Bloomsday

The Australian Irish Heritage Association Presents: Bloomsday

Enjoy performed readings from James Joyce’s literary masterpiece Ulysses, published 1922. The novel parallels Homer’s Odyssey with main characters Stephen Dedalus (the hero of Joyce’s earlier Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man); Leopold Bloom, a Jewish advertising canvasser; and his wife, Molly as modern counterparts of Telemachus, Ulysses (Odysseus), and Penelope, respectively. The events of the novel take place in Dublin on one day, June 16, 1904 and loosely parallel the major events in Odysseus’s journey home after the Trojan War

Editor Sean Byrne presents an Exile themed selection of Ulysses extracts overlaying Perth on Dublin with guest performers Peter Holland, Diana Warnock, Irish Theatre Players Marian Byrne and Niall O’Toole, Tony Bray and featuring pianist Louise Hodge playing Edwardian parlour music of the day. Part two of the evening features a Joycean movie ‘Love’s Bitter Mystery’ under license from Scene Studios Melbourne. This immersive and intellectually satisfying film focuses on a critical year in Joyce’s life. It was created as part of Bloomsday in Melbourne’s 2022 celebration of the hundredth anniversary of the publication of James Joyce’s Ulysses.