BC Bloomsday celebrants鈥攕ome sporting James Joyce-style bowler and mustache鈥攖ook turns reading Ulysses aloud during a stop in Stokes Hall. At far left are English and Irish Studies faculty member Joseph Nugent and Nina Khaghany 鈥24, who organized the event. (Photo by Guy Beiner)
Befitting a university with a distinguished Irish heritage and a leading Irish Studies program, Boston College has become a wellspring for James Joyce鈥檚 Ulysses, acclaimed as one of the 20th century鈥檚 greatest works, and one of the most challenging.
In 2007, BC was the setting for the first very Boston-based Bloomsday, an international celebration of Ulysses held every June 16, the date on which the book鈥檚 events occur. BC subsequently shifted its Bloomsday festivities to April, so as to incorporate them into the academic year.
This year, BC observed Bloomsday in November, thanks to undergraduates in the class on Ulysses taught by Joyce scholar Joseph Nugent, a professor of the practice in the English Department and Irish Studies faculty member. The students organized a moveable feast-like marathon reading of the book (an activity at many Bloomsday celebrations) at 18 locations across campus and even beyond, including Connolly House and the Chestnut Hill Reservoir; outside Corcoran Commons and 2150 Commonwealth Avenue; and in The Heights office, the Eagle鈥檚 Nest, and the Chocolate Bar鈥攕ites corresponding with locations in Dublin, where the novel鈥檚 events take place. 聽
They also assembled a related on which they planned to post a complementary podcast and movie, among other additions, and worked on individual Ulysses-oriented projects.
鈥@BCBloomsday鈥 began a little after 8 a.m. on November 10 in Connolly House and ended at about 1 p.m. the next day in the English Department conference room in Stokes Hall, as Nugent, Cyrus Rosen 鈥25, Eileen Flynn 鈥23, and Grace McPhee 鈥23 took turns reading the concluding chapter, 鈥淧enelope,鈥 its nearly 4,000-word final sentence ending with the rapturous 鈥測es I said yes I will Yes.鈥
Nugent has been a force for exploring new dimensions of Ulysses and other Irish literature through modern technology. Working with students over the years, he has adapted Ulysses as an immersive virtual reality 3D game, 鈥淛oycestick,鈥 and created a multi-media tour inspired by the book depicting Dublin in 1922, the year Ulysses was published. He鈥檚 by no means surprised by what the students can do, but he鈥檚 entirely grateful for it.
鈥淚t never fails to blow me away how interested they are in Ulysses鈥攖he class always fills up鈥攁nd how enthusiastically they take on such a complex, demanding book,鈥 said Nugent, noting that Rosen, an engineering major from Wilmington, Del., is using the DALL-E 2 artificial intelligence system to produce images for Ulysses based on specific passages from the book (鈥淭hey鈥檙e not precise,鈥 said Rosen, 鈥渂ut I think they capture the emotion in the text鈥).
The book is meant to be read alou . . .Reading it alone and silently really doesn鈥檛 do it justice. I wanted to do the marathon reading to mimic the Bloomsday tradition, and moving around campus and involving the students and faculty at BC made our project just so much more important to the study of this amazing work.
Written by Joyce as a parallel to Homer鈥檚 Odyssey, Ulysses has been hailed for its inventive technique, structure, and language, particularly its use of stream-of-consciousness. These qualities, plus a length of more than 700 pages, also make for a formidable read, as even its biggest fans acknowledge. Yet despite鈥攐r perhaps because of鈥攊ts imposing reputation, Ulysses occasionally enters the pop culture realm: A recent episode of the AMC series 鈥淜evin Can [Expletive] Himself鈥 included a scene in which a character tries to read the book; after a few seconds, clearly bewildered, she exclaims, 鈥淲hat? WHAT?鈥
None of this deterred Nina Khaghany 鈥24, an English and classical studies major from West Bloomfield, Mich., from taking Nugent鈥檚 class, or wanting to organize the marathon reading鈥攕omething her mother had participated in as an English major herself.
鈥淭he book is meant to be read aloud and, especially after our marathon reading, I am so grateful that we did so,鈥 she said. 鈥淩eading it alone and silently really doesn鈥檛 do it justice. I wanted to do the marathon reading to mimic the Bloomsday tradition, and moving around campus and involving the students and faculty at BC made our project just so much more important to the study of this amazing work.鈥
Still, Bloomsday鈥攍ike most marathons鈥攚as a feat of endurance. The reading of the 鈥淐irce鈥 chapter, which lasted from roughly 2-4:30 a.m., was 鈥渢ough,鈥 said Khaghany: 鈥淥ur delirium matched well with the intoxicated thoughts of Stephen Dedalus and Leopold Bloom,鈥 the book鈥檚 major characters. 聽
Reading Ulysses is no small task, Khaghany and McPhee readily admit, and trying to interest friends and acquaintances in it is an equally tall order.
鈥淭here are large portions that are drawn out and hard to get through,鈥 said McPhee, 鈥渁nd then there will be one sentence where you鈥檙e just floored. Some of my friends asked about the book and I said, 鈥楬ow can you not know what Ulysses is?鈥 So I read a couple of passages from the 鈥楥alypso鈥 chapter to them, and they said 鈥榃ow.鈥欌
鈥淚t鈥檚 not a novel that you just pick up; you have to live the book,鈥 said Khaghany. 鈥淚t takes over your brain, and that鈥檚 what Joyce wanted from it. Think as if you are Stephen Dedalus and Leopold Bloom; put yourself in someone else鈥檚 life and you will take away from it more than you know about yourself.鈥
Khaghany praised Nugent for inspiring her and her fellow students to see literature in a new light. 鈥淭he study of English doesn鈥檛 need to be so strict鈥攜ou know, stay in the library and read. There is so much you can do with books if you change the way you want to learn through them.鈥
Sean Smith | University Communications | December 2022