Happy Bloomsday.

A friend of mine in Ireland kindly sent me a postcard from Charlie Byrne’s bookshop in Galway. The card shows the shop window decked out with a James Joyce display to commemorate Bloomsday which is today June 16^th. It reminded me that I ought to write a little piece for Bloomsday myself. In the Van Morrison fan groups we had a friend called Birgit from Berlin who loved all things Irish and always remembered Bloomsday, So I would like to dedicate this little effort in memory of Birgit. 

Bloomsday is always held on June 16^th because that was the date in 1904 when the events of James Joyce’s masterpiece novel Ulysses take place. It is called Bloomsday after the protagonist in the novel called Leopold Bloom. There is a Bloom's Hotel in Dublin. Me and Kim stayed there many years ago. Joyce chose June 16th 1904 because it was on that day that he first went out with his future wife Nora Barnacle. Six years ago, when I was in Dublin, I went in a bookshop which was one of the locations visited by Leopold Bloom in Ulysses. In 1904 it was a pharmacy called Sweny’s where Bloom bought some lemony soap. I bought a print of Joyce in the shop as a souvenir of Dublin, had it framed and hung it on a wall at home..It was memorable for me because every afternoon they have a Joyce reading in the shop. I listened for a while, and they asked me if I would like to read a bit. I declined because I have a phobia about reading in public. I thought it was a great little shop though, and very nice people working there.

I am not a Joyce expert by any means. I have read Dubliners and Portrait Of The Artist As A Young Man and attempted Ulysses. I haven’t even attempted to start Finnegan’s Wake. One thing I am quite proud of though is that my family owned a pub in County Mayo called Joyce’s. There are a lot of Joyces in Mayo and Galway. It is known as ‘Joyce Country’, so I like to think I have a connection to James Joyce. Another small link is that my surname is Corley. In his book Dubliners Joyce wrote a story called Two Gallants in which one of the protagonists is called Corley, I would love to know why he chose that name.

Kim, Me, & James Joyce.

The first Bloomsday was held in 1954 on the 50th anniversary of the fictional events, when the writers and poets Brian O’Nolan (Flann O’Brien), Anthony Cronin, and Patrick Kavanagh, along with artist John Ryan, James Joyce’s cousin Tom Joyce and lecturer A.J. Leventhal decided to have a pilgrimage to all the locations mentioned in the book. They set off in two horse-drawn cabs of the type Bloom would have used. The first port of call was the Martello Tower at Sandycove which is where the book begins. The day descended into drunken chaos and arguing, they didn’t visit most of the intended locations and finally abandoned the day in the Bailey pub. That was bound to happen with the likes of Brian O’Nolan and Patrick Kavanagh involved. John Ryan shot some amateur footage of that historic day. I have shared it to this page if you want to see it.

First Bloomsday 1954.

They had planted a seed, and Bloomsday has grown over the years into a huge event. Because of Covid a lot of the activities are online this year. If you google Bloomsday Festival 2021 you can see what is on offer. If you are lucky enough to be in Dublin there are walking tours and other events you can join. I can’t think of anything else to say about Bloomsday now, except Happy Bloomsday !

PS, I took my friend's postcard from Charlie Byrne's Bookshop round to the pub and put it on the wall in Curly's Corner next to a card my brother Paul sent me from Shakespeare & Company's Bookshop in Paris. They go together because it was Shakespeare & Company who first published Ulysses in 1922. Paul's card shows the poet and owner of City Lights Bookshop Lawrence Ferlinghetti with the owner of Shakespeare & Co George Whitman..