John Stanislaus Joyce

John Stanislaus JoyceJJ's father was an only child born into a reasonably wealthy family in Cork. He left university there without a degree and well provided for financially, enjoyed himself. Having moved to Dublin, in 1877 he invested in a distillery which soon went bankrupt but with income from his Cork properties and a sinecure in Dublin Corporation remained comfortably off. Despite his mother's opposition, he married May Murray, a gentle woman who bore him twelve children. The Joyces moved to the north side of Dublin c.1892 to live a nomadic and increasingly impoverished life after John lost his job and neglected his family. By 1912 they had all left and this gifted, spoiled, and selfish man, lived on his own until 1931. Tim O'Neill