It is interesting how being inside of Leopold Bloom's head can stand in such contrast to what we are shown when thrust into a room that he has just walked out of. In Bloom's head we see a practical man who looks around him and thinks about ownership (153), health care (162), public policy (157), and nationalism (164,165). These concerns make Bloom seem like the anti-Stephen; someone rooted in the reality of economics and social systems. However, being inside Bloom's head we watch these things transform so that his musings about an advertisement turn into, "How can you own water really? It's alway flowing in a stream, never the same, which in the stream of life we trace. Because life is a stream. (153)" Or Bloom combines all his other observations on the Irish people and their system of governance in a Yeatsian image of "wheels within wheels. (163)" From here he take us to one of his most insightful, if gloomy, rants; "Things go on the same; day after day... one born every second somewhere. Other dying every second. Since I fed the birds five minutes. Three hundred kicked the bucket... No one is anything. (164)"
Humanity becomes futile in Bloom's eyes and this, as the preface to witnessing the cannibalistic eating habits of Irish men in a pub, combines to give us a grotesque view of man. We see this in Nosey Flynn whose nose is running and constantly threatening to drop mucus into his glass. We see it even in the altruistic gesture made by Bloom to help a blind young man cross the street. What he notices is the stains on his clothes. It becomes overwhelmingly evident when Bloom discusses Sinn Fein (163) and how the Irish will not speak out against Parnell's brother because they don't want to seem un-Irish. In his discussion of Sinn Fien Bloom describes a system where man locks themsleves into an organization that could latter be seen as a trap, much as Bloom is accused of being a part of the Freemasons, a very tight knit organization.
All of this informs the grotesque image of man that Bloom offers and is heightened at the end of the chapter when, after giving us insights into the baseness of the Irish, we see him run and hide between the statues of Goddesses to avoid being seen by his wife's lover. This display of cowardess drives home the idea in this, the Legostrygonians episode of Ulysses, that most men follow each other, are gluttonous, and will "eat" each other for gain. In the light of this Bloom runs away, much as Odysseus does for the island where all the other ships had docked in a land locked area. While Bloom may seem connected to the hero in Odysseus, here for his clever forethought, ultimately he becomes a smaller man hidden behind Greek Goddesses. In a way, Joyce here makes a commentary on the character of Odysseus, or the nature of the hero itself.
1 comment:
It is interesting that Bloom, one who once favored the faint taste of urine on his kidney, is now so disgusted with the eating habits of men. Indeed, he is disgusted with humanity in general, and even gives vegetarianism value, saying it might inspire the 'poetical.'
Yes, the grotesque image of humanity is most definitely portrayed, and I'm glad you brought up that he retreats behind the goddesses. I didn't catch that. Blooms strange relationship with women is noteworthy and this instance brings home the idea that women are the powerful, cruel sex, like in the Lotus-eaters, but still, Bloom seeks to retreat in Molly's bosom.
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