CHAPTER NINE, PART 1

Chapter 9, Part 1

Lecture Ten -- Scylla and Charybdis, I

(from "Joyce's Ulysses" by Professor James A.W. Hefferman of Dartmouth College)

Scope

As the first of two lectures on chapter 9, this lecture explains why

Stephen and Bloom each come to the National Library at this

time-just after lunch. The lecture also discusses the chapter’s

reenactment of the Homeric episode of Scylla and Charybdis, two

perils flanking a passage that Ulysses must negotiate on his way

back to Ithaca. In addition, We look at why Stephen feels

compelled to explain his theory of Shakespeare’s Hamlet to a

gathering of Dublin’s literati, even though he has no wish to

become one of them, that is, no wish to join the Irish Literary

Revival

Outline

I. In moving from chapter 8 to chapter 9, we move from the lunchroom to

the library, from the digestive tract to the brain, from the physical

World of Bloom and his appetites to the intellectual world of Stephen

and his speculations

II. Stephen comes to the library to deliver Deasy’s letter and explain his

theory of Shakespeare.

A. Having delivered one copy of Deasy’s letter to the newspapereditor in chapter 7, he delivers a second copy to the editor ofanother paper in the library. 

B. Though delivering Deasy’s letter about cattle is the low-level job
of a “bullockbefriending bard,” Stephen is also building on the
creative work he did at the end of chapter 7.

1. At the end of chapter 7, Stephen the listener becomes Stephenthe talker, the begetter of “The Parable of the Plums.” 

2. In this chapter, he offers a theory of Shakespeare that becomesa theory of literary creation-of literary fatherhood.

III. Bloom catches the eye of Mulligan, who scornfully points him out to

Stephen as a wandering Jew with sexual designs on Stephen. But

insofar as Bloom steers a middle way between sensuality and

intellectualism, he reenacts Ulysses’s passage between Scylla and

Charybdis--and offers Stephen a model to follow.

A. When Bloom comes to the library to look up a newspaper ad sothat he can copy its design, Mulligan scornfully points him out toStephen and makes several remarks:

1. Bloom knows Stephen’s “old fellow”-thus linking him withStephen’s father. 

2. Bloom has been eyeing the buttocks of the naked Venus in themuseum. 

3. Bloom is a “wandering jew” who lusts after Stephen

B. But as a wanderer, Bloom recalls Ulysses’s passage through Scylla
Charybdis and, thus, offers Stephen a model to follow.

1. Scylla and Charybdis are a pair of perils flanking a narrowstrait. After losing six men to the teeth of Scylla, a she-monster who lives in a cave halfway up a cliff, Ulysseshimself gets caught by Charybdis, a whirlpool. He saveshimself by clinging to the branch of a tree, thus managing tomake his way between the two perils. 

2. On his way out of the library, Bloom passes between Stephenand Mulligan.

a. Stephen stands for the intellect. 

b. Mulligan embodies sensuality.

3. In passing between them, Bloom suggests a middle waybetween mere sensuality and the whirlpool of pure ideas. 

4. He thus presents a model for Stephen, who must learn togenerate his art from the physical, material life of Dublin.

IV. This chapter reveals the parallels between Shakespeare’s Hamlet,

Homer’s Odyssey, and the life of Stephen Dedalus.

A. The plot of Hamlet shares two major points with Homer’sOdyssey.

1. The play and the epic each begin with a prince whose royalfather is absent, and in each case, the queen is confronted byone or more suitors who usurp the authority of the missingking in his own household. 

2. In each work, a son is roused to act on behalf of his dead ormissing father by killing or helping to kill those who wouldusurp his place.

B. Fittingly, then, Joyce’s re-creation of Homer also recalls some
features of Shakespeare’s play.

1. As Hamlet is haunted by the ghost of his father, Stephen ishaunted by the ghost of his mother. 

2. Because Mulligan accuses Stephen of killing his mother,Stephen has to bear the sort of guilt that Shakespeare loads onthe back of Claudius, who killed Hamlet’s father inShakespeare’s play.

V. In light of these parallels, Shakespeare shows Stephen how he can

make his way between two extremes: between the world of hard facts

and the world of poetic idealism, between the soul-devouring

machinery of journalism and the self-indulgent sentimentality of the

Irish Revival.

A. Stephen will not join the “pressgang” because if he did so, hewould be ground up by the machinery of journalism, just asUlysses’s men were ground up by the teeth of Scylla. 

B. His alternative is the Irish Literary Revival, but that presents the
alternative risk of self-indulgent sentimentality and a whirlpool of
idealistic self-absorption. ‘

1. The Irish Literary Revival sought to revive the Irish languageand culture. 

2. Among its leaders was George Russell, who believes that artshould reveal to us “formless spiritual essences.” 

3. Rather than losing himself in a whirlpool of Platonic idealismStephen would rather risk himself with the visible, tactile,audible data of sensory experience.

C. In Stephen’s eyes, the Irish Literary Revival is not only vitiated by
dreamy mysticism but sucked down by its nostalgic yearning to
revive the old Irish language-rather than working with the sights
and sounds of contemporary life.

1. Ironically, the only character to speak Irish in this novel so faris Haines, the Englishman. 

2. On his arrival at the library, Mulligan mocks the would-bepeasant speech of the plays of John Millington Synge: anilliterate version of English hardly sufficient for the kind ofliterature Stephen yearns to produce.

D. Though we read this novel in light of Homer’s Odyssey, Stephen
seeks his literary father neither in Homer nor in the Irish Literary
Revival but in Shakespeare.

1. Shakespeare is a world-class writer, probably the greatestplaywright of all time. 

2. Irish literature needs to generate a figure who can rivalShakespeare’s Hamlet. 

3. Stephen can meet this challenge only by working out his owninterpretation of Hamlet and all of Shakespeare’s plays and,thus, finding a literary father in Shakespeare. 

4. The quest for a literary father leads him to the ghost of OldKing Hamlet, who resembles not only Shakespeare himselfbut also Ulysses and Leopold Bloom.

VI. Stephen reads Hamlet and all of Shakespeare’s other work as basically

autobiographical-the disguised expression of his own family life.

A. From data furnished by three biographies of Shakespeare, Stephenconcocts his own weird story of Shakespeare’s life, then arguesthat Shakespeare’s plays reflect that life. 

B. Russell thinks biographical research is a waste of time because the
only thing important about Shakespeare’s plays are the “ideas”
they convey. 

C. Nonetheless, Stephen is determined to show what Hamlet reveals
about the life of the playwright and, specifically, how the ghost of
Old King Hamlet stands for Shakespeare himself.

Supplementary Reading:

Goldberg, The Classical Temper.

Kellogg, “Scylla and Charybdis,” in Hart and Hayman, pp. 147-79

Questions to Consider:

1. What does Stephen think of Goethe’s assessment of Hamlet as-in the

words of the librarian» “a beautiful ineffectual dreamer who comes to

grief against hard facts”?

2. If Stephen is reenacting the life of Homer’s Telemachus, Why does he

spend so much time talking about Shakespeare’s Hamlet-rather than

The Odyssey?

CHAPTER EIGHT

Chapter 8

Lecture Nine -- Lestrygonians at Lunchtime

(from "Joyce's Ulysses" by Professor James A.W. Hefferman of Dartmouth College)

Scope:

This chapter is called “Lestrygonians” because it reenacts

Ulysses’s sojourn with the cannibalistic people of that name. In

this chapter about Bloom’s lunchtime, cannibalism takes the form

of animalistic voracity: men wolfing their food at the Burton

restaurant. Repelled by this Lestrygonian savagery, Bloom goes

instead to a “moral pub,” where he dines on a cheese sandwich and

a glass of wine that evokes vivid memories of his first lovemaking

with Molly. But a conversation with another man at the pub leads

him back once again to the painful subject of Blazes Boylan, who

recalls Antiphates, the king of the Lestrygonians in Homer’s epic.

Along with thoughts of God as a devourer, which surface on the

very first page of the chapter, Bloom feels almost eaten alive by

his anxiety about Boylan.

Outline

I. This chapter about Bloom’s lunchtime is based on the story of

Ulysses’s narrow escape from the cannibalistic Lestrygonians.

A. Cautiously tying up his own ship outside the Lestrygonian harborUlysses lets his men take their ships into the harbor and sendsthree men to investigate the city. 

B. When one of the three is seized by the king for his dinner and the
other two nm away, the whole city is roused against the Greeks.
Caught in the harbor, the Greeks are speared like fish by the
Lestrygonians. 

C. Ulysses gets away with just the crew of his ship.

D. Like Ulysses, Bloom makes his getaway from savage eaters.

1. Bloom loves food, as we have learned already from chapter 4 

2. But as a discriminating eater, he’s repelled by the “dirtyeaters” he finds at Burton’s restaurant.3. So he takes his lunch at what he calls a “moral pub” nearby:Davy Byme’s.

II. The chapter shows the connection between eating and sex.

A. Because potting one’s meat is slang for having sex, a newspaperad for potted meat reminds Bloom of a limerick that linkscannibalism to sexual potency. 

B. Bloom’s conversation with Nosey Flynn leads to painful thoughts
about Blazes Boylan’s designs on Molly.

1. When Bloom tells Flynn that Molly is engaged for a singingtour, Flynn asks the now painfully familiar question, “Who’sgetting it up?” 

2. The question gives Bloom heartburn and makes him look atthe clock to see its “hands moving” toward the hour ofBoylan’s tryst with Molly. 

3. Bloom is almost literally devoured by his anxiety aboutBoylan, who becomes another Antiphates--the Lestrygonianking.

III. Bloom also feels threatened by the gospel of a devouring God

A. Early on in the chapter, he’s handed a throwaway announcing theadvent of Elijah-specifically the coming of an Americanevangelist named John Alexander Dowie. 

B. The language of the throwaway links Bloom and his day with
blood sacrifice.

1. The first four letters of “Blood” suggest Bloom’s own name. 

2. The reference in the throwaway to “kidney burntoffering”recalls the burnt kidney that Bloom had for breakfast.

IV. As a temperate man, Bloom steers a middle way between the extremes

of cannibalism and vegetarianism.

A. Bloom eats and drinks with restraint; he embodies the Ulysseanvirtue of restraint.

1. He’s repelled by the savagery of the eaters in Burton’srestaurant. 

2. He’s also put off by the sentimentality and dreaminess ofvegetarians. He chooses cheese, which comes from animalswithout slaughter. 

3. He also consumes two things made of vegetable matter,namely, bread and wine.

B. Bloom’s way of eating his lunch subtly recalls both the temperance
of Ulysses and the compassion of Christ.

V. Bloom is kind-hearted; he feels compassion for others and sometimes helps them.

A. He pities Dilly Dedalus, Stephen’s sister.

1. He see her raggedly dressed and underfed waiting outsideauction rooms, where the family furniture is being sold to paytheir debts. 

2. He mentally denounces priests for living off the far of the landwhile goading Catholic couples to increase and multiply theirway into poverty and hunger. 

3. He’s dismayed to learn that a woman named Mina Purefoy has been suffering in labor for three days. 

4. He helps a blind stripling cross the street.

D. Throwing away the gospel of a devouring god, he feeds seagulls with the “manna” of Banbury cakes and, thus, becomes for a moment a benevolent God--but without ceasing to be a human being.

1. Tossing into the River Liffey the throwaway announcing thecoming of Elijah, he sees that the gulls aren’t fooled intonibbling at it. 

2. He buys a couple of Banbury cakes and throws bits of them into the water. 

3. In offering what he calls “manna” to the birds, Bloombecomes in effect a benevolent God--by contrast with thedevouring God of the throwaway. 

4. But seeing pigeons whirling around later, he playfullyimagines one of them deciding to target him: “Must bethrilling from the air.”

VI. Bloom thinks about the whole digestive process--right up to excretion.

A. He can’t imagine any living being of any kind who doesn’t put food into one hole and push it out another. 

B. Planning to look at the statues of a naked goddess in the museumof the National Library after lunch as an “aid to digestion,” heresolves to find out surreptitiously whether or not she has an anus. 

C. At one point, he sees all of life as one huge digestive cycle goingnowhere, an endless repetition of birth and death.

VII. Through lunch regenerates Bloom because the taste of wine ignites the 

memory of his first lovemaking with Molly, he is nonetheless force to

recognize how much their relationship has changed.

A. His memory of their first lovemaking among the rhododendrons ofHowth Head mingles the joys of sex with the joys of eating.

1. As they kissed, seedcake passed from her mouth into his. 

2. He remembers even the droppings of a nannygoat--a sure sign sign that the digestive process never stops. 

3. They joyously consumed each other.

B. But Bloom is forced to recognize the changes wrought by time.

1. He’s stricken anew by the gulf between the man he is now andthe man he remembers in the scene of passionate lovemaking. 

2. Rudy’s death has left him with a residue of guilt and made itimpossible for his to “like”.

VIII. Though pained by thoughts of Boylan, Bloom is never quite devoured

or defeated. Catching sight of Boylan at the end of the chapger, he

escapes him by slipping into the National Library.

Supplementary Reading:

Friedman, “Lestrygonians,” in Hart and Hayman, pp. 131-46.

Question to Consider:

1. What does Bloom mean when he refers to Davy Byrne’s as a “moral 

pub”? What does morality have to do with eating?

2. How does Bloom’s experience with the blind stripling reveal the power

of his imagination--as well as demonstrating his compassion?

CHAPTER SEVEN

Chapter 7

Lecture Eight -- A Bag of Winds

(from "Joyce's Ulysses" by Professor James A.W. Hefferman of Dartmouth College)

Scope:

This chapter is called “Aeolus” because it evokes Ulysses’s visit to

the island of Aeolus, the king of winds in The Odyssey, In this

chapter, the counterpart of the king of winds is Myles Crawford,

hot-tempered editor of a Dublin newspaper called the Evening

Telegraph. This chapter brings Bloom and Stephen together for the

second time-fleetingly. Stephen comes to deliver Deasy’s letter

to the editor, and because Bloom works for the paper as a salesman

of advertising space, he comes to the newspaper office to ask

Crawford’s help in securing the renewal of an ad for a pub owner,

but is blown away by Crawford’s dismissive response. Wind in

this chapter takes the form of talk, especially speechmaking, and

three samples of it are held up as models for Stephen, the aspiring

writer, who produces his own bit of speechmaking at the end in the

form of a Dublin story. He thus struggles to find his own voice as

a writer in the face of pressures to join the “pressgang” of

journalism.

Outline

I. This chapter brings both Stephen and Bloom to the central Dublin

offices of a newspaper, the Evening Telegraph.

A. Bloom comes eastward from the cemetery (northwest of thecenter) to do his job at the newspaper: selling advertising space. 

B. Stephen comes to the office to deliver Deasy’s letter about hoof-and- mouth disease so that it can be published in the EveningTelegraph.

II. In passing each other on the stairs~almost like a pair of windblown

leaves-Stephen and Bloom help to show how the chapter reenacts

Ulysses’s sojourn with Aeolus, the king of winds.

A. Ulysses’s sojourn with the god of winds leads to yet anothersetback in his voyage home.

1. Aeolus, king of winds, gives Ulysses a bag of winds so that nowind will blow him off course. 

2. When his men open the bag just as they are approachingIthaca, the winds blow them away-right back to Aeolus. 

3. The king sends them angrily away.

B. The counterpart of Aeolus in this chapter is Myles Crawford,
editor of the Evening Telegraph.

1. Crawford at first sends Bloom off to secure the renewal of anad for a pub. 

2. When Bloom returns to ask Crawford’s help in closing thedeal for a renewal, Crawford blows him away. Like Ulysses,Bloom is blown off course just as he’s about to reach his goal

III. Bloom’s failure to secure the renewal exemplifies a general sense of

frustration.

A. Bloom fails to collect on a loan from Hynes. 

B. The chapter ends with electric tramcars immobilized by a powerfailure. 

C. Bloom and Stephen pass each other on the stairs but don’t meet.

IV. Bloom’s thoughts about Stephen’s boots reveal patemal solicitude.

A. The muck on Stephen’s boots remind us that he’s been walking onthe beach. 

B. The muck suggests to Bloom that Stephen is careless. 

C. Bloom suspects that Stephen is the “moving spirit” behind a
general migration of Crawford and the other men to the pub.

1. He begins to see that Stephen may be fated to sink intoalcoholism, like his father. 

2. Though the phrase “moving spirit” can refer to creativeinspiration, it’s ironic here because it alludes to spirits-theliquor at the pub.

V. The chapter shows that newspapers tend to grind up inspiration and

individuality in the machinery of journalism.

A. The impersonal, official tone of the headline for the Dignamobituary sharply contrasts with the personal tone of Bloom’s silentthoughts about the funeral.

1. The headline speaks the language of official regret. 

2. Bloom thinks about what he actually felt and saw-includingthe rat. 

3. He also notes the crushing power of machines, which grind upthe individuality of the dead man.

B. The headlines interspersed throughout the chapter break the flow
of the narrative and show how arbitrary headlines can be.

1. Joyce added the headlines after he wrote the chapter. 

2. They remind us that we are in a newspaper office and thatnewspapers are an essential part of daily life. 

3. They show how arbitrary headlines can be--as in the whollyirrelevant headline for the passage introducing Crawford, theking of winds in this chapter-a major character.

VI. In addition to revealing the arbitrariness and rigidity of newspapers, the chapter also mounts a critique of the windy art of speechmaking.

A. The chapter shows how each of three kinds of speechmaking fails. 

B. The third example of speechmaking sounds like a moving defense
of a people’s right to their own language and culture.

1. In the speech quoted, a man named Taylor defends the revivalof the Irish language against one of its haughty Anglophiliccritics. 

2. Drawing an analogy between the Irish and the ancient Jews,Taylor imagines a high priest telling Moses that the Jewsshould accept the language and culture of the Egyptians ratherthan clinging to their own language. 

3. Then he declares that if Moses had bowed to the Egyptians, hewould never have led the chosen people out of bondage.

C. But the message of the speech is undermined by irony.

1. Though made to defend the Irish tongue, the speech is givenin English. 

2. The sentimental twinning of the Irish and the Jews isundermined by the anti-Semitism of the Irish.

a. Deasy denounces the Jews in chapter 2. 

b. Bloom feels subtle forms of exclusion in chapter 6. 

c. In this chapter, Bloom gets open contempt from the editor when he tries to secure the renewal of an ad.

VII. Silently dismissing the “noble” speeches as nothing more than wind

and resisting the pressure to join the pressgang, Stephen begins to find

his own voice in the “parable of the plums,” which he tells at the end of

the chapter.

A. He dares to write of “Dubliners,” which became the title of JamesJoyce’s first book of fiction.  

B. In saying, “let there be life,” Stephan echoes the Book 0fG€H€S1S
and recalls Bloom’s return to the world of the living at the end of
the previous chapter-another link between the two men.

C. The story about the two women climbing to the top of Nelson's 
pillar links the Old and New Testaments in a parable about politics
and sex.

1. Its two titles link the story to the two biblical testaments.

a. A Pisgah Sight of Paradise recalls the mountain fromwhich God showed Moses the Promised Land that hecould not enter-yet another example of hope frustration. 

b. Parable of the Plums links the story to Christ, whopreached by way of parables.

2. Stephen takes the theme of promise from the Old Testamentand the theme of salvation from the New Testament andworks them into a bawdy parable about the frustration ofIreland’s yearning for independence. 

a. Nelson’s pillar commemorates a British naval hero whowas also a one-armed adulterer.  

b. The old virgins seemed to be titillated by this“one handled adulterer.”  

c. Hence, the parable suggests that Ireland has long sincelost its virginity to English power.

VIII. This is a chapter of frustrated expectations and windy

speechmaking -- against which Stephen strives to find his own voice.

Supplementary Reading: 

Attidge, “Aeolus’ without Wind,” in Beja and Norris, pp. 179-201.

Questions to Consider:

1. Why is the headline “O, HARP EOLIAN” Used to introduce a passage

in which Professor MacHugh twangs a piece of dental floss between

his teeth?

2, Compare the reception that Stephen gets tom the other men in this

chapter with the ways in which they respond to Bloom.

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SIX
Lecture Seven--Hades
(from "Joyce's Ulysses" by Professor James A.W. Hefferman of Dartmouth College)

Scope:

This chapter is called “Hades” because it reenacts Ulysses’s
journey to the realm of Hades, Who was lord of the dead in Greek
mythology. As Bloom and several other men ride to the cemetery
for the burial of Paddy Dignam, we are reminded ofthe various
references to death that have already occurred in the novel,
beginning with Stephen’s thoughts about his dead mother in
chapter 1. Because Bloom now thinks again of his dead son, Rudy,
and of his dead father, the chapter as a whole seems a memento
mori, a reminder that “in the midst of life, we are in death.” Yet in
spite of all the signs of death around him and his memories ofthe
dead, Bloom is resolutely life-affirming and, like Ulysses, he
returns from the realm of the dead to the World of the living at the
end ofthe chapter. Hence, its basic message reverses the apothegm
quoted above. “In the midst of death,” this chapter shows, “we are
in life.”

Outline

I. ln telling the story of a burial, this chapter highlights the theme of
death, which has already been introduced in previous chapters and
which takes a prominent place in virtually all great epics, including The
Odyssey.

A. Previous chapters include various references to death.

1. Stephen talks with Mulligan about his dead mother in chapter 

2. Chapter 2 includes discussion of bloody warfare. 

3. ln chapter 3, Stephen sees a dead dog and thinks about a
drowned man. 

4. In chapter 4, Bloom briefly remembers the death of his infant son. 

5. In chapter 5, Bloom thinks of his dead father.

B. Death is a prominent feature of epic poetry, including Homer’s.

1. Nearly all great epics of Western literature include a trip to the
underworld. 

2. In Homer’s Odyssey, Ulysses goes to the underworld and
meets the shades of various Greek heroes. He also talks to the
shade of his own man, Elpenor, who died after getting drunk
and accidentally jumping off the roof of the palace of Circe,
the enchantress.

II. Various characters in this chapter correspond to figures in the Hades
episode of The Odyssey.

A. Paddy Dignam, who drank himself to death, is the counterpart of
Homer’s Elpenor. 

B. The shade of Agamemnon, the Greek king killed by his wife and
her lover, is recalled by the grave of Charles Stewart Parnell,
Ireland’s uncrowned king, who was politically destroyed by the
revelation of his affair with a married woman. 

C. John O’Cormell, the cemetery caretaker, recalls Hades, lord of the
dead. 

D. Cerberus, the dog who guards the Lmderworld, reappears in the
doglike Father Coffey.

III. ln addition to recalling several characters from Ulysses’s visit to the
underworld, this chapter also re-creates the action of the Homeric
episode.

A. Just as Ulysses sails northwest to reach the land of the
Cimmerians, so do the mourners travel by carriage to a cemetery
northwest of central Dublin. 

B. The mourners also cross two rivers and two canals that together
recall the four rivers of Hades. 

C. .lust as Ulysses retums to the world ofthe living at the end ofthe
Homeric episode, so does Bloom walk back out through the
cemetery gates at the end of this chapter.

IV. Paradoxically, this chapter about death reveals-through the eyes of
Bloom-the irrepressibility of life. Reversing the apothegm that “inthe
midst of life, we are in death,” the chapter affirms that “in the midst of
death, we are in life.”

A. Bloom’s sighting of Stephen makes him think not just of Rudy’s
early death but also of the moment when he was conceived.

1. As the funeral carriage starts off, Bloom catches sight of
Stephen heading to Sandymount Strand, where he walks and
meditates in “Proteus.” 

2. Though Simon Dedalus simply rages at Mulligan for
corrupting Stephen, Bloom thinks of the son that Rudy might
have become. 

3. He also recalls the moment of Rudy’s conception, when the
sight of two dogs “at it” prompted Molly to ask him for “a
touch.”

a. Darcy O’Brien thinks this makes their sexual act “bestial
and obscene.” 

b. But Bloom is celebrating the sudden explosion of life
here: “How life begins,” he says to himself.

B. Bloom also reveals his unabashed love of life in his thoughts about
the sexual ripening of his daughter, Milly. '

V. Nevertheless, Bloom must struggle to preserve his commitment to life
against painful thoughts.

A. The sight of Blazes Boylan reminds him of what Boylan is
planning with Molly. 

B. Mr. PoWer’s tactless denunciation of suicide reminds him of his
father’s death. 

C. The sight of a child’s coffin reminds him of Rudy’s death and his
own possible responsibility for that death.

1. Bloom thinks of an ancient Jewish belief that a child’s health
reflects the virility of his father. 

2. lf he sees himself as responsible for Rudy’s death, this could
explain why he cannot bear to have another child and, hence,
has not had sex with Molly since Rudy’s death.

VI. No matter how hard he tries to be pan of the group of Christian
mourners, Bloom is made to feel isolated because of his Jewishness

A. Bloom is not allowed to identify himself with the others’ aversion
to a Jewish moneylender, nor to finish his funny story about the
moneylender.

1. When Simon Dedalus curses the moneylender, Martin
Cunningham says that “nearly all of us” have borrowed from
him-implicitly excluding Bloom. 

2. When Bloom tries to tell a funny story about the moneylender
to show that he is one ofthe boys~or one of the goys-
Cunningham steals the punchline.

B. A newspaperman who knows Bloom well enough to borrow fiom
him tactlessly asks him for his “Christian name,” then misspells
the sumame in the newspaper.

VII. Rejecting the Christian doctrine ofthe afterlife, Bloom tinnly believes
in the indestructibility of life on earth.

A. Christian burial is guided by the doctrine of the resurrection, the
belief that all good Christians who die will one day rise again and
go to heaven, just as Christ himself did. 

B. Though Bloom rejects the Christian doctrine of the resurrection, he
believes that life on earth continues indefinitely.

1. Corpses fertilize the ground, as exemplified by giant poppies
in Chinese cemeteries. 

2. Bloom thinks that a telephone should be putzinto each coffin
in case the corpse is still living. 

3. He also believes that gramophones should be used to preserve
the voices of the dead. 

4. He’s delighted to see a fat old rat scratching the pebbles
beside a crypt.

Vlll. Just as Ulysses returns to the World ofthe living after his visit to the
underworld, so Bloom happily steps out of the cemetery at the end of
this chapter.

A. He repeatedly affirms his faith in life against everything that
conspires to kill it. 

B. Unlike Simon Dedalus, who wants tojoin his wife in death, Bloom
emphatically wants to live.

Supplementary Reading:
Adams, “Hades,” in Hart and Hayman, pp. 91-114.

Questions to Consider:
l. Why does Bloom reject the doctrine of the resurrection?
2. ln a chapter devoted to the burial of Paddy Dignam, why do we leam
almost nothing about Dignam himself? Why, for instance, do we hear
not one word ofa eulogy for him?