Bloomsday

We hope you’re enjoying the holiday. That’s right, it’s Bloomsday.

On June 16, 1904, James Joyce and his future bride, Nora Barnacle, took a stroll in Dublin. In Joyce’s novel Ulysses, Leopold Bloom walks the same streets on the same date. Years later, a literary holiday was born:

“The day was 16 June, 1954, and though it was only mid-morning, Brian O’Nolan [Flann O’Brien] was already drunk. This day was the fiftieth anniversary of Mr. Leopold Bloom’s wanderings through Dublin, which James Joyce had immortalised in Ulysses.

To mark this occasion a small group of Dublin literati had gathered …just below the Martello tower in which the opening scene of Joyce’s novel is set. They planned to travel round the city through the day, visiting in turn the scenes of the novel, ending at night in what had once been the brothel quarter of the city, the area which Joyce had called Nighttown.”

– From flann o’brien, an illustrated biography, Peter Costello and Peter Van De Kamp, quoted in “the first bloom(sday),” Raynor Ganan, The Ragbag

While the term “Bloomsday” was never used by Joyce, the literary holiday is now observed worldwide.

No time or patience to read the 1040-page novel? Relax.

Ulysses Cheat Sheet, Mental Floss

“The Only Bloomsday Sentences You Will Ever Need to Know,” Margret Soltan, University Diaries (part two is here)

“Everything You Need to Enjoy Reading James Joyce’s Ulysses on Bloomsday,” Colin Marshall, Open Culture

“Celebrate Bloomsday With a Look at Joyce’s Handwritten Manuscript,” Hannah Keyser, Mental Floss

“Bloomsday Is a Travesty, but Not for the Reason You Think,” James S. Murphy, Vanity Fair

___________________

Short Link: http://wp.me/p6sb6-jrc

Image (“Bloomsday 2014, after Patrick Tuohy”) by Mike Licht. Download a copy here. Creative Commons license; credit Mike Licht, NotionsCapital.com

Comments are welcome if they are on-topic, substantive, concise, and not boring or obscene. Comments may be edited for clarity and length

Add to: Facebook | Digg | Del.icio.us | Stumbleupon | Reddit | Blinklist | Twitter | Technorati | Yahoo Buzz | Newsvine

Tags: 16 Meitheamh, Bloomsday, holidays, Irish literature, James Joyce, Joyce, June 16, June sixteenth, Lá Bloom, literary holidays, literature, Ulysses