As you may know, Dublin is a city of writers. Perhaps the most famous of these is James Joyce, author of Ulysses and lots of other confusing things. As it happens, June 16th (today!) is Bloomsday, the day on which Joyce set Ulysses. In case you are not aware, the entire action of the novel takes place on a single day. And Dublin takes this day seriously – almost as seriously as it takes Pride Week (next week). There is a whole series of events and lectures, even.
So we’ve been doing our homework! We’re pleased to report that we are, collectively, one and five-thirds of the way through Ulysses (one of us read it once and we’re both more than halfway through this go-round). We’ll leave the interpretation of Ulysses – sometimes called the ‘book about everything‘ – to the experts; we’re having fun finding classical and other references throughout, and are enjoying the multiple changes in register. And we’ve been getting into the spirit in Dublin by going to the James Joyce Centre, by visiting various locales mentioned in the books, and by attending several plays and museum exhibits focused on various aspects of Joyce’s life and work. Strolling through Ulysses, a one-act play by Robert Gogan, has been the highlight, by far.
There is a lot we didn’t know about James Joyce, like that he wrote only about Dublin, despite spending nearly all of his adult life in Europe. And that he was in medical school for a while. And that Ulysses takes place all across Dublin, including neighbourhoods where Joyce grew up but also wandering far afield. We did know that Joyce struggled to get Dubliners and also Ulysses published – both were seen as sacrilegious and pornographic/obscene. (Word to the wise: you might have ask a literary friend which are the dirty bits, as they are by no means obvious.)
Bloomsday itself began shortly after the publication of the novel in 1922. It’s first attested in 1924, though it’s not clear what that celebration included. On 16 June 1954, i.e., fifty years after the day on which the action of the book takes place, a group of Irish literary figures including John Ryan, Flann O’Brien, and Patrick Kavanaugh decided to retrace Leopold Bloom’s steps in the novel. (They failed, because – in true Irish fashion – they stopped too often for drinks at pubs mentioned in the novel, and passed out by mid-day.) Why June 16th? Because that’s the day Joyce went on his first (all-day) date with Nora Barnacle, later his wife. And ‘date’ seems to have included some kind of sexual encounter. Exactly what kind is a matter for fierce debate among the kinds of people who debate these things.
(“Bloomsday Temple Bar / Barnacles / Dublin Hostel” by Barnacles Hostels is licensed under CC BY 2.0.)
Great news! You don’t have to read Ulysses, or any other Joyce novel, in order to celebrate Bloomsday. And you don’t have to pass out, to have sex, or even to wander through Dublin in a drunken stupor. You don’t even have to eat a gorgonzola sandwich and drink a glass of burgundy in Davy Byrne’s pub. (Though you could, and we very well might!). You can simply think of Joyce and all the other Irish literary greats on this Bloomsday. Extra points if you do it in a bow tie and boater.
