Today is June 16, which, I’m sure you know, is the day that James Joyce’s Ulysses occurs (June 16, 1904). Despite its length, Ulysses adheres to the advice I frequently received from writing instructors: “Get to the party late and leave early.” This was a way of saying tell the story in the least amount of time you possibly can. Joyce takes Leopold Bloom and lays out his entire world in a single day.
What other books take place in a single day? Off the top of my head, I came up with two: Seize the Day, by Saul Bellow and Mrs. Dalloway, by Virginia Woolf. I’m a big fan of Seize the Day, which has to be one of the most desperate, heartbreaking books ever written. If you haven’t read it, take an afternoon or two this summer and dive in. It’s a tremendous achievement.
If this Wikipedia page is to be trusted, I’ve read several more books that happen in 24 hours, including Cosmopolis by Don DeLillo (which I’d blocked out of my mind) and One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich (duh). I was surprised to see both The DaVinci Code and Angels & Demons on the list. I saw the DaVinci Code movie, and it seemed like it was taking forever, but now that I think about it, it was only one day (excluding the epilogue, which I never saw, because I turned the channel to watch, I don’t know, “Keeping Up with the Kardashians” or something).
What about you? Do you have a favorite book that takes place in a single day?
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