Happy Bloomsday 2009
Here’s some clips from the 1967 film adaptation of James Joyce’s Ulysses with Milo O’Shea as Leopold Bloom including the scene which was immortalized in Kansas City by Dan O’Mara in his non-Brogeen Malarkey guise:
June 16 is called Bloomsday after the character Bloom, and because that was the date in 1904 in Dublin that Ulysses is set - although it was written some time later and published in 1922.
It was celebrated in Kansas City on Saturday gone, at the Plaza Library. As Nancy Shawver of Bloomsday Books said on Twitter, following the event:
Thanks to all who joined in our annual Bloomsday party — what fun! Special kudos to Sylvia Stoner & her crew of fantastic actors. YES!
And the more astute of you will have spotted Steve Paul of the Kansas City Star on twitter during the event:
Backstage w:Bloomsday Players, rehearsal, ‘Ulysses’ play. 30 mins to curtain. Joyce’ s bawdy text. Just handed more lines.
6:45 PM Jun 13th from mobile web
Bloomsday: In the bar. ‘Flood, gush, flow, joygush.’ The language…..’could a swim duck?’
7:16 PM Jun 13th from mobile web
Bloomsday: Nothing like hearing Molly Bloom’s soliloquy again. Four Mollys share the role this year on Plaza Lib stage. Yes yes yes.
8:35 PM Jun 13th from mobile web
Anyway, Saturday was Kansas City - I also noticed there were events in New York and Boston among other places celebrating Bloomsday on Saturday - but today, the actual official Bloomsday, is a Dublin day, for Ulysses is a Dublin book.
If you want to get an idea of the impact of the day in Ireland and on Irish people (including cynics and critics), do a search on Twitter for “Bloomsday” today - though bear in mind Dublin is 6 hours ahead of KC.
If you want to join in Kansas City today with some food as eaten by Ireland’s most famous literary character in Dublin before the Rising, here’s an excerpt from the book to give you some ideas:
Mr. Leopold Bloom ate with relish the inner organs of beasts and fowls. He liked thick giblet soup, nutty gizzards, a stuffed roast heart, liver slices fried with crustcrumbs, fried hencod’s roes. Most of all he liked grilled mutton kidneys which gave to his palate a fine tang of faintly scented urine
Enjoy.
Eolaí gan Fhéile:
