Bloggery

Friday 25th Nov 2011

Lucinda Corby

Ulysses Support Group: Penultimate

Ithaca Part II: Tuesday 22nd November

The second half of Ithaca, sees Bloom and Stephen part company. Stephen departs almost unnoticed, after an amusing passage which sees both men outside the house, simultaneously answering the call of nature.  Bloom alone goes back inside - and we are treated again to a very detailed analysis of the contents of his home. Objects are described with such precision, context and provenance that the reader feels he is in a tangible and complete world. We are fooled into believing that if only we had Bloom's life experiences and his utter familiarity with all things 'home', we could easily understand all of the references made to the objects (at one point we are presented with a selection of letters on a page - which according to the notes, represent, in Bloom's own special code, the name and address of his 'mistress').
 

The 'exam question' form of Ithaca continues and becomes more overt. We are asked to cross-multiply, reduce, explain and describe. We learn that Bloom's insomnia is related to a fear of 'dying in his sleep' - and there are references leading back to the 'accidental' suicide of his father. There are also Bloom's fantasies: fear of poverty, the desire for a better house, a bit of land, some standing in the community etc. We commented on how modest his daydreams were and whether this signified a level of happiness with the status quo.

Despite the wealth of factual information that we are provided with (when the Blooms' marriage was consummated, how long since Molly was last pregnant) there are still some ambiguities about the state of their realtionship. Joyce is particularly adept at unqualifying pronouns. We get lost in a maze of he, she, his, and hers. As a result, we debated whether Bloom is impotent; whether Molly refuses his advances; whether Bloom's 'unfaithfulness' consists merely of secret letters between his pseudonym and another woman - or whether he is actually unfaithful. Bloom simultaneously suggests that Molly has had a well documented string of lovers but at the same time each of her conquests is unaware of the others. Bloom comforts himself by thinking that he is always there, even if it is in the background. The closeness of this passage to the Odyssey, with Penelope surrounded by a gaggle of enthusiastic suitors, was appreciated by us all. The big question is, how chaste is Joyce's Penelope?
 

 The progress towards the marital bed is slow and when Bloom eventually gets in, we are shocked to discover that he sleeps 'top and tail' with his wife! After Bloom provides his wife with a brief synopsis of his day (tellingly leaving out anything salacious) he appears to drift into gobbledygook and sleep. So, our thoughts turned inevitably to that final chapter and we are all eager to find out whether Joyce is going to satsify some outstanding questions or pose a whole new set of possible interpretations.

The final meeting of the Ulysses Support Group will be at the Salamander on Wednesday 7th December from 7:15pm and I shall attempt to write the final blog as a stream of consciousness devoid of punctuation in homage.