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Ulysses by James Joyce Readalong & Re-Readalongs (2014, 2016); Audio Listen-Along (2017)
Petra, I keep reassuring myself that if I was living in Ireland in 1904, then this would make so much more sense to me. My Great Grandparents left Ireland for Canada in 1895, perhaps if I could channel them?
Yes, please do......and share the channelling experience & information with us, Evelyn. I keep thinking this, too. Yet, people in Joyce's time didn't "get" this book either so I don't know whether living in the time would have made this a more sensical read.
However, it's the history and references that make each re-reading more and more interesting. As a re-reader of this book, I can say that I'm getting much more out of it than the first time and I strongly suspect that a third reading would tell me more, a fourth more, etc.
(that said, I think many of you are getting so much more out of the read than I remember getting on my first read. You are all awesome!)
Petra ,I think first time readers like myself are getting a lot out of it because you gave been so helpful in guiding us along - so thanks for that . Also doing this as a read along gives us so much more with impressions other than our own .
Evelyn , I agree that sometimes continuity can be lost but it helps a lot to know what the references mean.
I commend you , Petra because even though I'm enjoying it - a reread is the farthest thing in my mind - lol !
Hahaha.....just wait until you finish the book, Angela, and realize how often it pops up in your mind as you go about life and other books. It's quite surprising. Then you'll start to think of a reread. And, thank you! I'm glad that my participation is helpful. That's really encouraging.
I finished reading chapter 7 yesterday. It felt a lot like news clips or sound bites. I am reading Allusions in Ulysses: An Annotated List along with this book. I just got the book a couple of months ago and this is the first chapter I have used it with.Sometimes reading Ulysses has been like reading a word list. I am glad that you are going slow so that I can digest what I am reading. If is also encouraging to hear one of you say that when you get through reading it will be something you will think about later and want to read again.
Right now I am just look for the badge that says "I've been there and read that."...and understood some of it along the way.
It's a few weeks since I finished this now. Just to say, I'm surprised how often when I'm walking about, I think of parts of the book. It's a bit of an old friend to me! I enjoy thinking about all the different events and people, and the various styles of writing. If I read it again, I'll go for an annotated version, I think.
Cosmic , I'm with you ! Ulysses has been onmy to read list for such a long time and I can't wait to be able to mark it as read ! Do I understand it all ? Absolutely not but I am certainly getting some if it and it's been fun!
Lol Cosmic! I think we all will have earned that badge by the end, love the idea!
Episode 8: Lestrygonians(1:00 p.m.; The Lunch, esophagus; architecture; - - -; constables; peristaltic).
Bloom walks along the streets south of the river, deciding where to eat lunch. In the course of his walk he meets and talks with Mrs. Breen, sees constables walking Indian file, goes into the Burton restaurant but doesn't like the look of it, and finally goes on to Davy Byrne's pub where he has a cheese sandwich and a glass of burgundy. While in Byrne's pub he talks with Nosy Flynn.
After his meal Bloom walks toward the National Library, sees Boylan, and ducks into the National Museum.
Homer's Lestrygonians were giant cannibals who ate many of Odysseus' crew.
http://stuffjeffreads.wordpress.com/2...
A rather interesting blog. He's written his thoughts on each episode. Scroll down to the bottom for links to the other episodes.
http://www.novelguide.com/ulysses/sum...
Another summary of episode 8. The other episodes also have links.
I'm a bit behind this week but will have this episode read by Sunday afternoon. Sorry but I've had to work some overtime this week, including an over-nighter once, which left me really tired for a couple of days.
Petra , no need to apologize ! I'm planning on getting to it tomorrow too . Had a busy weekend with family stuff (all good stuff) and it's way too late for me to read and understand any of it so tomorrow it is .
Angela wrote: "Cosmic , I'm with you ! Ulysses has been onmy to read list for such a long time and I can't wait to be able to mark it as read ! Do I understand it all ? Absolutely not but I am certainly getting ..."
Hope you don't judge me. One of the reasons I put Ulysses on my reading list was because he influenced Hemingway and Fitzgerald. These two men influenced Salinger. I have been trying to break the "code" to the Catcher in the Rye. I thought that Ulysses writing style might give me a hint at how Salinger wrote the Catcher. So far it has related in the use of allusions and puns. Salinger was known for his love of puns.
I am also listening to a professor "explains" it to me. He is from the teaching company and I got it off of audible.
Cosmic,We don't judge here - just voice our opinions so no worries . Please don't misunderstand us - I don't think any of us would be reading Ulysses if we were not serious readers . I think it's in jest that we say we want to move it off our tr lists but there is definitely truth to it . I've been meaning to read it for so long .
I love Fitzgerald and Hemingway . I commend you on your quest to break Salinger's code. Hope you enjoy the discussion here . It's been enlightening and fun too .
I just finished listening to Joyce's Ulysses chapter 8, which is on Aeolus, chapter 7.Wind and Ulysses http://fitz-blog-fitz.blogspot.com/
In Joyce's Ulysses Bloom and Stephen fail to meet and Bloom fails to close the ad deal. In the later, Myles Crawford is Joyce's Ulysses "wind". Stephen realizes that the newspaper industry is impersonal and will drive him further away from his goal as a writer. (There are two scenes [might not be the right word. They come one after the other] ... where Digims (IRONY for dignity though their is no dignity in his death) obituary is described in a very flat and unemotional language of the newspaper and then Bloom describes what the news paper does to the personal ideals of man as it thrashed him through the machine like the printing machine of a newspaper. The rat there being a reflection back to the rat that they saw at the funeral.
There are three kinds of speech according to Aristotle, represented in this chapter. Did you see those?
"A Joe Miller" is another name for a jest or a joke.
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_Mi...
Here is a little entertainment to go with this chapter...(anything to make it more memorable)
http://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=d...
After studying this chapter and connecting a song to it, it makes me want to go back and connect a song to each one of the chapters. So as we go through the book maybe we can think about a song to represent how we viewed that chapters meaning.
11:57 A.M. I have finished chapter 7 and I am starting chapter 8.
A few of my initial observations on Episode 8:Episode 8 feels busy with all of the people that Bloom meets along his way looking for something to eat. Ah yes, food - Bloom seems soooooo focused on food here. "I hope they have liver and bacon today." In the pub and rather sickened with the way the men were eating, then to the cafe for a cheese sandwich.
Bloom once again does not miss an opportunity to look at a woman. In this case a former flame, Mrs. Breem.
He still is very concerned about Molly's affair with Boylan. He wonders if Boylan has an STD or if Boylan and Molly were touching when they walked together. He doesn't seem to want to confront what's happenning or Boylan himself as Bloom hides from him in the gate of the library.
I found the discussion of the tern "parallax" in the analysis fascinating. Bloom doesn't get what it means. It's an astrological term as you know from the reading and the analysis indicated the importance of this term to the book - reflecting various points of view of the same thing.
These are a few of the things that caught my attention.
I also loved the ad Bloom mentioned: "Wanted live man for spirit counter."
I'm enjoying all the various articles and blogs that you all suggesting. ThanksRe the men with the sandwich boards. Do the letters on them have a deeper significance, do you think?
Gill , doesn't it seem like everything has more significance in this book ? I don't think I'll ever get it all but I'm still enjoying it !
Lestrygonians is the chapter about Cannibles in the story of The Adventures of Ulysses. So when I read this chapter I think about different people. Just like in the chapter before Bloom throws the waded up newspaper in the water and the gulls dive in after it...it reminds me of "birds of a feather flock together" and they eat the same thing...and the think the same thing. I think there was something about the vomit of a dog gets licked up....and I think their is a connection there.I am mostly just writing from memory....now I need to go back and read. What fun.
I haven't gotten to the "the sandwich boards."
"Do the letters on them have a deeper significance, do you think? "
I am looking in Allusions in Ulysses: An Annotated List. Where is this scene located on Kindle. It might help me find it in this book.
Cosmic wrote: "Lestrygonians is the chapter about Cannibles in the story of The Adventures of Ulysses. So when I read this chapter I think about different people. Just like in the chapter before ..."It's near the start of Chapter 8, Cosmic. The boards say HELYS. I know it's meant to be the name of a company connected to Bloom, but I wondered whether it meant anything else
I'm still behind (didn't feel well at all yesterday).From the annotated notes in my book:
HELYS = Wisdom Hely's (see note at 81:1)
Note 81:1 (from the Hades episode; page 81; line 1):
Wisdom Hely's = Hely's Ltd, a Dublin stationer and printer at 27-30 Dame Street. The managing director was Charles Wisdom Hely. Bloom started work there when he married Molly.
....seems that all roads lead to Molly.
Cosmic, does your book say something, too?
I'm feeling a bit better today and ready to tackle Joyce now that I'm home from work. I'll be back to ramble on soon.
I'm really enjoying this episode. Sorry that I'm so late this week. I'm about half way through.I really like Bloom. He's a warm, kind man who remembers people and cares for them.
His ideas seem quite progressive, especially the idea of giving 5 quid to every newborn & investing it into a high interest account for them.
I laughed at his thoughts about the overhead seagulls deciding "who will we do it on?"
Also chuckled at the vegetarian quip.....something about if you eat a steak, the eyes of the cow will follow you forever.
Bloom is also rather fastidious. He didn't like that a lady walked walked in the street with loose stockings over her ankles.
So, so much sadness over Rudy and the distance his death put between Bloom & Molly. I feel so sad for both of them. I feel that they want that closeness but can't find it.
ETA: I also liked the description of the life of a planet (gas to solid to cold rock).
Petra, I completely agree with you. I only finished this episode last night and want to give it another skim after work this evening before gathering my thoughts. I did see more humour in this episode, perhaps because the funeral is over.
I have decided to post my comments about chapter 8 here:https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
I don't think those are all my thoughts about chapter 8 as I am still digesting this chapter. Pun intended.
One thing that I am doing is reading this while reading All Quiet on the Western Front. It is helping me with the mindset of those that went through the war years. They were completely changed by the war. Who were made different...you might say altered or handicapped by the war experience. They were no longer innocent.
I have more to say about this but I need to think some more.
I wonder if you are also reading something that maybe influencing your experience in reading Ulysses. It is kinda like picking a good wine. I think All Quiet on the Western Front has paired up well.
Done with episode 8. There are some very funny passages in here, as well as some deeply sad ones. Loved the quips I mentioned above, as well as the advertisement for Potted Meats in the obituary page.
Food....lots and lots of food, in a gluttony, overdone way. I chuckled when, right after a particularly gory, blood & gut filled description of meats, Bloom says, "Ah, I'm hungry".
Bloom carries so much sadness in himself: about Rudy, about Molly's possible affair and the state of their marriage.
Had fun with this line about Cannibals:
"White missionary too salty. Like pickled pork. Expect the chief consumes the parts of honour."
Cosmic, I agree. There's so much in episode 8 that we can't possibly get it all. There's so much in these pages. At least we're getting enough that we're enjoying the read. I'm glad you're all reading this with me. It's making this a really fun read.
I have never heard the term greenhouse for outhouse before.I like how Bloom spends time thinking about various advertising campaigns. His mind is still working even though he isn't at work.
Bloom's thoughts also continuously return to Molly. He seems to be reminiscing about their early years together, happier times. Then this thought about Rudy. "Can't bring back time. Like holding water in your hand." What a brilliant analogy for futility.
The part where Bloom notices a woman with thick feet in white stockings, then goes on to hope the rain mucks them up on her really surprised me. He seems like such a nice person and this thought seems really out of character.
This made me chuckle "Do ptake some ptarmigan." I can hear the p's being pronounced in both words. Also, my husband used to fly for Ptarmigan Airways (silent p) when we lived up north, and we would quite often see little ptarmigan families out for walks on the road.
I am confused about the one thing Bloom will never do according to Nosey Flynn. He scrawled a dry pen signature beside his grog and Davy Byrne said I know. What? Does anybody get what that meant? There was nothing in my notes or analysis about this.
Evelyn ,I read in Smoop's analysis "Flynn points out that Bloom won't put his name to contracts, which was a common stereotype about Jews."
I guess that's what was referred to with "His hand scrawled a dry pen signature beside his grog."
It seems we are seeing more antisemitism as we saw earlier when Bloom was riding to the funeral .
Thanks Angela, now that makes sense, because it goes on to say nothing in black and white. So how does he sell advertising for 2 year terms without a contract? Now I am beginning to doubt that he is successful at his job. That may be why it is rumoured the Mason's are supporting him?
To be honest, I had forgotten that Bloom was Jewish....
I certainly didn't catch that this was a reference to his being Jewish . Thankfully these analyses are there ! I did remember that Bloom was Jewish but would not have thought that the signature thing had anything to do with it .
Evelyn wrote: "The part where Bloom notices a woman with thick feet in white stockings, then goes on to hope the rain mucks them up on her really surprised me. He seems like such a nice person and this thought seems really out of character...."I noticed that passage, too, Evelyn, and took it differently. I thought Joyce was showing us another side of Bloom: that he's quite particular and prim; things need to be in their place.
I completely missed the reference about not signing contracts. That's interesting.
Petra wrote: "Done with episode 8. There are some very funny passages in here, as well as some deeply sad ones. Loved the quips I mentioned above, as well as the advertisement for Potted Meats in the obituary ..."
The "potted meat" is a sexual connotation. It is a Dublin http://www.englishtohindi.in/meaning-...
I think used the idea expressed by the dry pen with my daughter today. She asked me to get something for her and she would pay me back. Only she didn't offer to pay me back when we got back home. When I confronted her about it several days later, she said she didn't know that I was keeping score. I told her that I didn't know she would sign the contract with a dry pen. She appreciated the reference to Ulysses.
I"m having trouble telling where this section ends. I have it on an iPad app so the pages don't tell me much. Can someone give a couple sentences that end it besides just the last word? Thanks!
Robin ,End of section 8 :
"Hurry . Walk quietly . Moment more . My heart .
His hand looking for the where did I put found in his hip pocket soap lotion have to call tepid paper stuck . Ah soap there I yes. Gate .
Safe!
Cosmic wrote: "Petra wrote: "The "potted meat" is a sexual connotation..."LOL! I didn't know that!
I understood it as packing meat (or a meat blend) into a container, cooking/steaming it, for slicing and eating.....doubled with an obituary, which brings to mind burying....or packing meat into a container. (oops!)
I missed the potted meat connotation, too ! I could probably read this ten times and not get it all . Glad you guys are picking up on these things - thanks.
Angela wrote: "Robin ,End of section 8 :
"Hurry . Walk quietly . Moment more . My heart .
His hand looking for the where did I put found in his hip pocket soap lotion have to call tepid paper stuck . Ah soap t..."
Great, thank you!
Angela wrote: "I certainly didn't catch that this was a reference to his being Jewish . Thankfully these analyses are there ! I did remember that Bloom was Jewish but would not have thought that the signature th..."
I wonder if he is trying to make us ask what makes Bloom Jewish? Or a person Catholic (join the church to be able to marry Molly) or in the first chapter, Irish (lost Gaelic language, that I believe was banned.)or whatever identity. Can someone say they are Jewish because they join the temple and if someone were to question his "signature", (fill in the blank) say "they are antisemitic"? And should this matter anymore than being Catholic in order to get married?
Does he or Molly act Catholic?
Bloom is not Kosher (he eats organ meat and pork). His father did not practice Judaism, and so he probably wasn't raised in the Jewish tradition.
Is this a type of being Jewish with a dry pen...no evidence?
Lot of irony here I believe.
Petra wrote: "Cosmic wrote: "Petra wrote: "The "potted meat" is a sexual connotation..."LOL! I didn't know that!
I understood it as packing meat (or a meat blend) into a container, cooking/steaming it, for sl..."
The professor says the irony is the corpse are tucked into coffins and ready to eat.
Potted meats. What is home without Plumtree's potted meat? Incomplete. What a stupid ad! Under the obituary notices they stuck it. All up a plumtree. Dignam's potted meat. Cannibals would with lemon and rice. White missionary too salty. Like pickled pork. Expect the chief consumes the parts of honour. Ought to be tough from exercise. His wives in a row to watch the effect. There was a right royal old nigger. Who ate or something the somethings of the reverend Mr MacTrigger. With it an abode of bliss. Lord knows what concoction. Cauls mouldy tripes windpipes faked and minced up. Puzzle find the meat. Kosher. No meat and milk together. Hygiene that was what they call now. Yom Kippur fast spring cleaning of inside. Peace and war depend on some fellow's digestion. Religions. Christmas turkeys and geese. Slaughter of innocents. Eat drink and be merry. Then casual wards full after. Heads bandaged. Cheese digests all but itself. Mity cheese.
The bold part part of the sexual and also a racial limerick. He eats missionaries and he gets bigger.
This reminds me of Pearl S. BuckPearl S. BuckMy Several Worlds. She talks about how missionaries created the instability that allowed communism to take hold. And also of Heart of Darkness, how they were suppose to be bring light (his wife's delusion)into the Congo but they were actually exploiting Africa...and
He is talking to his friend and thinking about the chief...
"He studded under each lifted strip yellow blobs. Their lives. I have it. It grew bigger and bigger and bigger.
—Getting it up? he said. Well, it's like a company idea, you see. Part shares and part profits."
There is more but I am just getting it a little at a time...because it reminds me of something else that at least for me was relevant.
Cosmic , not signing the contract was a "common stereotype about Jews at the time ."Using those stereotypes to me seems antisemitic because whether or not Bloom keeps to the Jewish practices , it Is known that he is of Jewish origin . That's just how I interpret it .
Angela wrote: "Cosmic , not signing the contract was a "common stereotype about Jews at the time ."Using those stereotypes to me seems antisemitic because whether or not Bloom keeps to the Jewish practices , it ..."
I appreciate you bring this up, I really didn't catch this the first time I read it.
I don't disagree with you but I am just pointing out some different ways that we classify people and thinking that Joyce is making us ask ourselves why? There is irony in a Jew that eats organ meat and thinks about offering meat as burnt offering to God, which he had burnt earlier at breakfast, but his mind is not religiously oriented. He has been made to think about this through a tract. Which he throws to the birds or gulls. This made me think of birds of a feather flock together. In the case of sea gulls this is very true. And in the fact that they attack the tract because they are hungry is this not possibly an allusion to propaganda?
It would be fine if you disagreed with me - different perspectives make GR a great place for discussion . I don't disagree with you that Joyce is questioning and therefore asking his readers to question these things too .
There's a lot going on here to say the least .
"Never know whose thoughts you're chewing. Then who'd wash up all the plates and forks? Might be all feeding on tabloids that time. Teeth getting worse and worse."We often say that a book is food for thought. Joyce has made us see that we are cannibals of other men's thoughts. The washing of plates and forks reminds me of something that is clean or contaminated. How do we know that the facts we have been given are more than propaganda, which is the old word. Now we call it PR.
I like this documentary called The Century Of The Self because it relates to how the masses are fed communal style, which was the reference in the paragraph where the quote was taken. Great way to get everyone on the same page feed them the same thing.
http://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=c...
http://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=c...
Bloom talked about feeding a sea gull on fish and it made their meat fishy...:
"Wait. Those poor birds.
He halted again and bought from the old applewoman two Banbury cakes for a penny and broke the brittle paste and threw its fragments down into the Liffey. See that? The gulls swooped silently, two, then all from their heights, pouncing on prey. Gone. Every morsel.
Aware of their greed and cunning he shook the powdery crumb from his hands. They never expected that. Manna. Live on fish, fishy flesh they have, all seabirds, gulls, seagoose. Swans from Anna Liffey swim down here sometimes to preen themselves. No accounting for tastes. Wonder what kind is swanmeat. Robinson Crusoe had to live on them."
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banbur...
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banbury
One of their chief industries is printing. That is interesting.
"Banbury's main industries are car components, electrical goods, plastics, food processing, and printing."
It is near Oxford:
"21 miles (34 km) north northwest of the county town of Oxford."
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxford
"Oxford has a broad economic base. Its industries include motor manufacturing, education, publishing, and a large number of information technology and science-based businesses, some being academic offshoots."
This reminds me of what they do to geese:
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foie_gras
The text before he talks about the poor gulls:
They wheeled lower. Looking for grub. Wait.
He threw down among them a crumpled paper ball. Elijah thirtytwo feet per sec is com. Not a bit. The ball bobbed unheeded on the wake of swells, floated under by the bridgepiers. Not such damn fools. Also the day I threw that stale cake out of the Erin's King picked it up in the wake fifty yards astern. Live by their wits. They wheeled, flapping.
The hungry famished gull
Flaps o'er the waters dull.
That is how poets write, the similar sounds. But then Shakespeare has no rhymes: blank verse. The flow of the language it is. The thoughts. Solemn.
Hamlet, I am thy father's spirit
Doomed for a certain time to walk the earth.
—Two apples a penny! Two for a penny!
His gaze passed over the glazed apples serried on her stand. Australians they must be this time of year. Shiny peels: polishes them up with a rag or a handkerchief.
This made me think of the metaphor of missionaries. They are not from Ireland and they sell foreign "food for thought" food.
It is interesting that he talks about the chief eating missionaries and getting an erection see message 389.
Cosmic I really like the idea of us being cannibals of other men' thoughts. Angela is so right, I could also read this 10 times and not get it all.
Evelyn wrote: "Cosmic I really like the idea of us being cannibals of other men' thoughts. Angela is so right, I could also read this 10 times and not get it all."I think this was intentional. I think this was so he Joyce could write about things and then dismiss it and not get in trouble for it. It was by association that the reader digested the thoughts of the writer. So we are eating Joyce's words, or thoughts as well...Will we vomit it up or digest it. Is this not his predigested food that he has regurgitated for us. I think there is a quote like this ....I will have to look for it.
Maybe I was thinking of this:
Sardines on the shelves. Almost taste them by looking. Sandwich? Ham and his descendants musterred and bred there. Potted meats. What is home without Plumtree's potted meat? Incomplete. What a stupid ad! Under the obituary notices they stuck it. All up a plumtree. Dignam's potted meat. Cannibals would with lemon and rice. White missionary too salty. Like pickled pork. Expect the chief consumes the parts of honour. Ought to be tough from exercise. His wives in a row to watch the effect. There was a right royal old nigger. Who ate or something the somethings of the reverend Mr MacTrigger. With it an abode of bliss. Lord knows what concoction. Cauls mouldy tripes windpipes faked and minced up. Puzzle find the meat. Kosher. No meat and milk together. Hygiene that was what they call now. Yom Kippur fast spring cleaning of inside. Peace and war depend on some fellow's digestion. Religions. Christmas turkeys and geese. Slaughter of innocents. Eat drink and be merry. Then casual wards full after. Heads bandaged. Cheese digests all but itself. Mity cheese."
I think I will start reading chapter 9 today.
Just a side note related to Oxford:
"God, isn't he dreadful? he said frankly. A ponderous Saxon. He thinks you're not a gentleman. God, these bloody English! Bursting with money and indigestion. Because he comes from Oxford. You know, Dedalus, you have the real Oxford manner. He can't make you out. O, my name for you is the best: Kinch, the knife-blade." Chapter one
Of Ulysses.
Episode 9: Scylla and CharybdisBy 2pm Stephen is in the National Library presenting his theory of Hamlet to John Eglinton (respected librarian) and George William Russell (renowned literary figure in Dublin). Russell thinks that prying into Shakespeare's biography is irrelevant, and that the only important thing about a work of art is its formless spiritual essence. Eglinton is also skeptical of Stephen, but hears him out to the end. At great length, Stephen argues that Shakespeare corresponds more closely to King Hamlet than to the Prince. He re-works some Catholic beliefs about the trinity so as to be applied to art.
In the course of the discussion, Russell gets up to leave. Stephen feels snubbed when Russell and Eglinton discuss a literary event they will be attending that evening without inviting him. Toward the end of Stephen's argument, Mulligan appears and chides him for missing their 12:30 meeting. He tells him that he saw Bloom peeking up the skirts of the statue of Aphrodite in the lounge. When Stephen finishes, Eglinton asks him if he believes his theory and Stephen says he does not. Mulligan and Stephen leave to go get a drink, and as they pass out, they see Bloom. Mulligan kids Stephen that Bloom is gay and that Stephen must be on his guard.
(from: http://www.shmoop.com/ulysses-joyce/s...)
Another blog:
http://somanybooksblog.com/2011/08/29...
9. SCYLLA & CHARYBDIS
TIME: 2.00 pm.
SCENE: The National Library
ORGAN: The Brain
ART: Literature
COLOURS: None
SYMBOL: Stratford, London
TECHNIQUE: Dialectic
CORRESPONDENCES:
The Rock-Aristotle, dogma, Stratford;
The Whirlpool-Plato, mysticism, London;
Ulysses-Socrates, Jesus, Shakespeare.
(Scylla and Charybdis, Ulysses, Telemachus, Antinoos.
Hamlet, Shakespeare, Christ, Socrates, London and Stratford, Scholasticism and Mysticism, Plato and Aristotle, Youth and Maturity. Sense: Two-edged dilemma)
Homeric Parallels:
In book 12 of The Odyssey, returning from HADES and after burying Elpenor on Circe's island, Odysseus is given a choice of routes by her. She warns him of the SIRENS and the WANDERING ROCKS (which none, "not even birds", may pass), and suggests that he journeys between the six-headed monster Scylla and the whirling maelstrom Charybdis.
I'm still with you, just enjoying the discussion, and thinking how much I enjoyed the book. It makes me wonder how many 'near misses' I have, in terms of not quite meeting people who might (or might not!) make a big difference to my life.
Well, this section was turbulent, don't you think? The discussion about Shakespeare was circular, with no solution or ending. I was quite frustrated through it, probably because I wasn't that interested in it. Then there was a calmer, more reasonable section that talked about fathers and sons.
It was, in feeling, a bit like The Odyssey's chapter of finding a safe passage, going through rough waters and steering for somewhere calmer. (am I reading things into this episode?)
Wow! Bloom & Stephen are together in the same building for one hour and DO NOT MEET! Bloom did send his card (why?) but no one in Stephen's group seemed to care about that or act upon it. (was there a reason? Was it to show, once again, that Bloom is an outsider?)
I'm still not fond of Mulligan.
Why did Bloom storm out so at the end? Or am I reading more into his sudden exit, barrelling through Stephen & Mulligan?
Lots and lots of thought given to fathers and sons: unhappy rifts, separation, ghost father figures, etc. The father/son rift is a big subject throughout this book.
Stephen seems to be very different here and very annoying. He expresses antisemitism, makes rude jokes about women and sex, and in the end says he doesn't even believe his own theories. In the earlier scenes I thought he was less confident and more sincere. The conflict about whether an author's biography is relevant to a reading of his works has continued for the past 100 years. We even do it here looking for parallels between Joyce's life and Stephen's. In the 1970's it was all the rage to say that the author's life, society they lived in and even intent of the author all were irrelevant to "the text".
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What are your thoughts up to episode 7? Are you enjoying the book?
Evelyn, this book is chock full of references....so much so that it would take multiple readings to understand it completely (is that even possible?).
Yeah, the parable of the plums is interesting. I'm still not sure if I really get it.
The politics and history of Ireland are leaving me a bit out of the loop. But, reading the references makes me realize how much Joyce has packed into this book.