Blooms & Barnacles

Kelly and Dermot discuss the stories of Elizabeth Aldworth, the lady mason, and author P.L. Travers

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Eglinton knows Best.

Topics in this episode include the real-life versions of John Eglinton and Richard Best, Best’s contribution to the study of Irish mythology, how Best supported James Joyce’s abandoned music career, what his portrayal in Ulysses gets right and wrong, how the real Best felt about his fictional counterpart in Ulysses, gay-coding and homophobia in the fictional portrayal of Best, Oscar Wilde, the ancient Greeks, Joyce’s misguided attempt to re-connect with Best in 1909, William Kirkpatrick Magee (aka John Eglinton) and his contribution to Irish literature, Eglinton as an outsider, stories of Joyce and Gogarty terrorizing Eglinton, a rude limerick, the time Eglinton rejected Joyce’s Portrait, and Eglinton’s reaction to being portrayed in Ulysses.

Who Were the Real Men in the Library from "Scylla and Charybdis"?

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Here be monsters.

We crack into Ulysses' ninth episode: "Scylla and Charybdis." Topics in this episode include: a great philosopher's thoughts on Shakespeare, Dermot, another great philosopher's, thoughts on Shakespeare, Odysseus' encounter with Scylla and Charybdis, the geography and currents of the Strait of Messina that likely inspired the story of Scylla and Charybdis, the triumphant return of Stephen Dedalus, Aristotle and Plato, George Æ Russell the engulfer of souls, why the brain is man's cruelest weapon, intellectual dialectic contrasted with empty rhetoric, the National Library of Ireland and why it's great, "The Holy Office", well-timed lunch, Stephen Dedalus' three forms of literature, Henrik Ibsen and the primacy of drama in Stephen's literary schema, and how to navigate between two sea monsters.

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We discuss Oscar Wilde's novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray.

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We discuss the 1949 film, The Third Man because James Joyce is briefly mentioned in it. Also, it's a really good movie.

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A wild Blazes Boylan appears.

Topics in this episode include the incredible story of Reverend Thomas Connellan, the Bible Wars, Soupers, the Bird’s Nest orphanage, apostasy and conversion, a typographical error heroically corrected, the blind stripling, whether or not the blind stripling actually wants help from Leopold Bloom, Bloom’s savior complex, Bloom’s empathy, the history of blind piano tuners, whether or not blind people’s other senses are stronger than those of sighted people, whether or not wine loses its flavor based on appearance, parallels between the blind stripling and Stephen Dedalus, how Joyce’s eye trouble influenced the development of the blind stripling, how Joyce used the blind stripling to work out his personal stuggles on the page, the dreams of blind people, the General Slocum disaster, Sir Frederick Falkiner, the Mirus Bazaar, Handel’s Messiah, and escaping Blazes Boylan.

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I need to see a man about a horse.

Topics in this episode include a return to nutarianism, Tom Rochford’s surprisingly heroic back story, the Ascot Gold Cup, racehorses with weird names, Jack B. Yeats’ Olympic career, the life cycle of a pernicious rumor, Tom Rochford’s invention, Don Giovanni’s ending (spoiler alert), peristalsis nearing its inevitable conclusion, Prescott’s Dye Works, gambling culture in Edwardian Dublin, the class consciousness of gambling culture, whether it’s better to win or lose a wager, the alienation of the gambler, Bloom’s immunity to society’s “narcotics”, the symbolism of horses, a fear of horses, the racialisation of orientalism, the performance of masculinity, the masculinity of Blazes Boylan contrasted with the masculinity of Leopold Bloom, and why you should bet on the dark horse.

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Artist Penelope Wade joins the podcast to discuss her project, "The Tarot of Mme Marion Bloom." Wade uses collages of found objects to create densely symbolic images based on the themes and characters in Ulysses. She has arranged her collages into a one-of-a-kind tarot deck. We discuss tarot, Ulysses, Molly Bloom. Kelly even gets a tarot reading!

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You can see Penelope's art at her website.

Are you on the level?

Topics in this episode include discussion of whether or not Leopold Bloom is a freemason, how well Nosey Flynn knows the business of the other Dubliners, why Bloom never thinks about being a freemason, whether or not Tom Kernan is in the craft, whether or not you can leave the freemasons, freemason symbols and lore, whether Bloom has connections to the upper echelons of Dublin society, the Hungarian lottery tickets scandal, what James Joyce knew about freemasons, times when Bloom deploys freemason symbols, the Catholic Church’s campaign against the freemasons, how that campaign was also antisemitic, and why Æ was talking about octopuses.

Was Leopold Bloom a Freemason?

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Zoe Patterson of Trinity College Dublin joins Blooms & Barnacles to talk about about her research into James Joyce community groups.

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