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What is Bloomsday? |
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The date Joyce chose for Bloom's perambulations was a tribute to his wife and muse Nora Barnacle. Joyce first encountered Nora, who worked at a nearby hotel, outside Trinity College. She originally mistook him for a Norwegian sailor but did agree to meet him, and so June 16th marks their first rendezvous. Why Celebrate? Read on.... Mary Durkan, Festival Director. ************************************* The festival is dedicated to the
memory of the late, much-loved Bloomsday actor Claire Crawford Guinn ************************************ Bloom Bites ·
In the summer
of 2006, the reading of Ulysses received a much-needed
boost from CBC Radio host, Jian Ghomeshi. On the What Canada Intends to Read portion of his show, Sounds Like Canada, he challenged himself and the country
to finish reading Ulysses by the end of the summer. The nationwide Ulysses
promotion was hugely successful and the response overwhelming. The summer-long publicity
may have helped to dispel the
aura of impenetrability that’s grown up around Ulysses. ·
This past
year, a number of groups took up the Ulysses challenge and spent the
winter exploring the book’s depths. I was involved with one inspiring group
organised by Classical Pursuits
and its director, Ann Kirkland, a long-time Bloomsday enthusiast. Our
Ulyssian sherpa was Prof. Michael
Groden, a renowned Joyce scholar and consultant to the Irish Government
in the acquisition of the Joyce manuscripts exhibited at the National
Library’s Joyce Centenary Exhibition in Dublin in 2004. ·
Earlier this
year, when the Joyce Research Centre was inaugurated at University College
Dublin, Joyce’s alma mater, Michael gave the keynote address. ·
In the
spring, I was invited by Sheilagh Hickie to visit another Toronto group that
was happily exploring Ulysses. In the guise of Molly
Bloom, I spent a very entertaining morning at UofT’s Knox College with
members of the Academy for Lifelong
Learning. ·
Something we’ve all discovered is that in
order to fully appreciate the enormous riches of Ulysses, it helps to
hear the text read aloud. Hence, the Bloomday celebration!
·
The Toronto Bloomsday Festival is twinned with the Glasthule/Sandycove Bloomsday Festival
which takes place in Caveston’s of Glasthule and Fitzgerald’s of Sandycove, in the shadow
of the
Martello Tower immortalised in the opening chapter of Ulysses. The Toronto Bloomsday is prominently featured in the Vintage book “yes I said yes I will Yes” celebrating 100 years of Bloomsday. Film maker Fritzi Hortstman, director of the 2004 documentary Joyce to the World, has described the Toronto Bloomsday as glorious...wonderful.. with amazing actors....in the top two Bloomsday celebration anywhere . Special centenary ReJoyce! tshirts will be on sale during the festivities.
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© Anna
Livia Productions 1999-2004 James Joyce Logo © Anna Livia Productions
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