Joyce, you randy devil

A bawdy three-page letter written in 1909 by literary icon, James Joyce, to his main squeeze, Nora Barnacle, just fetched a whopping £240,800 ($590,000 Canadian) at auction. If I'd known writing dirty paid so much money, I would have taken a course or something. Joyce's "Araby" is one of my all-time favourite short stories, but I've still got his daunting Ulysses (considered by many to be the best novel of the 20th century) on my "to read" list.

• Read the Sotheby's press release about the Joyce letter, which Sotheby's describes as "the missing link from the most famous erotic correspondence in modern literature."
• BBC News: "Joyce letter smashes sales record"
• Official "Bloomsday" centenary website (commemorating the 100th anniversary of the day of action in James Joyce's Ulysses: June 16, 1904).