To commemorate the 100th anniversary of the publication of James Joyce's first novel, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, University College Dublin has brought together literary academics, computer scientists, and actors to create a digital multimedia edition of the novel.

Included on the website is a map of all the locations that Stephen Dedalus, protagonist of the novel, travels around Dublin.

"It is on Google Maps so if you want to travel around all the locations it will show you where Stephen lived, walked around or was educated and how it is in parallel to Joyce's own journey," said Gerardine Meaney, a professor of cultural theory at University College Dublin in a press statement.

"You can see from the interactive map that Stephen's Dublin and Joyce's Dublin are very close to each other. It was a struggle finding the old haunts of Dedalus. We even found the location of cottages mentioned in the novel near the river Tolka which are now under water."

Also included on the website is a free audiobook of the novel, recorded by father and son acting duo Barry and Sam McGovern and a free eBook with critical commentary. (You may recognize Barry McGovern from A Game of Thrones). The younger McGovern voices Stephen as a young man, while the elder McGovern voices Stephen when he is older.

The influential novel was first published in 1916 in New York by BW Huebsch.

Over the holiday week, I took a trip to Corning, New York, home of the Corning Museum of Glass. My primary intention was to see the collection of antique microscopes on exhibit (and featured in our fall 2016 issue). Revealing the Invisible: The History of Glass and the Microscope, on display in the museum's Rakow Research Library, looks at the scientists and artists who developed and refined microscopy between the 1600s and the late 1800s. It is a neat exhibition that spotlights the ingenuity of these pioneers, and it remains up through March 19.

It was another exhibition, however, that really surprised me. Fragile Legacy: The Marine Invertebrate Glass Models of Leopold and Rudolf Blaschka, unfortunately soon to close, explores the artistry and business of the German father and son who crafted astonishing glass models of sea creatures in the mid-to-late nineteenth century. From their initial drawings, based on illustrated books or preserved specimens, to their glass creations, to the printed catalogue used to sell their models to universities and museums, the exhibition peeks into a wondrous world. The examples on exhibit belong to Cornell University, which ordered 570 models in 1885.

If you can't make it to Corning this week--the exhibition closes on January 8--marine filmmaker David Brown made a thirty-minute, award-winnning documentary about the Cornell Blaschka collection and how the models might now provide perspective on biodiversity and climate change.

                                                                                                                                                                                      Images: (Above) Blaschka Nr. 573, Octopus salutii (1885). Photo credit: C. Barry; (Below) Catalogue of Glass Models of Invertebrate Animals (Rochester, New York, 1878). This catalogue featured 630 Blaschka models, with prices ranging from twenty cents to seven dollars. Photo credit: C. Barry.