A draft chapter from James Joyce's masterpiece Ulysseswas sold at auction in London today for stg£861,250 (IR£1.1m). There had been speculation that the manuscript could fetch as much as IR£1.5 million.
The manuscript of the Eumaeus chapter was bought by an anonymous private collector telephoning into the auction at Sothebys.
"The fact that this previously unknown draft has come to light could revolutionise our understanding of Joyce's compositional processes," Sotheby's literature specialist Mr Peter Selley said.
The manuscript is being sold by a private collector who acquired it several years ago from Mr Henri-Etienne Hoppenot (1891-1977), a distinguished diplomat, poet and writer who was the French ambassador in Berne from 1945 to 1952.
Ulysses, published on Joyce's birthday on February 2nd, 1922, took seven years to write.
It recounts the adventures of a fictional Everyman, Leopold Bloom, over 24 hours in Dublin in June 1904, using diverse styles and fantastic representations and is widely-regarded as the finest work of fiction of the 20th century.