The Ugly Duckling of the Book

Joyce told Frank Budgen that "Ithaca" was the ugly duckling of the book and his favorite. Philip Kitcher starts with why it puts readers off: the whole episode is questions and answers, in the manner of a schoolbook of facts Joyce knew as a boy, dressed up in long words that sound precise and often answer something other than what you wanted to know. Along the way it tells you Bloom's height, his funds, and a good deal about water flows in Ireland.

Kitcher follows Stephen Dedalus and Leopold Bloom to 7 Eccles Street, where Bloom, keyless, lets himself in through the kitchen, makes the cocoa, and talks. Stephen walks out the back gate and out of literature, still directionless but perhaps closer to the word known to all men. Bloom climbs into bed beside Molly Bloom, crumbs and all.

Then Kitcher reads the episode's list of Molly's supposed lovers, from Mulvey to Blazes Boylan, and makes his case. The names are the men Bloom has worried about at one time or another, and Molly has slept with none of them. On his reading, this day is the first time she has been unfaithful, and that is what makes it matter so much to Bloom.