Category: Ulysses

The order of evacuation by the authorities demonstrates the intensity of the danger, and the information Heinrich provides, as ambiguous as it is, further questions the sense of living. The cloud, a by-product of a consumer product designed to remove the discomforts of nature from our world, is a literalized culmination of the various insidious waves and radiation that Heinrich informs his family are killing the Gladney’s every day. The invisible killers have materialized in the form of the cloud.

The cloud’s toxicity and its ability to create fear and panic in the novel’s characters seem to represent what Buell refers to as “toxic discourse,” which he says “can be sweepingly defined as expressed anxiety arising from perceived threat of environmental hazard due to chemical modification by human agency” (31).

Jack describes the evacuation as a religious journey. Jack sees the event in almost biblical proportions, a mass exodus of people from the Holy Land. Not only does his description invoke epic imagery of “doom and ruin,” but the image of the cloud, surrounded and illuminated by police helicopters invokes the type of “gothification” that Buell names: “The enormous dark mass moved like some death ship in a Norse legend, escorted across the night by armored creatures with spiral wings” (127). Here, the cloud invokes images of gothic beasts waiting to descend upon him.

The death threat of airborne toxic event demonstrates a postmodern perspective of death, a perspective that separates death from the self. After being exposed to Nyodene D, Gladney goes to the SIMUVAC authorities who conduct “a massive data-base tally” in which they put information about Gladney into a computer. The computer “comes back pulsing stars” and the SIMUVAC man explains, “this doesn’t mean anything is going to happen to you as such, at least not today or tomorrow. It just means you are the sum total of your data. No man escapes that” (141). Despite the ambiguous results, Gladney interprets the data to mean “death has entered,” and says,

It is when death is rendered graphically, is televised so to speak, that you sense an eerie separation between your condition and yourself. A network of symbols has been introduced, an entire awesome technology has been wrested from the gods. It makes you feel like a stranger in your own dying. (142)

Jack is disturbed by this postmodern sense of death. The fact that death seems to have been reduced to a set of data becomes more insidious and inevitable. Death becomes less a part of the process of living. Death as a sign of Gladney’s struggle against postmodern perceptions of life, the reality of death still exists for him. Exposure to the toxic cloud makes Gladney more aware of the reality and inevitability of death. The toxicity represents the reality of life and death, what Jack refers to as “seeping” and “falsehearted.”

DeLillo suggests the lasting impact of Nyodene D survives among the children along with the lives. For instance, Jack’s youngest daughter, Steffie distrusts the environment around her. After the second evacuation from the toxic cloud, she refuses to take off her protective mask.

Steffie refuses to take off the mask designed to protect her from the equally invisible dangers of the toxic cloud. Later in the novel, Jack finds her conscientiously participating in the Simuvac procedures, drills performed to practice for another real environmental emergency. DeLillo shows Steffie as a person who thinks of herself at the age of nine, “already a victim, trying to polish her skills.. .deeply imbued with the idea of a sweeping disaster” and Jack wonders, “is this the future she envisioned?” (205). The future of all children at Blacksmith was envisioned through Steffie and Heinrich who participate in drills. The airborne toxic event is not simply dropped into the novel; it forms the characters’ consciousness, feeds into and informs the fear of death.

Lentricchia points and the toxic cloud as “some death ship in a Norse legend, escorted across the night by armored creatures with spiral wings” (127) as evidence of impact of the unreal future and living.

Technological development influenced the children of the novel White Noise. The children relay more on scientific development rather than their family relationships and own consciousness. Fine example for the influence of technology is the conversation between Gladney and his son Heinrich on rainfall. Jack struggled with his son to make him recognize the reality of the rainfall. Heinrich argues with Jack and questions the reality Jack referred as rain. He does not trust the stuff falling from the sky is rain and accuses,

you’re so sure that’s rain. How do you know it’s not sulfuric acid from factories across the river? How do you know it’s not fallout from a war in China? You want an answer here and now. Can you prove, here and now, that this stuff is rain? How do I know that what you call rain is really rain? What is rain anyway?”

In the end, Jack sarcastically responds, “A victory for uncertainty, randomness and chaos. Science’s finest hour”. (WN 24) Jack and his son Heinrich’s discussion on rain demonstrates Gladney’s struggle against the American surroundings that are controlled by the media and argues for evidence rather than accepting the reality.

The power of media even questions the human reality. DeLillo presents a conversation that questions the reality of human senses. It also argues that media overpowers human reality. For instance, Heinrich informs jack, “It’s supposed to rain tonight,” but Gladney replies, “It’s raining now.” The uncertainty on reality becomes an argument between Jack and his son adding,

“The radio said tonight”….

“Look at the windshield,” I said. “Is that rain or isn’t it?”

“I’m only telling you what they said.”

“Just because it’s on the radio doesn’t mean we have to suspend belief in the

evidence of our senses.”

“Our senses? Our senses are wrong a lot more often than they’re right.”….

As Stephan Dedalus from James Joyce Ulysses question the human reality; Heinrich in White Noise questions the reality of life. Heinrich does not just offer a philosophical questioning of reality; after all, would this be all too new? Doesn’t Stephen Dedalus in “Proteus,” the third chapter of James Joyce’s Ulysses, go through a similar questioning of reality when he walks with his eyes closed to test whether his perception of the world is what makes it real? He walks and listens to the “Crush, crack, crick, crick” under his feet telling him that the world is still there. Finally, he commands himself, “open your eyes now. I will. One moment. Has all vanished since?” He opens his eyes and discovers that Sandymountstrand still exists and calms himself: “see now. There all the time without you: and ever shall be, world without end” (Ulysses 37). DeLillo addresses such questions and, like Joyce, affirms the existence of material reality.

Jack attempts to hide the fear of death by creating an image of him as powerful person. He accomplished himself as a powerful person through the role as Chairman of Hitler Studies at the College on the Hill. After heading the department, Jack created a powerful persona to go along with his new position. He changed his name from Jack to J.A.K., gains weight, and dons a pair of glasses “with thick black heavy frames and dark lenses.” Wearing these glasses and a black academic robe gives Jack a sense of power, despite his realization that “I am the false character that follows the name around” (17). Jack believes that the association with Hitler would provide protection from death. He feels that the power and control that Hitler wielded in life will overshadow his own weaknesses and vulnerabilities. The mere thought of Jack lead him not to realise the reality of life in the beginning of the novel.

Another way Jack attempts to stave off death is through consumption. For instance, at the beginning of the novel Jack admits that “the mass and variety of our purchases” brings a feeling of “wellbeing, the security and contentment these products brought to some snug home in our souls” (20). In a desperate attempt to quell his fear of death, Jack enthusiastically engages in his consumer culture and associates himself with all things German.

Reverting to his alternate method of protection, Jack admits, “the encounter put me in the mood to shop.” He proceeds to puzzle and excite his family with his “desire to buy” (83), as if he can gain the power that he just lost through purchasing consumer products. Jack goes on a frenzied shopping spree. As his daughters help him to buy as much as possible, he considers them “guides to endless well-being” (83). As he shops he feels himself beginning “to grow in value and self-regard” (84). Shopping gives Jack a sense of empowerment similar to his dark glasses and academic role. He is able to escape the subjective self. These techniques are thus, to a certain extent, similar to his attempt to murder. Each is an attempt to repress the subjective self in favour of an image of the self as powerful, larger than life.

Next major attempt Jack took to overcome the fear of death was following Siskind advice of murdering Willie Mink also known as Mr.Gray, the man with whom Babette had an illegal affair in order to get the Dylar tablets. Siskind tells Jack, there are two kinds of people in the world. Killers and diers. Most of us are diers. We don’t have the disposition, the rage or whatever it takes to be a killer. We let death happen. We lie down and die. But think what it’s like to be a killer. Think how exciting it is, in theory, to kill a person in direct confrontation. If he dies, you cannot. To kill him is to gain life-credit” (290).

He continues, “the more people you kill, the more credit you store up. It explains any number of massacres, wars, executions” (290). The advice is not only immoral; it is also absurd. Jack follows it anyway. In an attempt to stave off death and to gain power, Jack decides to kill Willie Mink to overcome the fear of death.

Gladney felt that murdering a person gains power over death. He says, “I sensed I was part of a network of structures and channels. I knew the precise nature of events. I was moving closer to things in their actual state as I approached a violence, a smashing intensity” (305). With this violent act Jack thought that he will become something magnificant; he will be a killer. After shooting Mink twice Gladney says, “I tried to see myself from Mink’s viewpoint. Looming, dominant, gaining life-power, storing up life-credit” (312). This figure echoes Siskind’s description of Hitler as one of the “epic men who intimidate and darkly loom” (287). Siskind had told Jack that, “some people are larger than life. Hitler is larger than death” (287). Jack tries to imagine himself more powerful and larger than death, but it does not quite work.

Gladney’s murderous plot is yet another attempt to stave off death. The plan concentrates on images more than strategic details, revealing familiar murder scenes from television and movies. One of the main elements of Jack’s plan is to “walk home in the rain and the fog” (304). He repeats the step of the plan four times. He was so consumed with the image of the walk through the rain and fog that it does not even occur to him. While having nothing to do with the logistics of his plan, the rain and fog will dramatize the image he is creating of himself as a “killer.”

Another important aspect of Jack’s plan was the image of the victim. His first plan is to write “a cryptic suicide note on the full length mirror”(304) with lipstick or crayon. He has no idea if the motel room has a full-length mirror, and for some reason he believes there will be a crayon or lipstick tube lying around the room. This is because the crayoned message will correspond with familiar images of murder scenes. After entering the motel room and seeing Mink, he slightly changes the plan. He says he will “put the gun in his hand to suggest a lonely man’s suicide, write semi-coherent things on the mirror” (306). Jack’s plan also includes the image of his victim as a “lonely man,” half out of his senses. His plan soon changes to “write suicidal cult messages on the mirrors and walls” (309). His final plan is the most elaborate and detail oriented. He decides to , “place the weapon in the victim’s hand to suggest the trite and predictable suicide of a motel recluse, smear crude words on the walls in the victim’s own blood as evidence of his final cult-related frenzy” (311). Jack creates and recreates the plan onslaught of images during the short period that he is in the motel room preparing to kill Mink. Jack’s plan and preparation to murder depicts the varying murder scenes he has seen on television, read in the papers, and heard on the radio. Jack’s murder plan proves that he is highly influenced by media and dependent on media.

Ulysses is dwelling on his return home after his long and fulfilling journey through the seas and is unsatisfied with what he has returned to. He is longing for the satisfaction of sharing the adventures that he experienced after the Trojan war, however, he is disappointed when his kingdom is nothing but ungrateful. Ulysses feels disrespected when all that the kingdom wants from him is to do what he is expected to as a king. This disregards Ulysses’ wishes as this is not what he wants with his life, rejecting the status quo. He wishes for new experiences that will enhance his life, experiences that will give him the opportunity to travel and figure out what he wants. The thought of watching the world go by is daunting for Ulysses. This is shown when he says, “As though to breathe were life” meaning that just because you may be breathing, that doesn’t mean you are necessarily living. To follow his passion and desire of exploring, Ulysses leaves his throne to his son, Telemachus. He feels as though Telemachus is more fit for the position than he ever will be, and will be more passionate and successful when leading the kingdom. Ulysses is aware of what Telemachus’ is capable of and he believes his son has a better chance of leading the “rugged people” of Ithaca into civilization. Thus, enabling him to return to the life of adventure with his mariners, accepting the dangers and thrills of the journey.

Ulysses has spent the majority of his life working towards one goal, what he thought to believe to be his purpose in life for an extensive amount of time, returning home to be king. Throughout this journey, he realized it is not about the destination, alternatively, he found value in what it took to get there. This made him realize he did not want the destination of being king, instead his passion was an adventure. Ulysses is not the only one who believed they were destined for something greater than where they currently were. Jeff Bezos, billionaire and founder of Amazon, was not always on the entrepreneurial path. Similar to Ulysses, Bezos began his journey living as what he thought was his purpose. His entrepreneurship that lead to Amazon was not his first passion, Bezos graduated from Princeton then worked on Wall Street in a computer science field. In Jeff’s case, it took a road trip rather than a journey to Ithaca, to create the concept of Amazon. Although Jeff was not as aged as Ulysses, he still only found his vocation at a later point in his life. Bezos was only 30 when he quit the job at D.E. Shaw and moved to Seattle, to open a virtual bookstore. It took the journey from NY or SA for Jeff to find his true passion. Today, people are still struggling to figure out what their purpose in life is, and sometimes one may take the wrong path to get to where they want to be. The message being conveyed is that while it may take multiple tries to get there, you should never give up, that is what Ulysses did.

Rather than being a man that people genuinely knew, Ulysses has become a legend, he has “become a name”. Like all legends, the less important and interesting parts are usually not mentioned often, and he is expressed more as a figure rather than a human being. Although he is known as a legend, it has resulted in people forgetting the fact that he was a person in the first place; viewing him only as a king, expecting him to follow certain standards. Following the standard of “What People will think and Say”, prevents individuals of living the way they desire. The lesson learnt is that real happiness will be felt when we listen to our hearts and feelings. Life is short, so do not waste it in prioritizing other people before yourself, in terms of happiness.

Mother Teresa, an Albanian-Indian Roman Catholic nun and missionary who was honoured in the Catholic Church once said “Be happy in the moment, that’s enough. Each moment is all we need, not more.” Life is about doing what makes you happy, you do not need an eternity to find it, all that matters is that you find your happiness, regardless of time, and follow whatever leads you to your happiness. That is what Ulysses desired and accomplished. Despite age, time, and responsibilities, he found out what he wanted with his life and followed through. Ulysses believes there is still honour and work to be done even at this point in his life. This is a lifestyle people spend their entire lives trying to achieve and find meaning towards. Finding what essentially completed your life was and still is a mystery today. People remain clueless about their purpose and this will remain a constant mentality when it comes to humans. To conclude, the solution to this is not to settle, Ulysses did not settle for being king because he knew that he was meant for more.

I or Eye

This essay ponders upon one of the main aspects present in James Joyce’s Ulysses, namely Joyce’s ‘postmodern’ turn, discourse parallax. In order for this to properly happen, the first and foremost issue to discuss should be the chapter titled ‘Cyclops’, this being the chapter in which I opt to analyze this aspect. During my analysis, it is mainly important to ponder upon the meaning of parallax and the use of it, but what is even more important than doing this is first to understand the literary genealogy within which the work can be situated. Other aspects are also important, these, however, will not be named in the introductory part of my essay, the reader of my work is going to get acquainted with them during the process of reading the work.

Joyce never outlined a literary genealogy within which his own works might be situated, scholars even stated that ‘it has always been far from easy to determine. . . what his literary tastes and opinions were’

One reason why Joyce’s Ulysses may be called postmodern instead of just modern is because it contains interior discourse (whether direct or free indirect) and this involves parallax since the events are presented from the narrator’s point of view and from the characters’ interior. The reason for this parallax is to juxtapose two or more character’ different constructions of the same world – or some part of a world. This multiplication of versions has two simultaneous functions, the first being that of confirming the stability of the world outside consciousness and the second one being that of exposing the similarities and differences between different minds.

Since it has already been mentioned, I find it important to define the word parallax. Parallax happens when an object is viewed from two different points, it resulting in an apparent change in the position of the object. A method to better understand this concept is to take astronomy into consideration, where it refers to the different perceiving of the same celestial body from two points in space. This method is used for example in astronomy to measure for example the distance of a star from our planet. By viewing something from different points it also makes the viewed object to having different backgrounds. This can easily be sensed if one takes one of their hands and puts it in front of their face. Without moving the hand, if one closes one of their eyes and keeps the other open, after which does the same with the other eye, followed by doing this consecutively for a few times, they can observe that the background of the hand constantly changes, it is similar but not the same when viewed with the different eyes.

In such manner if a specific event is explained from different points of view, even if the told event is the same, it could be rendered in two different manners, this being possible due to the fact that the two receptors paid attention to different aspects or maybe they focused on different elements of what happened. Parallax in Ulysses is mainly based on Bloom’s and Stephen’s perspective. Reality has become fluid, metamorphic, not merely as a function of the consciousnesses it is constructed from.

There are multiple types of parallaxes, two of them being the parallax of subjectivities/individual reality and the other, parallax of discourse. The former helps to confer stability on the world that is outside of consciousness if we have more points of view, it is easier for us to understand how the world of the novel works, so the more observers we have, the better we can understand the narrated events. The latter on the other hand has the opposite effect, it dissolves the world presented in Ulysses into a plurality of different and diverse worlds. Two other types of parallaxes include the interior or authorial discourse of characters, more specifically two adjacent sentences from it. It may sound strange to have parallax that includes only one character, but two adjacent sentences of an interior discourse can also differ due to numerous factors. These could include either interior or exterior factors, the former being either a medical condition or it could just simply happen due to the free flow of thoughts that could cross one’s mind. The latter, meaning the exterior factors, could also differ, it could occur due to what the character sees or hears, it could be due to another character – what they say, how they act- or simply what could be seen or heard in the close or further environment of the character. Another parallax could occur within a character’s discourse, this is a bit complicated than the one mentioned before, because, while the other concerns only the character and the reader who has the job to properly understand the parallax, this one comes into contact with other characters and the job of the reader is even harder, deciphering it is more complicated. Each character’s discourse proves on closer examination to be more like a mosaic of heterogeneous discourse fragments: quotations, allusions, echoes of other characters, bits of anonymous social wisdom or prejudice. In order to properly understand these quotations, allusions and/or echoes of other characters, the reader must pay attention to more bits of evidence, thus the whole web created is even more complicated.

When it comes to parallaxes and properly understand a novel that one is reading, one of the most important quests when one starts reading is to figure out how the complicated web of thoughts folds and to solve the complex puzzle the parallaxes create. This is a very hard quest, especially in the case of James Joyce’s works, especially Ulysses since it is particularly hard to decipher. One needs to pay attention to its every puzzle piece in order to properly understand it, and even after getting acquainted with the whole of the novel, one could never find every piece of the puzzle. And in my opinion, this is what makes James Joyce a great writer. Not only this but also the fact that even if one reads this novel of his for multiple times, even then the puzzle is not complete, moreover, more and more pieces of puzzle appear in order to make the whole picture more and more complicated.

When it comes to the chapter ‘Cyclops’ of Ulysses, the job of the reader to decipher the complicated webs created by the events and the characters is even harder. The process of getting acquainted with this part of the novel can be compared to Odysseus jabbing a ‘pike into the eye of the Cyclops’ (Moser and Stone) since Bloom throws in the same manner ‘verbal wrenches into the gears of conversation that occur in this episode’ (ibid.). Moreover, as Bloom does this in the novel, the writer of the novel does the same thing with his readers, moreover, as it was already mentioned in my work, because of these, the reader cannot get fully acquainted with the whole of the novel.

A very interesting issue about this chapter of the novel is the fact that the concept of parallax stands on the direct opposite of the title, ‘Cyclops’. Being forced to understand all the allusions, all the webs created by the parallaxes, to see everything at least from two points of view is completely antithetical to the concept that revolves around the title, that of having one eye. The fact that the whole chapter starts with the first person pronoun, I. This is also very strange because the whole novel is built on third-person narration -besides some parts that are not based on it, this episode, on the other hand, announces at its very beginning that this part is nothing like the ones it presented before. The fact that the speaker is never announced and also does not appear in any other chapter of the novel makes this chapter even more mysterious. Moreover, this aspect also changes the receiving of the whole, the readers are subjected to the narrator’s very limited point of view and compared to the other chapters of the novel, it feels very constraining to read such a chapter. The pronoun used at the beginning of the chapter thus becomes a ‘metaphor for the Cyclops, for only being able to see things one way’ (Ulysses Readalong Ch 12: Cyclops). The reader on the other hand, as it was previously mentioned, must read the events in order to successfully manage to understand what is told, to properly connect the dots to understand the whole.

Another allusion to the one-eyed being could be found at the very beginning of this chapter when the reader gets acquainted with the narrator of the chapter and the first sentence uttered already alludes to almost having only one eye because a chimneysweep almost poked one of his eyes out with their brush. Even if at first glance these allusions are not that evident, on a closer look they really are important in understanding the whole concept of parallax and being one-eyed.

In order to properly understand this chapter, others must be mentioned to properly understand the discrepancy between this part and the others. Throughout the novel, the reader is exposed to multiple points of view. These are Leopold’s, Stephen’s, and Molly’s. Besides these, there are other minor ones that the reader must differentiate between. These are used for short periods of time: Father Conmee, Patrick Dignam Jr., Gerty MacDowell, and, last but not least, the narrator of ‘Cyclops’. As for what concerns parallax in this aforementioned chapter, there is, for instance, the following sequence: ‘I dare him, says he, and I doubledare [sic] him. Come on out here Geraghty, you notorious bloody hill and dale robber’ (Joyce). There are some sequences that were intentionally italicized, these constitute most of the sentence spoken by Geraghty, this being entirely sure because it was recently related by the anonymous narrator of the chapter. The rest of the quotation, on the other hand, is a variation of another sentence, ‘ that’s the most notorious bloody robber you’d meet in a day’s walk’ (Joyce), said by the narrator to characterize him. The second sentence of the quotation, on the other hand, which is not italicized is highly ambiguous because the reader is not told who said these words, moreover, it is also unsure who was the receiver of this sentence. By using this method, Joyce steps one step closer to its masterpiece and pushes the reader one step further, letting them in the mist created around his work. Through this method the readers have no chance of really figuring out who said the aforementioned sentence, they could just speculate upon it, there is no way that the reader could find out whether these words were said once but written down two times, or spoken twice by the narrator, or repeated once by Joe, who hears the narrator, or it could be the narrator who is mocking the character who he has created.

This aforementioned issue is present in the novel because of the postmodernist part of the novel, without it, they would not exist, thus this is a more complex parallax because the reader is not acquainted with its explanation.

On another instance in the novel, the men are in the bar and they are discussing several topics. There is Citizen who offers his perceptions on all of the topics that he and his bar mates discuss. Bloom is also there who also tries to express his opinions on the discussed subjects. He explains whenever explanation is needed, he uses counterarguments in order to express his own points of view and by this he creates parallax, he makes the reader’s job harder to properly understand the topics discussed. A subject discussed by them in the bar is that of identifying the source of Ireland’s problems. By giving two opposing arguments to a topic he makes the whole arguing process harder, moreover, it creates another parallax. His two arguments are the following: ‘Foreign wars is the cause of it’ (Joyce) and A dishonoured wife, says the citizen, that’s what’s the cause of all our misfortunes’ (ibid.). Using more than one argument usually serves as a clarification, here, on the other hand, the speaker uses these arguments to place the responsibility for all of Ireland’s problems on singular events. This worldview, on the other hand, that Citizen presents it one that Bloom refuses to accept. In another instance, again, while discussing several topics in the pub, the men argue upon the subject of the nation, more specifically, they would like to find out what is it. Bloom brings forward two arguments, the second broader than the first one, these being ‘A nation is the same people living in the same place’ (Joyce) ‘Or also living in different places’ (ibid.). These completely opposing definitions he comes up with are just the sole evidence that Bloom finds definitions unimportant (Moser and Stone)

To conclude, it must certainly be said that by writing Ulysses, James Joyce truly proved to his audience that he is a great writer. One of the main principles of his when writing this masterpiece was to step one way closer to his work and pushing the readers one step away from it in order to make their job of deciphering the text harder. This is the main aspect that makes him great and makes the reader read his novels for more than one time, doing this in order to understand it better, which in the case of other writers works perfectly, in the case of Joyce on the other hand it makes the reader realize that with reading his novels many times, more and more dots appear that had to be connected but fewer and fewer methods to connect them.

Works Cited

1. James Joyce. ‘Cyclops.’ Ulysses, http://m.joyceproject.com/chapters/cyclops.html. Accessed 7 February 2019.
2. Moser, Anna, and William Stone. ‘The Cyclops’ Modernism Lab, https://modernism.coursepress.yale.edu/the-cyclops. Accessed 7 February 2019.
3. Richardson, Brian. ‘The Genealogies of ‘Ulysses’, the Invention of Postmodernism, and the Narratives of Literary History.’ ELH, vol. 67, no. 4, 2000, pp. 1035–1054. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/30031950. Accessed 7 February 2019.
4. ‘Ulysses Readalong Ch 12: Cyclops.’ Girl Detective, WordPress, 14 April 2015, http://www.girldetective.net/?p=6239. Accessed 7 February 2019.
5. Ungar, Andras. Joyce’s Ulysses as a National Epic. The University Press of Florida, 2001.

Modernism was a movement that formed at the beginning of the twentieth century and lasted roughly 65 years. Cultural shocks, such as World War I, instigated the era of Modernism. While this war was meant to end all wars, people could not fathom that such an event was actually taking place, and the disastrous state of humanity that it revealed. After World War II followed within the span of a single generation, the morale and peace of Western civilization was profoundly shocked and dismantled. Discontentment led to new forms of thinking, art and literature. As a result, the Modernism movement was birthed, marked by an abrupt and unforeseen departure from inherited ways of living and traditional perspectives of the world as a means of coping with such emotional, mental and physical upheaval.

Modernism came forth as a protest against the reign of established custom. In its denouncement of “instrumental reason and market culture,” modernism set forth patterns that would shatter the status quo while providing a medium through which individuals could process and make use of the unanticipated emotions that a series of cultural shocks had stirred within (Armstrong 4). It was a way of discovering one’s identity in the midst of unbearable instability and inconceivable change, along with the demand for conformity in the name of congruity. Modernism was a valiant attempt to create a safe place for “individuality, creativity and aesthetic value in an increasingly homogenous and bourgeois world” (Armstrong 4). The spirit of modernism can frequently be likened with “cultural despair,” which sees the individual as trapped into “a world of inner freedom” (Armstrong 15). Such notions testify to the modernist intention to separate from the past while denouncing outmoded traditions that no longer suited the era of technology and worldwide violence.

Experimentation became highly desirable and instrumental to self-discovery, while individualism was prized above all else. Ironically, this central theme of experimentation and individualism are what make the entire literary field of Modernism quite cohesive in intent and theme amongst different authors and artist. Writers never simply fell into modernism in their work; they did so consciously and deliberately. As a result, what brought all of them together was the joint desire to question and reinvent traditional art forms. Such innovators included Waldo Pierce in painting, Gertrude Stein in literature, Isadora Duncan in dance, Igor Stravinsky in music, and Frank Lloyd Wright in architecture. For example, in James Joyce’s Ulysses, he writes: “A soft qualm regret, flowed down his backbone, increasing. Will happen, yes. Prevent. Useless: can’t move. Girl’s sweet light lips. Will happen too. He felt the flowing qualm spread over him. Useless to move now. Lips kissed, kissing kissed. Full gluey woman’s lips” (Joyce 65). Here we see a deep focus onto the inner self and the consciousness of being, as shown in the sensual experience of hesitancy and desire for the kiss of a woman. The stream of consciousness structure of the book lends to the experimental nature of Modernism in literature, while altering the entire nature of novel writing for generations to come. The wayward direction of the novel permits the appropriate amount of confusion for the reader, who is forced to question even the most basic aspects of a novel. The emphasis is therefore less about proper form and structure, and more an accurate, experiential exploration of the inner-workings of human consciousness.

In another example, Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot exemplifies a deficiency in plot and a departure from traditional narrative form. This defiance of classic standards demonstrates the modernist’s general removal from the past while setting forth a new path of absurdism, surrealism, and existentialism. For instance, Lucky begins a verbose, seemingly unending diatribe: “Given the existence as uttered forth in the public works of Puncher and Wattmann of a personal God quaquaquaqua with white beard quaquaquaqua outside time without extension who from the heights of divine apathia divine athambia divine aphasia loves us dearly with some exceptions for reasons unknown but time will tell and suffers like the divine Miranda…”. The lack of cohesiveness and the absurd nature creates the same jolting impetus that first spurred the Modernist way of creating. Whereas the Romantic era paid an almost religious-like reverence for nature, Modernism almost depended upon the decay of the natural world and the increasing isolation of the individual to create the literature that it did. The sterility of modern society in fact catalyzed the experimental and groundbreaking new forms of art and literature.

As a series of cultural travesties rendered Western civilization completely battered and confused, the age of Modernism came forth to provide an avenue for strength, resilience introspection, and unique expression. New forms of literary communication were built, carrying within them the desire to create unforeseen mediums of selfexpression. Creative impulses were favored in lieu of the machinery of modern society, as the mind turned inward and attempted to express the language of consciousness. Rather than adorn their work with ornate words or perfect artistic form, they chose to challenge the known and call forth the true consciousness and inner genius of the individual. Coping with a newfound sense of loss and tragedy also spurred the creative vision. Ultimately, Modernists understood that truth was relative, and that knowing was truly knowable; as a result, the in-flux nature of reality provided them the appropriate backdrop to experiment and express freely while being soberly aware of the fragility of modern day systems supporting their very existence.

Alfred Lord Tennyson’s fascination with Greek mythology and Arthurian legends are largely evident in his literary works. The Lady of Shallot, Sir Lancelot and Queen Guinevere, Galahad and Idylls of the King are examples of his Arthurian inclinations. Ulysses, Tithonus and The Lotos Eaters show his beguilement to Greek mythology.

The poem Ulysses was written in 1833 the same year his friend Arthur Hallam passed away. The poem, co-incidentally, largely looms around the concept of death. Tennyson perhaps wrote Ulysses to come to terms with the reality of his friend’s death, the portrayal of death as a journey would plausibly have aided Tennyson to accept Hallam’s premature demise. The poet himself has said the poem, “gave my feeling about the need of going forward and braving the struggle of life’.

The perspective of domesticity in the poem provides insight into the personal life of the poet. Tennyson’s father passed away in 1831 which forced him to take responsibility for his family. He had a paltry income and three brothers who were ill. His dearest friend Arthur Hallam who was also his sister, Emily’s fiancé, died just as he was finally adjusting to his duties.

Ulysses’ frustration and discontent reflects the poets own state of mind at the time, having to manage a household so deeply entrenched in grief. On another occasion when the poet was discussing his poem he revealed his emotional state at the time, “There is more about myself in Ulysses, which was written under the sense of loss and that all had gone by, but that still life must be fought out to the end. It was more written with the feeling of his loss upon me.”

The impetus to write Ulysses was enthused on both personal and literary fronts. The poem Ulysses draws inspiration from Homer’s epic, Odyssey and Dante’s Ulisse in Inferno. Tennyson found inspiration for the mood and attitude of his Ulysses from Homer’s Odysseus and the form and feeling of the poem as well as the post-classical frame of heroic spirit was mirrored from Dante’s Inferno.

Shakespeare’s Ulysses from Troilus and Cressida has also inspired the character of Tennyson’s own Ulysses.

However, Tennyson altered the original characters of Homer and Dante to suit his personal outlook and the popular social philosophies of the Victorian age. In the middle ages ambition was considered depraved, one is to be happy with their place in life, however, in the Victorian era ambition and striving were considered admirable traits. This is reflected in Tennyson’s poem. Tennyson’s Ulysses is rife with creative inspiration. It reflects the poet’s personal method of dealing with profound sorrow. He astutely marries his enthrallment with mythology and the preservation of Hallam’s soul in literature.

Mazzeno’s review of ‘Ulysses’ begins with an outlook on different perspectives of critics. While Tennyson’s contemporaries seem to view it as the heroic spirit who is determined ‘to strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield’, some later critics see it as the most unconscious confessions of a king who has failed. He, after all, proposes to abandon his family and his kingdom, run away from his duties and risk the lives of his companions with a desire to explore more in life. It is true that Tennyson’s Ulysses is not a perfect man.

However, as Mazzeno suggests Ulysses search is his reason for living, and that there is a search for adventure, experience, and meaning which make life worth living. Mazzeno seems to be supporting the view that Ulysses is not ready to accept a more passive lifestyle as a king but instead feels the urge to go on the search for adventure, experience, and meaning to make his life worth living. Once he decides to leave the monarchy to his son, Telemachus, he gathers up a crew of men to sail with him across the oceans of the world.

Mazzeno points out that Ulysses speech is elevated in tone as well as filled with images and sounds that suggest the emotional state of the speaker. He backs up this point by referencing the lines in the poem, ‘the long day wanes, the slow moon climbs, the deep/ Moans round with many voices,’. Further, his use of ‘repetition of vowel sounds in ‘day’ and ‘wane’, the alliteration of ‘moon’ and ‘Moans’, and the slow, humming murmur of all those m’s and n’s’ create a musical effect that suggest a melancholy mood ‘but not, in the end, the voice of a man trying to simple escape’. Moreover, Ulysses seems to be hinting to the idea that he feels ready to die, only if he is living an adventure that he was supposed to be on.

Perhaps this is illustrated within the lines in the poem in which Ulysses is persuading the crew to sail with him. ‘There is a recognised risk in action: ‘It may be that the gulfs will wash us down,’ he tells them, but if they are fortunate enough, they may ‘touch the Happy Isles, / And see the great Achilles that we knew’. This perhaps suggests that this is a journey to death and that Ulysses is searching for adventure and ultimate death. So, he may have left his kingdom and family because he really believed that he belonged on adventures until the day that he died, or it may just have been a way to escape his responsibilities as king. It could be claimed that Ulysses needed the sea and leaving the kingship to Telemachus was a much too easy way to escape from the boredom of being King of Ithaca.

Either of the two opinions of ‘Ulysses’ in Mazzeno’s article could be true. It is true that Ulysses really believed he didn’t belong in Ithaca he desired to move on and face new challenges. In the first stanza, Ulysses mentions his comfortable life as a king who has a family, a kingdom, food, a place to sleep, etc. however before then he uses the phrase ‘It little profits that an idle king’, which is another way of saying he is sitting around and he is bored because Ithaca is boring. He is aware if he stays and continues his life as a king and not as an explorer that he will die bored and miserable. When he was a man of action he always enjoyed life despite the fact that he suffered greatly.

The idea that Ulysses is a failed king could be easily picked up on because of how he chooses to deal with his notion of problems. He lived his life to the fullest for twenty years and returned home to live in comfort as a king. This perhaps implies he believes himself to be above his entire kingdom. He is reluctant to fulfill his duties as king as he must ‘mete and dole/ Unequal laws unto a savage race, / That hoard, and sleep, and feed, and know not me. ‘Describing his people as savage probably suggests that he considers them to be primitive and uncivilised, and since he experienced the world, he sees himself much smarter and higher ranking than them.

Even as they obey their king in line five, they don’t seem to know the legend they are obeying. Ulysses knows that he is popular. For example, in line eleven, he says ‘I am become a name’. He is aware that the world has heard of his achievements and his exemplary heroism. He has lost many battles, so he is humble, but also has won just as many, so he is a warrior. Indeed, he could very easily be a man who just wants to be able to do the things he desires, but he could also just easily be an old king who cannot get out of not letting go that he is no longer the young adventurer he used to be.

As Mazzeno states, Tennyson utilised the poetic form of a dramatic monologue in Ulysses. According to Robert Fraser, this form ‘accentuates the feeling and the message of the poem’ where Ulysses is addressing a crowd of his followers. Both Mazzeno and Fraser seem to suggest that Ulysses drives from Homeric myth. Although this time Tennyson’s, the main source was not Homer but the medieval Florentine poet Dante.

The Inferno, the first part of Dante’s poem, the Divine Comedy, in which a vision is evoked where Dante passes through nine circles of Hell. He encounters Ulysses shade in the eight circles who told him that after returning to Ithaca he had persuaded his crewmen to go on one final voyage to past the Pillar of Hercules near the western straits of the Mediterranean. This would prove fatal, and result in Ulysses’ detention in Hell for the sin of abusing of the intellect. In spite of this, Dante’s words to Ulysses as he exhorts his men to this final, ill-fated expedition are heroic: ‘Call to mind from whence ye sprang: / Ye were not formed to live the life of brutes, / But virtue to pursue and knowledge high. It draws on ancient Greek myth. So, ‘Ulysses’ is a poem to which xx refers to as ‘a later source on which Tennyson drew had significantly revised and extended the perspectives of an earlier one’.

As reported by Homer, after his prolonged absence The Odyssey, Ulysses returned home and killed all the suitors of his long-suffering wife Penelope and was reunited with his long-suffering wife and his capable son Telemachus. In book 11, the blind prophet Tiresias appears and foretells that Ulysses will once more set sail on the high seas that is doomed to be deadly. This is what Dante had seized and expanded on from Homer’s work for his own objectives thus hinting at the theme of Tennyson’s poem. Tennyson wrote a fairly long elegy to Dante whom with he was very familiar. Tennyson’s close friend Hallam was also a Dante enthusiast.

Hallam’s influence on Tennyson’s work, especially in the form of long elegiac sequence ‘In Memoriam’. According to Tennyson’s own account, he wrote ‘Ulysses’ shortly after Hallam’s sudden and unexpected death on a trip to Vienna, and Tennyson was devastated. Therefore, it could be questioned how far should we allow our interpretation of the poem as reflections of the author’s life. It is difficult or impossible to know whether a particular life event may be relevant to Tennyson’s poem until we read more about both the poem and his life. Or due to the fact that, although important for Dante’s narrative, but not actually mentioned by Tennyson that Ulysses and his crew perished on the voyage towards which the poem beckons?

The image of ‘Ulysses’ seemingly provides idealised representations of the perpetual movement, perpetual development, perpetual adventure characteristic of the Victorian age in which imperial expansion, geographical and scientific discoveries were much desired. The Catholic readers of Dante’s poem, by contrast, were more attuned to the medieval philosophy that human knowledge has limits which no one can surpass. Dante seemed to have held that mankind should not proceed beyond the limits set for man by God, otherwise they will clash with God’s requirements.

Therefore, Tennyson’s poem, indirectly, deals with and even questions the realities of human need or desire to empower in the nineteenth century. Dante’s ‘Ulysses’ leads us into the culture of the nineteenth century revealing its faults enthralled as it was by scientific progress, while clearly embracing a Christian belief that in its traditional forms had urged submissiveness and intellectual self-control. It could be argued then that we are dealing with a poem that is seemingly floored optimistic, while at its core is extremely pessimistic which at times breaks into the energetic surface of the poem, like at line 31 where knowledge is compared with ‘a sinking star’. These contradictions are intensified by the dramatic dialogue form, which allows Ulysses to reveal his possibly deluded thoughts in his own words. If Tennyson is making use of both Homer and Dante, his approach to his subject matter can only be greatly divided.