Telemachus

In the first episode of Ulysses we are re-introduced to Stephen Dedalus, Joyce's alter ego and the hero of his earlier work, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. It is early morning, June 16, 1904—fourteen years in the past from when the episode was first published in 1918, and almost eighteen years in the past from when the completed novel was published in February of 1922. The writer Stephen is found renting a Martello tower on the outskirts of Dublin with a roommate, the boisterous and irreverent Malachi "Buck" Mulligan. They also have a house guest, an Englishman by the name of Haines.

Within the episode Stephen and Buck Mulligan converse on the roof of the tower while Mulligan shaves; afterward they eat breakfast with Haines, and then Stephen follows them out as they go to bathe in Dublin Bay. Stephen then heads off to his day job as a schoolteacher. He is a fiercely intense young man, aptly described by Buck Mulligan as "brooding." He is preoccupied with a dream he had the night before about his recently deceased mother, and what we might imagine to be guilt about the fact that he did not accede to her deathbed wish that he kneel down and pray. He is also preoccupied with the Englishman Haines, whom he so dislikes that he resolves not to return to the tower that night.

Rereading the episode this time around I figured out something important about Stephen and Haines that I had never understood before. I had previously assumed that Stephen's dislike of Haines was merely because he represented for Stephen the English rule of Ireland; the distaste seemed a bit extreme, however, considering how self-centered Stephen is, and then why does Stephen think at the very end of the episode "usurper"? Now I get it: Stephen does not dislike Haines merely because he is an Englishman, but because he is an Englishman writing a book about Irish culture. Stephen feels that if anyone should be writing about Irish culture, it should be an Irishman. This resentment is only exacerbated when Haines speaks Gaelic to the elderly woman who delivers the milk and she doesn't understand the language.

The final thought, the indignation at Irish culture being explained by an outsider, is perhaps a declaration of intent by Joyce for Ulysses as a whole; it is to be a book of Ireland by an Irishman.

In terms of correspondence to Homer, Stephen is Telemachus, and perhaps Ireland or Irish culture is the mother Penelope that is besieged (and thus also perhaps Stephen's own kingship). Buck Mulligan can be seen as corresponding to the disloyal servants in Odysseus's household, since he flatters Haines and feeds him tidbits of Irish culture in the hopes of sponging money off him.

Within the episode there is also an elaborate parody of liturgical rite by Buck Mulligan, as well as a sacrilegious poem about Christ. Though these serve to paint a vivid picture of one of Stephen's contemporaries and afford Stephen a jumping-off point for his own thoughts about religion and his mother, I'm not sure what purpose they serve for the novel as a whole.

Ulysses

When I was in my twenties, one of my favorite books was James Joyce's Ulysses. I loved the the language and the challenge of it, as well as the flashes of humor and humanity. I can't remember how many times I read the book; I would guess three times all the way through, though some episodes I've probably read five times or more. However, I often felt that I was missing out on a lot of what the novel had to offer because I was unfamiliar with the book's touchstone, the Odyssey. For those who don't know, in Ulysses, Joyce takes the action of Homer's Odyssey and translates it to Dublin in 1904; the reincarnation is a bit ironic, however, because Odysseus's double, Leopold Bloom, is not a hero but an ordinary man, and his perils and adventures are mostly of the everyday sort. Regardless, I'd long had the ambition of reading the poem and then immediately going back to Ulysses to see what that opened up for me. Around 1997 or 1998 I bought a copy of the Robert Fagles translation of the Odyssey for this purpose, as well as his translation of the Iliad, since as long as I was doing the one I might as well do the other, but they looked awfully long, and I kept putting off reading them.

Eight or nine years later I suddenly discovered that I wasn't getting any younger, and so in the interest of having as few deathbed regrets as possible, I hunkered down and made my way through the Iliad; it was worthwhile, but a bit of a slog at times, and I wanted to take a break before tackling the Odyssey. The short break became a long one, but this month I finally accomplished my goal: the Odyssey is finished. It's funny, though—what struck me on reading the epic was how vague the connections between the two works were; I had imagined that there would be elaborate correspondences between the two stories, but instead it's more as if Odysseus's adventures are merely frames or inspirations or jumping-off points for Joyce. Regardless, I think that knowing what parts belong to who will help me in understanding Ulysses.

So anyway, this is all a roundabout way of saying that I'm reading Ulysses again. It will be an interesting journey, I think; in a way it's as if I'm revisiting a younger version of myself, just as Joyce revisited his own younger self in the creation of Stephen Dedalus. What's particularly interesting (to me) is that when I first read the novel I was close to the age of the Stephen Dedalus; now I am almost the same age as the older man, Leopold Bloom. Already I feel as though I understand the character better.

I think it would be a worthwhile exercise for me to write up a little something about the episodes as I read them; it will help ensure that I am thinking about what is going on in the novel and getting the most out of it. I will post the thoughts here on the off chance that they'll be useful to someone.