Sir, - Your correspondent Louise East reports that Joyce's Ulysses (1922) contained the first reference to the telephone in literature (Weekend, June 6th). Yet almost 40 years earlier Mark Twain was writing in Life on the Mississippi (1883) that "The telephone is everywhere". In Conan Doyle's The Sign of Four (1893) a policeman responds to Sherlock Holmes' request for a fast policeboat "That is easily managed. There is always one about there, but I can step across the road and telephone to make sure". In 1903, Joyce's compatriot Shaw spoke in Man and Superman of the modern Prime Minister instructing his stockbroker through the telephone. I dare say earlier and better literary references to the telephone can be found, but what is certain is that Joyce was far from the earliest author to refer to this technology. - Yours, etc., Kevin O'Sullivan,
Letterkenny, Co. Donegal.