Feared by Joyceans and publishers alike, Stephen James Joyce has been notoriously protective of his grandfather’s work, refusing permission for new versions or threatening legal action against unauthorised extracts.

But in a move that has surprised the literary world, the man entrusted with this franchise has agreed to allow a small publishing house to bring out a bargain version of Ulysses next year.

The copyright is due to expire in 2012, which may have been a deciding factor. The estate earns hundreds of thousands of euros a year in royalties from James Joyce’s works. However, the copyright ends 70 years after the author’s death, meaning they pass into the public domain.

After the deal goes through, the market will be flooded with his approved book, leaving little incentive for other publishers to bring out other versions — none of which will pay royalties — in two years’ time.

Published in 1922, Ulysses tells the story of a day in the life of Leopold Bloom, an advertising salesman, his wife, and Stephen Dedalus, their surrogate son. Considered one of the most important books of the 20th century, it was banned in Britain and America because it was deemed to be obscene.

Wordsworth Editions, a British company with only three full-time staff, signed a deal last Monday with the Joyce estate to publish a paperback version in its bargain classic series next January.

Joyce, who will receive an undisclosed one-off fee instead of a royalty, is allowing the independent publisher to bring out a £1.99 (€2.33) version of the 1932 edition worldwide. The book will retail at €2.99 in Ireland. Currently paperback versions sell for between €10 and €14.

The deal was hatched when the widow of the company’s owner wrote to Joyce saying it would be her dream to publish the book before it enters the public domain in January 2012.

The agreement will allow Wordsworth to capture the bargain market a full two years before it opens to big publishing houses like Penguin, which currently sells a paperback version for £9.99 and hardback for £12.99. Wordsworth believes it will sell 100,000 copies.

Helen Trayler, managing director of Wordsworth Editions, said: “It is a huge personal achievement for me purely because the estate and Stephen are very hot on copyright. I’ve always wanted to do Ulysses. I’d been monitoring how long we had left to go, how long we would need to get it typeset and everything else so I could hit Dublin with it in January 2012, knowing full well that if I did it a day beforehand then somebody would come down on me like a tonne of bricks.”

Now 77, Stephen Joyce has controlled the Joyce estate since the mid-1980s, meaning scholars must ask permission to quote large passages of Joyce’s work or to reproduce his manuscript pages from those works of Joyce’s that remain under copyright. In most cases he has refused. It has been years since a new version of the book was published.

Robert Joyce, James’s grand-nephew, said: “In general, what seems to have happened in the past is that there is a challenge from the Joyce estate to anything. There was a situation where students wanted to re-enact parts of the book and it was challenged. People back down if there’s a challenge.”

Trayler was aware Joyce was protective but took a chance. “I had read up about Stephen and was sure he wasn’t going to allow me to do this but I thought: ‘What’s the harm in asking?’,” she said.

“I wrote a nice letter to the estate. One day I answered the phone and it was Stephen ringing from France. He asked me why did I want to do it. I explained that the joint owner of Wordsworth, which was my husband, had died four years ago from leukaemia and said it would be a real achievement for me because if I get something like this, people will think we’re not going out of business. He liked all my reasons and said: ‘I’ll help you achieve that and also to prove that I’m not actually as unreasonable as people think I am.’ I found him absolutely charming, very witty and very cooperative.”

There are already pre-orders from as far afield as America and India. “Part of our agreement is I do not change a word (from the 1932 edition). Mine will be printed as James Joyce wrote it, without any corrections, which I’m very happy to do. I’ve agreed a one-off payment, which I’m not allowed to disclose, for doing it. It will take us several print-runs to offset the agreed fee, but after that we should be able to make our regular mark-up on it.”

Gary Reilly of Roberts Wholesale Books, Ireland’s largest bargain wholesalers, said: “It’s in Stephen’s interest as well to do the deal. It’s his last chance to make some money. Wordsworth have pulled off a huge coup by getting it in advance and being able to do it at €2.99.”

Reilly has pre-ordered 10,000 copies, twice as many as for other classics. “I’d say I would safely sell another 10,000 next year on repeat orders. There’s an old saying that people spend 20 quid on a copy of Ulysses, never to read it. So €2.99 for a book you’re never going to read is going to be great. It’s on everyone’s list of must-read books before they die.”

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