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The New Bloomsday Book: A Guide Through Ulysses
Since 1966 readers new to James Joyce have depended upon this essential guide to Ulysses . Harry Blamires helps readers to negotiate their way through this formidable, remarkable novel and gain an understanding of it which, without help, it might have taken several readings to achieve.
The New Bloomsday Book is a crystal clear, page-by-page, line-by-line running commentary on the plot of Ulysses which illuminates symbolic themes and structures along the way. It is a highly accessible, indispensible guide for anyone reading Joyce's masterpiece for the first time.
To ensure that Blamires' classic work will remain useful to new readers, this third edition contains the page numbering and references to three commonly read editions of Ulysses : the Oxford University Press 'World Classics' (1993), the Penguin 'Twentieth-Century Classics' (1992), and the Gabler 'Corrected Text' (1986) editions.
The New Bloomsday Book is a crystal clear, page-by-page, line-by-line running commentary on the plot of Ulysses which illuminates symbolic themes and structures along the way. It is a highly accessible, indispensible guide for anyone reading Joyce's masterpiece for the first time.
To ensure that Blamires' classic work will remain useful to new readers, this third edition contains the page numbering and references to three commonly read editions of Ulysses : the Oxford University Press 'World Classics' (1993), the Penguin 'Twentieth-Century Classics' (1992), and the Gabler 'Corrected Text' (1986) editions.
272 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 1988
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Harry Blamires
42 books14 followersLibrarian Note:
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September 9, 2010
PB’S REALLY SHORT BLUFFER’S GUIDE TO ULYSSES
I know some people would like to read Ulysses but can't find the six months in their busy schedules they think they'll need, so here's the short version. It consists of the first and last lines from each chapter. It struck me how stunningly beautiful these sentences are, so even if you never do get to read Ulysses, you can get the gist of the damn thing right here. Let's go. (I also add my own summary of the action in brackets).
CHAPTER ONE
Stately, plump Buck Mulligan came from the stairhead bearing a bowl of lather on which a mirror and a razor lay crossed.
Usurper.
(Stephen and his mate have breakfast and decide to fuck off to town.)
CHAPTER TWO
You, Cochrane, what city sent for him?
On his wise shoulders through the checkerwork of leaves the sun flung spangles, dancing coins.
(Stephen does a morning of teaching history and has to put up with his boss the headmaster boring him to death.)
CHAPTER THREE
Ineluctable modality of the visible : at least that if no more, thought through my eyes.
Moving through the air high spars of a threemaster, her sails braided up on the crosstrees, homing, upstream, silently moving, a silent ship.
(Stephen mooches to town and thinks his head off about all kinds of shit.)
CHAPTER FOUR
Mr Leopold Bloom ate with relish the inner organs of beasts and fowls.
Poor Dignam!
(Introducing the fairly dull Leopold Bloom and his MILF wife Molly. Has anyone noticed Molly is a total Milf before? This point appears to have escaped the professors.)
CHAPTER FIVE
By lorries along Sir John Rogerson's quay Mr Bloom walked soberly, past Windmill Lane, Leask's, the linseed crushers, the postal telegraph office.
He saw the trunk and limbs riprippled over and sustained, buoyed highly upward, lemonyellow: his navel, bud of flesh : and saw the dark tangled curls of his bush floating, floating hair of the stream around the limp father of thousands, a languid floating flower.
(Bloom goes to a public bath and has a bit of a wank. No big deal.)
CHAPTER SIX
Martin Cunningham, first, poked his silkhatted head into the creaking carriage and, entering deftly, seated himself.
How grand we are this morning.
(They all go to a funeral and think morbid thoughts like you do.)
CHAPTER SEVEN
In the heart of the Hibernian metropolis.
Tickled the old ones too, Myles Crawford said, if the God Almighty’s truth was known!
(Stephen & some really boring types go to a newspaper office and jaw jaw jaw for what seem like hours.)
CHAPTER EIGHT
Pineapple rock, lemon platt, butter scotch.
Safe!
(Bloom goes for a pint and a pie in some pub and gets grossed out by the eating habits of his fellow human beings. Like you do.)
CHAPTER NINE
Urbane, to comfort them, the quaker librarian purred :
Laud we the gods and let our crooked smokes climb to their nostrils from our bless’d altars.
(Stephen spins some really migraine inducing theories about Shakespeare to some old fuckwits in the library. Read this and hang yourself. But we’re already half way done!)
CHAPTER TEN
The superior, the Very reverend John Conmee S.J. reset his smooth watch in his interior pocket as he came down the presbytery steps.
On Northumberland and Landsdowne roads His Excellency acknowledged punctually salutes from rare male walkers, the salute of two small schoolboys at the garden gate of the house said to have been admired by the late queen when visiting the Irish capital with her husband, the prince consort, in 1849, and the salute of Almidano Artifoni’s sturdy trousers swallowed by a closing door.
(Lots of people meander about Dublin. Some get the bus.)
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Bronze by gold heard the hoofirons, steelyringing.
Done.
(Bloom visits yet another pub, bloody hell. He fancies the barmaids.)
CHAPTER TWELVE
I was just passing the time of day with old Troy of the D.M.P. at the corner of Arbour hill there and be damned but a bloody sweep came along and he near drove his gear into my eye.
And they beheld Him, even Him, ben Bloom Elijah, amid clouds of angels ascend to the glory of the brightness at an angle of fortyfive degrees over Donohoe’s in Little Green Street like a shot off a shovel.
(To coin a phrase, this chapter’s got more rabbit than Sainsburys. These Irish guys, man they can argue.)
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
The summer evening had begun to fold the world in its mysterious embrace.
Cuckoo.
(Bloom wandering along the seafront and eyeing up this teenage girl, she must be no more than 15, and giving himself a crafty feel, like you do. Well, you might. I would never do that.)
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Deshil Holles Eamus.
Just you try it on.
(Stephen and his drinking pals round the maternity hospital and guess what, more drinking and jawing. Fuck me.)
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
The Mabbot street entrance of nighttown, before which stretches an uncobbled tramsiding set with skeleton tracks, red and green will-o’-the-wisps and danger signals.
A white lamkbin peeps out of his waistcoat pocket.
(This is the Freud-on-Acid section – Bloom and some other random guys go to the red light area to continue their carousing. Not much in the way of lapdancing or actual sex, however, sorry to disappoint.)
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Preparatory to anything else Mr Bloom brushed off the greater bulk of the shavings and handed Stephen the hat and ashplant and bucked him up generally in orthodox Samaritan fashion, which he very badly needed.
As they walked, they at times stopped and walked again, continuing their tete-a-tete (which of course he was utterly out of), about sirens, enemies of man’s reason, mingled with a number of other topics of the same category, usurpers, historical cases of the kind while the man in the sweeper car or you might as well call it in the sleeper car who in any case couldn’t possibly hear because they were too far simply sat in his seat near the end of Lower Gardiner Street and looked after their lowbacked car.
(They’re all quite drunk and rambling and shagged out, so this chapter is written in a DELIBERATELY BORING way – you can tell, can’t you – I mean, what author does that? I mean, fuck that.)
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
What parallel courses did Bloom and Stephen follow returning?
Where?
(Bloom is taking Stephen back to his house to crash because Stephen doesn’t want to go back to his own gaff because he’s hacked off with his mate. This chapter is written in question and answer fashion, and is supposed to reveal the secrets of the universe or I don’t know something along those lines. By now, who cares.)
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Yes because he never did a thing like that before as ask to get his breakfast in bed with a couple of eggs
yes and his heart was going like mad and yes I said yes I will Yes.
(I had to cheat here as the last NINETY PAGE chapter doesn’t have any punctuation in it – way to go, JJ. Anyways, this is pure milf-of consciousness as Molly Bloom of the ample proportions takes it away. If you can groove on it it’s not too bad, but 90 pages is pushing it.)
There you are. Now you can say “I haven’t read Ulysses but I have read the first and the last sentences of every chapter.” Watch how this impresses your friends! Or perhaps makes them think you’re slightly unhinged.
I know some people would like to read Ulysses but can't find the six months in their busy schedules they think they'll need, so here's the short version. It consists of the first and last lines from each chapter. It struck me how stunningly beautiful these sentences are, so even if you never do get to read Ulysses, you can get the gist of the damn thing right here. Let's go. (I also add my own summary of the action in brackets).
CHAPTER ONE
Stately, plump Buck Mulligan came from the stairhead bearing a bowl of lather on which a mirror and a razor lay crossed.
Usurper.
(Stephen and his mate have breakfast and decide to fuck off to town.)
CHAPTER TWO
You, Cochrane, what city sent for him?
On his wise shoulders through the checkerwork of leaves the sun flung spangles, dancing coins.
(Stephen does a morning of teaching history and has to put up with his boss the headmaster boring him to death.)
CHAPTER THREE
Ineluctable modality of the visible : at least that if no more, thought through my eyes.
Moving through the air high spars of a threemaster, her sails braided up on the crosstrees, homing, upstream, silently moving, a silent ship.
(Stephen mooches to town and thinks his head off about all kinds of shit.)
CHAPTER FOUR
Mr Leopold Bloom ate with relish the inner organs of beasts and fowls.
Poor Dignam!
(Introducing the fairly dull Leopold Bloom and his MILF wife Molly. Has anyone noticed Molly is a total Milf before? This point appears to have escaped the professors.)
CHAPTER FIVE
By lorries along Sir John Rogerson's quay Mr Bloom walked soberly, past Windmill Lane, Leask's, the linseed crushers, the postal telegraph office.
He saw the trunk and limbs riprippled over and sustained, buoyed highly upward, lemonyellow: his navel, bud of flesh : and saw the dark tangled curls of his bush floating, floating hair of the stream around the limp father of thousands, a languid floating flower.
(Bloom goes to a public bath and has a bit of a wank. No big deal.)
CHAPTER SIX
Martin Cunningham, first, poked his silkhatted head into the creaking carriage and, entering deftly, seated himself.
How grand we are this morning.
(They all go to a funeral and think morbid thoughts like you do.)
CHAPTER SEVEN
In the heart of the Hibernian metropolis.
Tickled the old ones too, Myles Crawford said, if the God Almighty’s truth was known!
(Stephen & some really boring types go to a newspaper office and jaw jaw jaw for what seem like hours.)
CHAPTER EIGHT
Pineapple rock, lemon platt, butter scotch.
Safe!
(Bloom goes for a pint and a pie in some pub and gets grossed out by the eating habits of his fellow human beings. Like you do.)
CHAPTER NINE
Urbane, to comfort them, the quaker librarian purred :
Laud we the gods and let our crooked smokes climb to their nostrils from our bless’d altars.
(Stephen spins some really migraine inducing theories about Shakespeare to some old fuckwits in the library. Read this and hang yourself. But we’re already half way done!)
CHAPTER TEN
The superior, the Very reverend John Conmee S.J. reset his smooth watch in his interior pocket as he came down the presbytery steps.
On Northumberland and Landsdowne roads His Excellency acknowledged punctually salutes from rare male walkers, the salute of two small schoolboys at the garden gate of the house said to have been admired by the late queen when visiting the Irish capital with her husband, the prince consort, in 1849, and the salute of Almidano Artifoni’s sturdy trousers swallowed by a closing door.
(Lots of people meander about Dublin. Some get the bus.)
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Bronze by gold heard the hoofirons, steelyringing.
Done.
(Bloom visits yet another pub, bloody hell. He fancies the barmaids.)
CHAPTER TWELVE
I was just passing the time of day with old Troy of the D.M.P. at the corner of Arbour hill there and be damned but a bloody sweep came along and he near drove his gear into my eye.
And they beheld Him, even Him, ben Bloom Elijah, amid clouds of angels ascend to the glory of the brightness at an angle of fortyfive degrees over Donohoe’s in Little Green Street like a shot off a shovel.
(To coin a phrase, this chapter’s got more rabbit than Sainsburys. These Irish guys, man they can argue.)
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
The summer evening had begun to fold the world in its mysterious embrace.
Cuckoo.
(Bloom wandering along the seafront and eyeing up this teenage girl, she must be no more than 15, and giving himself a crafty feel, like you do. Well, you might. I would never do that.)
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Deshil Holles Eamus.
Just you try it on.
(Stephen and his drinking pals round the maternity hospital and guess what, more drinking and jawing. Fuck me.)
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
The Mabbot street entrance of nighttown, before which stretches an uncobbled tramsiding set with skeleton tracks, red and green will-o’-the-wisps and danger signals.
A white lamkbin peeps out of his waistcoat pocket.
(This is the Freud-on-Acid section – Bloom and some other random guys go to the red light area to continue their carousing. Not much in the way of lapdancing or actual sex, however, sorry to disappoint.)
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Preparatory to anything else Mr Bloom brushed off the greater bulk of the shavings and handed Stephen the hat and ashplant and bucked him up generally in orthodox Samaritan fashion, which he very badly needed.
As they walked, they at times stopped and walked again, continuing their tete-a-tete (which of course he was utterly out of), about sirens, enemies of man’s reason, mingled with a number of other topics of the same category, usurpers, historical cases of the kind while the man in the sweeper car or you might as well call it in the sleeper car who in any case couldn’t possibly hear because they were too far simply sat in his seat near the end of Lower Gardiner Street and looked after their lowbacked car.
(They’re all quite drunk and rambling and shagged out, so this chapter is written in a DELIBERATELY BORING way – you can tell, can’t you – I mean, what author does that? I mean, fuck that.)
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
What parallel courses did Bloom and Stephen follow returning?
Where?
(Bloom is taking Stephen back to his house to crash because Stephen doesn’t want to go back to his own gaff because he’s hacked off with his mate. This chapter is written in question and answer fashion, and is supposed to reveal the secrets of the universe or I don’t know something along those lines. By now, who cares.)
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Yes because he never did a thing like that before as ask to get his breakfast in bed with a couple of eggs
yes and his heart was going like mad and yes I said yes I will Yes.
(I had to cheat here as the last NINETY PAGE chapter doesn’t have any punctuation in it – way to go, JJ. Anyways, this is pure milf-of consciousness as Molly Bloom of the ample proportions takes it away. If you can groove on it it’s not too bad, but 90 pages is pushing it.)
There you are. Now you can say “I haven’t read Ulysses but I have read the first and the last sentences of every chapter.” Watch how this impresses your friends! Or perhaps makes them think you’re slightly unhinged.
February 16, 2016
...and Blamires came to my rescue and saved me, and I could reach my home base or the final YES...
September 16, 2012
After just completing my first reading of Ulysses, I am joining my voice to the GR chorus of appreciation for Blamires's guide. MJ referred to it as indispensable in his review, and I concur with his assessment.
Blamires provides short, beautifully written overviews of each episode, but these overviews are not simply summaries (although his summaries are indispensable in certain passages and episodes that otherwise could be difficult to follow). Instead, Blamires also discusses some approaches to interpreting Ulysses, indicating themes and motifs that reappear throughout the novel, providing some gentle guidance for the reader to begin appreciating the intricate connections that Joyce weaves throughout the novel.
I have described Blamires's The New Bloomsday Book as serving a function similar to that of synopses of operas in playbills. He provides a sense of the action and some important elements to consider when reading Ulysses, but he does so in such a way that readers remain free to respond to Ulysses on their own terms. It's a very difficult balancing act, and one that he executes perfectly.
Blamires provides short, beautifully written overviews of each episode, but these overviews are not simply summaries (although his summaries are indispensable in certain passages and episodes that otherwise could be difficult to follow). Instead, Blamires also discusses some approaches to interpreting Ulysses, indicating themes and motifs that reappear throughout the novel, providing some gentle guidance for the reader to begin appreciating the intricate connections that Joyce weaves throughout the novel.
I have described Blamires's The New Bloomsday Book as serving a function similar to that of synopses of operas in playbills. He provides a sense of the action and some important elements to consider when reading Ulysses, but he does so in such a way that readers remain free to respond to Ulysses on their own terms. It's a very difficult balancing act, and one that he executes perfectly.
August 17, 2012
Essential for the Ulysses neophyte, like me. Don’t attempt Ulysses without reading this alongside. Some people, understandably, won’t read books that require additional explanatory texts—Shakespeare, we all know, can be completely incomprehensible without the side-by-side notes, and no fun or spoiled when rendered in updated English—but this essential précis illuminates and 100% enhances one’s pleasure from the Ulysses experience. Fact. Most attention is paid to the extremely difficult chapters—Oxen of the Sun, Circe and Eumaeus—and often the summation barely matches up to the text, but The New Bloomsday Book is entirely necessary to comprehend the subtle, esoteric parody skillz Joyce is laying down (esp. in Oxen, perhaps the hardest overall chapter). Sadly, the book is out of print or merely expensive. An updated Idiot’s Guide is needed. Perhaps all us Ulysses lovers on GR can come together and write one? (And whittle it down to under 2000 pages?)
January 2, 2015
My first book completion of 2015 puts to rest my 2014 reading of Ulysses. Blamires' guide provides succinct (especially in comparison to Joyce himself) summaries of each episode, wonderful insights into what Joyce has written not quite so clearly.
I write this with a smile and a chuckle as I made the decision fairly early on to read the guide summary AFTER reading each episode. I wanted to experience Joyce "unexplained" first, to see how my language skills and literary experience would help me. The answer has been highly variable. But I also learned that that is quite fine with me. I do want to know "correct" interpretations but I'm glad for my visceral responses too, be they right or wrong.
So I heartily endorse using this guide, just as I endorse reading Ulysses with a group of wonderful GR friends as I also did. Just don't fear allowing your own brain and spirit to wander through Ulysses on its own some of the time.
I'm quite certain I will use the Blamires' guide during any re-read of Joyce in the future.
I write this with a smile and a chuckle as I made the decision fairly early on to read the guide summary AFTER reading each episode. I wanted to experience Joyce "unexplained" first, to see how my language skills and literary experience would help me. The answer has been highly variable. But I also learned that that is quite fine with me. I do want to know "correct" interpretations but I'm glad for my visceral responses too, be they right or wrong.
So I heartily endorse using this guide, just as I endorse reading Ulysses with a group of wonderful GR friends as I also did. Just don't fear allowing your own brain and spirit to wander through Ulysses on its own some of the time.
I'm quite certain I will use the Blamires' guide during any re-read of Joyce in the future.
May 3, 2012
I will forever be grateful to Harry Blamires for writing this book. I would not have finished reading James Joyce's masterpiece, Ulysses if not for this. Ulysses is that type of book that for most people is insurmountable: they hear that it is good, they buy it, they try to read a few pages, they drop it, but they display it on their shelves like a trophy but never to read again. For an ordinary, i.e., no in-depth formal training on literature, readers (like me), I think the only way for this not to happen is to have this Blamires guide book.
Blamires wrote a caveat in his introduction: "it would be foolish to pretend that my view of Ulysses is exactly the same as the next man's." This cannot be overstated. James Joyce is a genius that he wrote a book to puzzle generations. Doris Lessing in her introduction to her equally brilliant (although not as complex as Ulysses) The Golden Notebook said that the more interpretations a reader could give to a novel, the better it is. It was short of detesting that fictions that cannot be read another way were mediocre. But I believed her and that statement was what I brought and kept in mind while reading Ulysses.
I also noticed that Blamires put Homer's characters as chapter titles in his book. Maybe this did not originate from him but it helped me appreciate Ulysses more. It gave better structure to it and Blamires even introduced the chapter by giving the Homeric parallelisms. I am still to read Homer's works. These books, Ulysses and this guide made me more interested on Homer so I have now put his two works among my to-be-read books this year. Will it help to read Homer's Odyssey first before tackling Ulysses?, my answer is no but it will help. The reason for the no is if you are to use this Blamires book, everything will be explained to you. Also, Joyce also made heavy references to Shakespeare's works such as Hamlet, Macbeth, As You Like It, etc; his other own works such as A Portait of the Artist as a Young Man and some of his short stories in Dubliners; Chaucer's tales in Canterbury such as The Wife of Bath and The Prioress' Tale; and of course, the Holy Bible. So, if you want to read Ulysses and you have to read all of these first, it will take you forever to be fully prepared.
Thank God, there was Blamires. Thank God, there was my brother who recommended this book to me.
Blamires wrote a caveat in his introduction: "it would be foolish to pretend that my view of Ulysses is exactly the same as the next man's." This cannot be overstated. James Joyce is a genius that he wrote a book to puzzle generations. Doris Lessing in her introduction to her equally brilliant (although not as complex as Ulysses) The Golden Notebook said that the more interpretations a reader could give to a novel, the better it is. It was short of detesting that fictions that cannot be read another way were mediocre. But I believed her and that statement was what I brought and kept in mind while reading Ulysses.
I also noticed that Blamires put Homer's characters as chapter titles in his book. Maybe this did not originate from him but it helped me appreciate Ulysses more. It gave better structure to it and Blamires even introduced the chapter by giving the Homeric parallelisms. I am still to read Homer's works. These books, Ulysses and this guide made me more interested on Homer so I have now put his two works among my to-be-read books this year. Will it help to read Homer's Odyssey first before tackling Ulysses?, my answer is no but it will help. The reason for the no is if you are to use this Blamires book, everything will be explained to you. Also, Joyce also made heavy references to Shakespeare's works such as Hamlet, Macbeth, As You Like It, etc; his other own works such as A Portait of the Artist as a Young Man and some of his short stories in Dubliners; Chaucer's tales in Canterbury such as The Wife of Bath and The Prioress' Tale; and of course, the Holy Bible. So, if you want to read Ulysses and you have to read all of these first, it will take you forever to be fully prepared.
Thank God, there was Blamires. Thank God, there was my brother who recommended this book to me.
November 27, 2014
For a first reading of Ulysses (attempting to read it xx years ago doesn't count...), this has been an absolutely irreplaceable guide and I can't recommend it highly enough. Blamires, despite his own philosophical world view (see his bibliography) is a tremendously intelligent guy (to judge by reading this book), and a fine Joycean scholar. Yet the book does not read like scholarship - but is rather like following an experienced guide on a relatively brief tour through a foreign city.
November 25, 2016
Blamires is Virgil to my Dante through Joyce's "Inferno,"
Ulysses
. An indispensable companion. My only complaint is that, while he brought the Baedeker, he didn't bring a dictionary, which might have proven half again as helpful. Still, his pedagogy is perfectly spotless, giving the student much at the beginning, steeping him in the milieu, then weaning him off to lesser dependence as the journey continues, but not neglecting a hearty conversation at the very end, right where it's needed.
If I make the journey again, I do it on my own, or with another traveling companion. But as a trailblazer, Blamires is very, very tough to beat.
If I make the journey again, I do it on my own, or with another traveling companion. But as a trailblazer, Blamires is very, very tough to beat.
September 21, 2019
Finished ahead of finishing Ulysses, where I have only (he says) the final two chapters, "Ithaca" and "Penelope" to go.
The good news? This is about as plain-speaking a guide as you're going to find if you're looking for someone to hold your hand while reading Joyce's classic.
The bad news? The publisher, Routledge, has put a price of $36 on this silly little (250 pp.) paperback. Shades of the university bookstore, where everything, paperback or no, is considered a "textbook" and therefore suitable for "textbook" (read: "legal stick-up") prices. Shameless.
Bottom line: borrow if you can.
The good news? This is about as plain-speaking a guide as you're going to find if you're looking for someone to hold your hand while reading Joyce's classic.
The bad news? The publisher, Routledge, has put a price of $36 on this silly little (250 pp.) paperback. Shades of the university bookstore, where everything, paperback or no, is considered a "textbook" and therefore suitable for "textbook" (read: "legal stick-up") prices. Shameless.
Bottom line: borrow if you can.
April 23, 2007
This is so helpful in the reading of Ulysses. Do yourself a favor and read them at the same time. The Bloomsday book will be your own personal Virgil, and I don't mean to compare reading Ulysses to touring hell or anything. You get my drift...
March 30, 2009
This is the only companion to have while reading Ulysses. I read the Blamires commentary first, then read the Joyce chapter. Very satisfying!
November 26, 2014
Censorious, dull, inaccurate and sloppy, this book rips the joy out of "Ulysses" and serves the corpse up for the reader to choke on. There are anachronistic comparisons to other works (comparing the trial sequence in the whorehouse chapter with Kafka's "The Trial" as an influence--a work which didn't even appear in German until after "Ulysses" was published--for example, along with references to T. S. Eliot poems that had yet to be written much less published). When information about Joyce's thought behind the work appears, it is often badly edited to conveniently fit snugly into Blamires's interpretation of the text; reading the original source in full makes it apparent that this fit should have more wiggle room. In addition to this, Blamires edits at least one of Joyce's letters quoted in the book to remove profanity and sexual slang--in the case of the Penelope chapter, it's the word "cunt." This changes the flow and meaning of the letter quoted and misleads the reader's interpretation--not very good scholarship. In addition to this, there is an unfortunate tendency to treat anything scandalous with kid gloves. At times Blamires's writing is so convoluted in its attempts to imply what happened instead of actually saying what happened that it's easier to figure out what he's talking about by reading that page of "Ulysses" without paying any attention to his commentary. (The particular example I was thinking of is when Bloom reminiscing about feeling up Mrs. Breen [aka Josie Powell] in a barn during a party many years before; Blamires makes it sound as if he made a pass at her when the text is pretty clear that much more was going down.) A fast search on Blamires reveals that he is an Anglican theologian formerly tutored by C. S. Lewis. Correlation does not inherently mean causation, but it strikes me that perhaps his religious objections as a Christian to adultery and profanity are part of the reason why his writing becomes so tortured and his scholarship dips into the realm of the slip-shod while he addresses these subjects. And let's not even get into the fact that for a reader's guide it does almost nothing to translate the multiple languages used through the text, even when there's a whole page written in languages other than English.
"Ulysses" is an intensely complicated book and a reader's guide is very helpful. I was assigned this work on my second big read and I have to say that it was helpful--to a point. But beyond that point, the book was misleading and didn't deliver on the expectations it raised.
"Ulysses" is an intensely complicated book and a reader's guide is very helpful. I was assigned this work on my second big read and I have to say that it was helpful--to a point. But beyond that point, the book was misleading and didn't deliver on the expectations it raised.
May 29, 2025
As far as reference texts go, this is one of the better ones. Sufficiently granular, but doesn't lose the forest for the trees (a criticism I lobbed at Weisenberger's Gravity's Rainbow companion). I actually found Chris Reich's video commentary on YouTube to be a more clarifying supplement to my reading, but the Bloomsday Book was an invaluable resource on a line-by-line basis. Highly recommended for first time readers, such as myself.
May 29, 2020
At first I dismissed Harry Blamires’s work, The New Bloomsday Book. A Guide through Ulysses, as a huge spoiler, a book written for lazy people who find it easier to have second-hand knowledge about famous oeuvres, instead of reading the book itself.
But because it gave me the impulse to re-read Joyce, and what a joy it was, I hereby grant it three full stars 😊.
But because it gave me the impulse to re-read Joyce, and what a joy it was, I hereby grant it three full stars 😊.
April 23, 2015
Odysseus had no guide, and look at what happened to him. Washed up naked on the shore, at the mercy of beautiful young maidens washing their panties by the sea. If you don't want that to happen to you, Mr. Blamires is here to help. This is the guide that most people want when they set off on the snot-green sea of Ulysses, and unlike the numerous commentaries and critical essays that one finds like flotsam in the lough, the Bloomsday Book is actually helpful. It's more or less a summary of the putative "action" of the novel, with minimal analysis to influence the first-time reader's virgin sensations. Blamires does have a slightly theological take on the novel, but his comments to that effect are marginal and discreet. Mostly he does what a good guide is supposed to do -- he shows you the path and stays out of the way.
September 17, 2011
Essential to the understanding of Ulysses by James Joyce. In the order of my own reading, I would read this after every chapter of Ulysses before the other books, because it was the simplest look. It would summarize the events of the chapter and sometimes point to themes or tricks, without going too deep or far.
December 18, 2014
Marvelous! Elegant analysis of father/son relationships, Ireland/England/imperialism, sexual/neglect/fear/desire/fantasy/gender blur, Jews/Christians, Homer/Shakespeare, dream states....did I say all that is in Ulysses? A book to reread, indeed!
December 26, 2024
Ulysses okumak isteyenler için olmazsa olmaz bir kılavuz kitap. Okumamış olsam Ulysses’e dair çoğu şeyi anlayamazdım.
November 15, 2021
Shoutout to this book. Brief, incisive summaries of each chapter and good reminders of trends that run throughout the book. Professor described Ulysses as a symphony and individual themes as specific instruments, in one moment driving the movement and adding but a small layer to the piece in the next. This book did a good job keeping track of those trends/themes/details, regardless of whether they were in the foreground or background of each respective chapter.
September 4, 2013
I'm pretty grateful to Blamires for pointing out all the bodily functions I would have plumb missed reading Ulysses on my own.
December 20, 2024
Bu kitap olmasaydı Ulysses çok eksik kalırdı.
Tüm detayları, göndermeleri, paralellikleri, bölümlerin birbirleriyle bağlantılarını gösteriyor. Bölüm bölüm sayfa sayfa açıklamalar var, Ulysses ile eş zamanlı ve ya bölüm sonlarında okuyabilirsiniz. Sayesinde "ne oldu şimdi?" demeden bütün taşların yerine oturduğu bir Ulysses okuması yaşadım. Mutlaka tavsiye ediyorum.
Tüm detayları, göndermeleri, paralellikleri, bölümlerin birbirleriyle bağlantılarını gösteriyor. Bölüm bölüm sayfa sayfa açıklamalar var, Ulysses ile eş zamanlı ve ya bölüm sonlarında okuyabilirsiniz. Sayesinde "ne oldu şimdi?" demeden bütün taşların yerine oturduğu bir Ulysses okuması yaşadım. Mutlaka tavsiye ediyorum.
July 3, 2022
Una guía fundamental (casi imprescindible) para los que amamos el "Ulises", de Joyce. Para no perderse ni por las calles de Dublín ni por las mentes de sus personajes.
February 9, 2025
fine as a guide - but I do not understand why people are obsessed with these details- they simply bore me. Just because a writer is making allusions to many things does not make them interesting, in fact, for me, the opposite.
January 16, 2008
Very very helpful as a companion guide to Ulysses! I started out reading a few pages in Ulysses, then bouncing back to this to get a clearer perspective on it, which gradually happened less and less (tho' the opening paragraph for each chapter was really useful to set up what was going on/the stylistic significance), until by the end I didn't need it at all -- which I think means it did its job!
Co-reading with Ulysses. Strikes an excellent balance between annotation and accessibility. It's already helped clarify some things I'd missed the first time (partway) through Ulysses.
Co-reading with Ulysses. Strikes an excellent balance between annotation and accessibility. It's already helped clarify some things I'd missed the first time (partway) through Ulysses.
September 4, 2011
I expected the primary purpose of this book to be to point out patterns and obscure references and clarify the more difficult passages in Ulysses. To some degree, it does, but it's actually closer to Cliff's Notes in that the primary purpose seems to be to summarize the book. For some chapters of Ulysses I found that to be pretty useful, for others, unnecessary.
November 25, 2011
I've decided to cut and run. You heard it! I've decided that a book like Ulysses which only elicits angst in me is not worth the investment. So I'm going to listen to my intuition and shred it to pieces. ;)
This book, for those who want to push on and read Ulysses, is probably an excellent investment for you!
Good luck. And don't cry.
This book, for those who want to push on and read Ulysses, is probably an excellent investment for you!
Good luck. And don't cry.
December 10, 2014
A very helpfull guide for the first time "Ulysses" reader. Somewhat prude in the way it deals and analyses the more overtly outrageous sexual content in the novel, but very well structured and enlightening. Overall a very good road map for the journey and challenges "Ulysses" presents for a first-time reader of the novel.
February 6, 2015
Really helpful guide for my reading of Ulysses this month, my first in a non-classroom setting. There isn't really a point of writing a long review of Ulysses (I love it, but as I get older I begin to wonder if it is all bait and no hook), but the elegant simplicity of the Blamires is worth recommending. I was too self-important to use "guides" when I was in college - I now regret it.
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