This semi-autobiographical novel was first serialised in the magazine The Egoist from 1914 to 1915, and published first in book format in 1916 by B.W. Huebsch, New York. The first English edition was published by the Egoist Press in February 1917. It describes the formative years of the life of Stephen Dedalus, a fictional alter ego of Joyce and an allusion to the consummate craftsman of Greek mythology, Daedalus. Written in Joyce's characteristic free indirect speech style, A Portrait is a ma