He is attached to his family, grieves the loss of his son, readily helps people, and suffers from Marion’s betrayal. This unsophisticated bourgeois is sympathetic and kind, which is evident through his priorities. Bloom’s line is designed in a different style: the details of an everyday character prevail as something vital, material, and quite real is important (Thurston 8).

Stephen’s speech involves historical names, and the stream of his thoughts includes words in many languages, such as Latin, French, Greek, Italian, Spanish, and German. He is well-educated as the vastness of his knowledge is conveyed in a complex stream of his consciousness, including elements from the texts of Shakespeare, Virgil, Aristotle, Homer, and other prominent authors. For example, intellectual characteristics are represented in Stephen. Bloom’s wife, Marion, or Molly, is the modern Penelope, and the young hero of the novel, Stephen Daedalus, is a parallel to Telemachus, Odysseus’s son.Įach of the three key characters of Ulysses has its line, themes, and motives. In other words, Odyssey concentrated all the fullness of life experience, and Joyce created such a universal person, Leopold Bloom, the main character of the novel (Schwarz 42). Homer’s Odysseus is shown in all the life roles that a person can have: he is a son, husband, lover, father, leader, beggar, and diplomat.

Odysseus is a Roman name of Ulysses, who was the first of the ancient heroes having not only physical strength but also intelligence and various skills. Joyce undertook an attempt to create an epic like Homer’s Odyssey, which is quite rare in modern literature.

Learn More Endless Day, Stream of Consciousness, and Modernism

James joyce ulysses