Summary of Ulysses
Ulysses follows Leopold Bloom, an advertising canvasser, through Dublin on 16 June 1904 (a date still celebrated annually in Dublin as Bloomsday). The novel begins at 8 a.m. and continues into the early hours of the following morning. Its eighteen episodes are written in different styles and loosely correspond to episodes in Homer’s ancient Greek epic The Odyssey. Bloom is the modern counterpart of Odysseus, while his wife Molly corresponds to Penelope and Stephen Dedalus, a young schoolteacher and aspiring writer, to Telemachus. Unlike Odysseus’s ten-year journey home, however, Bloom’s modern odyssey unfolds over a single day and revolves around the everyday experiences of an ordinary man. Through the characters’ movements, conversations and inner thoughts, Ulysses offers a detailed portrait of life in Dublin in 1904.
Reasons to read Ulysses
Ulysses is the best-known work by Irish author James Joyce and is widely regarded as one of the most important works of twentieth-century modernist literature. It is both an innovative work of fiction and a famously challenging read. Joyce employs a wide range of literary styles and techniques, including stream of consciousness, interior monologue, symbolism, parody, puns and linguistic experimentation. The novel also contains allusions to Shakespeare, particularly Hamlet, as well as to Christianity, Irish history and many other literary and cultural sources. Other notable works by James Joyce include Dubliners, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and Finnegans Wake. Dublin is at the heart of Joyce’s writing, even though he spent most of his adult life outside Ireland, mainly in Trieste, Zurich and Paris
Setting: Dublin (Ireland)
Ulysses opens at the Sandycove Martello Tower, south of Dublin, and then moves through numerous locations in and around the city. These include Sandymount Strand, Leopold Bloom’s home at 7 Eccles Street (now part of the Mater Private Hospital), Sweny’s Pharmacy on Lincoln Place, Westland Row post office, the offices of the Freeman’s Journal on Prince’s Street North, Davy Byrne’s pub at 21 Duke Street, the National Library on Kildare Street, the Ormond Hotel on Ormond Quay, Barney Kiernan’s pub, the National Maternity Hospital on Holles Street, Bella Cohen’s brothel at 82 Tyrone Street Lower (now Railway Street), Butt Bridge and Howth Head, north of Dublin.
Original title: Ulysses
Year of publication: 1922
Nr of pages: 768
