One of this year’s challenges was to read Ulysses. This is one of the three companion books I chose to help me with this task. It is the first book that comes up on all the lists when looking for support in reading Ulysses. It is a straightforward book, explaining chapter by chapter without fuss, with meaning, structure and cross-references. The text includes the page numbers of the three most popular editions of Ulysses. There is also the Bloom and Dedalus family tree at the beginning, and the correspondence between the pages of the Gabler and Oxford editions. It’s a very useful book, and I couldn’t have got through Ulysses without it.
“In this mood of acceptance Bloom’s pilgrimage ends. He resigns himself contentedly to the human situation. He accepts the world, the two hemispheres, eastern and western, here represented by the two cheeks of Molly’s behind, warm, ample, full of promise and comfort. They express the silent, unchangeable animal reality underlying our changing moods and restless cerebration. They are “redolent of milk and honey” like the Promised Land. They are the symbol of abundant Nature in all her sureness and rest. Odysseus was so happy at returning to his own homeland that “he kissed the generous soil” : Bloom, stirred with desire, shifts himself and accepts the revelation given by Molly’s plump melon-sweet rump in silent contemplation. He kisses each cheek in turn, and the kisses represent his decisive and final Yes.”