 'get it,' in the end, if you make it. Part of it is seeing if you can make it, so you sort of fail in your test of yourself if you immediately resort to consulting some sort of 'dictionary of Joyce.' For anyone that sees this book as too daunting, let me just say that I'm not an English major or in a literature related field. I'm a music student, just a plain old undergraduate joe that read this book. I read the book without annotations except for one period where I was stuck and thought I didn't understand. I checked the annotations out from the library and I found that I did understand (at least as well as the annotator) and that I just needed to keep going to figure it out, just like in finding out how a Dickens plot is going to unfold. I would recommend against taking that step. Leave the annotations on the shelf. I'd recommend that you, another plain old non - literature joe or jane, try it. Trust yourself and try it.
Rating:
Summary: A must-have
Review: James Joyce has more books written about him and his works than possibly anyone else in the english language - barring Shakespeare. There are countless guides through the labyrinth that is Ulysses, and all do their job well, some better than others. This one, by Stuart Gilbert, was the first and is still the best. Originally written in the thirties, it remains the definitive guide to Joyce's masterpiece of modernism. Gilbert was a close friend of Joyce's, and it was written under the scrutiny and supervision of Joyce himself, making this the closest thing to a guide written by the author himself (which would probably be unintelligible in itself!). This small, helpful book guided me through one of the most difficult but most rewarding reading experiences of my life - and saw me through safely to the other side, and I would highly recommend it to anyone who is taking the plunge for the first time.
Rating:
Summary: A must-have
Review: James Joyce has more books written about him and his works than possibly anyone else in the english language - barring Shakespeare. There are countless guides through the labyrinth that is Ulysses, and all do their job well, some better than others. This one, by Stuart Gilbert, was the first and is still the best. Originally written in the thirties, it remains the definitive guide to Joyce's masterpiece of modernism. Gilbert was a close friend of Joyce's, and it was written under the scrutiny and supervision of Joyce himself, making this the closest thing to a guide written by the author himself (which would probably be unintelligible in itself!). This small, helpful book guided me through one of the most difficult but most rewarding reading experiences of my life - and saw me through safely to the other side, and I would highly recommend it to anyone who is taking the plunge for the first time.
Rating:
Summary: Great way to start!
Review: The Introduction is masterful. Of books on "Ulysses"--and there are many, let's face it--this one stays close to my heart. A great one to begin your trek through the Dublin of 16 June 1904.
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