Ulysses Characters

I Have a Body and I'm Proud of ItOur introduction to Bloom begins, "Mr. Leopold Bloom ate with relish the inner organs of beasts and fowls" (4.1). From that first line on, we find that Bloom is a m...

The Prequel: A Portrait of the Artist as a Slightly Older Young ManIf you have read A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, then you'll already have something of a sense for Stephen's intense, and...

An Absent AdulteressFor seventeen of the eighteen episodes in Ulysses, we don't get anything but a fleeting glimpse of Mrs. Molly Bloom. In "Calypso," she asks Leopold about the word, "metempsychos...

Buck Mulligan is a Dublin medical student, and a companion of Stephen Dedalus's. Like Dedalus, he has cast off many of the traditional belief structures and social constraints that might confine a...

Blazes Boylan is the manager of a fighter, an advertising man, and a fellow singer of Molly's. He appears sporadically in Ulysses, but occupies Bloom's thought frequently because Bloom knows Boylan...

Haines features mainly in "Telemachus." He is an Englishman that is staying with Buck Mulligan at Martello Tower, and he has developed an interest in Irish folklore and country life. From the outse...

Deasy is a minor character and is represented as something of a fool. In the "Nestor" episode, he lectures Stephen about money and English history, but it is clear that Stephen does not respect him...

Milly does not actually appear in Ulysses, except in the thoughts of Leopold and Molly and in the somewhat indiscreet gossip of the young Alec Bannon. She is fifteen years old, and Molly and Leopol...

Cunningham appears earlier in Joyce's work, in the short story "Grace" from Dubliners. According to Gifford's annotations, Cunningham himself was modeled on a man named Matthew F. Kane, the chief c...

Simon Dedalus was a major figure in A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, and he appears frequently in Ulysses. He grew up in Cork, and was a fairly successful man until recently, when fell on h...

Stephen's sisters only appear briefly in the novel. Half of the point is that there are a lot of them. Before Episode 10, it seems as if all of Stephen's remorse is focused upon something that he c...

Mary Dedalus dies from cancer between the end of A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and the opening of Ulysses. Stephen returns home from Paris to see her. In her dying moments, she asks Steph...

John Eglinton is actually the pseudonym of William Kirkpatrick Magee, and you'll notice that throughout "Scylla and Charybdis," Stephen sometimes refers to him by his actual name. Both in the novel...

George Russell was a real-life literary giant, who was dominant in the Irish renaissance around the turn of the century. He was committed to mystical experience, and was considered to be something...

Myles Crawford is the editor of the Freeman's Journal. Almost as soon as he appears in the back office to joke with the men, we learn that he is something of a drunk and already has booze on his b...

In "Cyclops," the citizen sits tucked away in the corner of Barney Kiernan's pub with his dog, Garryowen, drinking one beer after another. The citizen is the double for the Cyclops Polyphemus from...

Gerty MacDowell is a young girl who is lame in one foot. Her big role comes in "Nausicaa" when Leopold Bloom masturbates to her while she lies on the beach and daydreams about men. We learn that Ge...

O'Molloy is one of many examples in the novel of Dublin men who have fallen upon hard times. As soon as Bloom sees him, he thinks what a shame it is that O'Molloy seemed to be such a promising youn...

Lenehan appeared earlier in Joyce's work, as a character in the Dubliners story "Two Gallants." Here, he comes off as something of a simpleton. He cracks jokes amongst the men, and follows Boylan a...

Rudy is the son of Leopold and Molly Bloom. He died very shortly after birth. Ever since his death, roughly ten years ago, Leopold has been unable to enjoy sex with Molly. In "Hades," "Sirens," and...

Rudolph Virag is Leopold Bloom's father. After the death of Bloom's mother, Rudolph lost faith and poisoned himself in the year 1886. In "Hades," the men think of what a shameful act suicide is, an...

Ellen is Leopold's mother. It was her death that drove Rudolph Virag to his eventual suicide. In one of Bloom's fever dreams in "Circe," Ellen appears briefly and wonders what Bloom is doing in Nig...

Lipoti Virag is Leopold's grandfather. In "Circe," while Bloom is engaging in one of his elaborate dreamscapes in Bella Cohen's brothel, Lipoti appears and begins to lecture him about sex. His gran...

Martha Clifford is a woman who responded to an ad of Bloom's in the paper requesting a typist. The two of them have begun writing letters to each other full of sexual innuendo, though by most stand...

According to Gilbert's annotations, in real life Mina Purefoy was married to a Dublin obstetrician who in 1904 was former master of Rotunda Lying-in Hospital on Rutland Square. In the book, she is...

Lyons also appears as a character in "Ivy Day in the Committee Room" in Joyce's Dubliners. Here, he appears briefly in "Lotus-Eaters." Bloom tries to give him a 'throwaway' paper that he has been h...

MacHugh appears briefly in the Aeolus episode. His biggest moment is re-enacting a speech by John F. Taylor on the revival of the Irish tongue. Later, Stephen tells him "Parable of the Plums," whic...

If it weren't for the fact that all of "Cyclops" is told from his perspective, the anonymous narrator would just be another guy at the bar – another Joe Hynes, John Wyse Nolan, Bob Doran, or...

Hynes is a minor character who briefly gets some spotlight in "Cyclops" because of his close affiliation with the first-person narrator of the chapter. There is little particularly distinguishing a...

Cissy is one of the girls on Sandymount Strand in Episode 13, "Nausicaa." She is there watching over her two younger brothers, Tommy and Jacky. In the scene, she comes across as a light-spirited fu...

Edy Boardman appears in Episode 13 as one of the girls on Sandymount Strand. She is there with her baby, who Cissy keeps playing with. Edy, being the only mother on the beach, appears a bit more gr...

In real life, Menton was a solicitor and commissioner of affidavits. In the novel, he is presented as ex-employer of the fictional Patrick Dignam. Menton does not come off well in his brief appeara...

Beaufoy wrote a prize-winning story for the penny weekly Titbits. Though it is made clear that it is not very good, Bloom admires him and thinks that perhaps he can write like Beaufoy does. In the...

As with many characters in Ulysses, Davy Byrne was a real man, and his bar still exists today on Duke Street, forever immortalized by Joyce's writing. Byrne has a minor role in the novel, but he is...

Best was the real assistant director of the National Library in 1904. He translated a book on Irish myths, and was an admirer of Walter Pater and Oscar Wilde. He references all of these in the cour...

Lyster was the real life librarian of the National Library of Ireland from 1895 to 1920. He translated a biography of Goethe, and thus it comes as no surprise that he is discussing Goethe at the st...

Kernan was a real tea merchant in Dublin. In Joyce's work, he is a fictional agent for Pulbrook Robertson & Co. He appeared earlier in the short story "Grace" from Dubliners. Tom Kernan's major rol...

Conmee was the rector of Clongowes Wood College when Joyce was a student there. He then became prefect of studies at Belvedere College. In Portrait, Stephen went to Conmee for support when he was u...

Patrick Dignam dies a few days before the setting of Ulysses. In "Hades," all of the men go to attend his funeral. Dignam has left behind his wife and a number of children, and Martin Cunningham fe...

Patrick is one of the sons of the late Patrick Dignam. In "Wandering Rocks," he is returning home with some porksteaks. He thinks of how boring it is to sit in mourning for his father, and wonders...

According to the Gifford annotations, Rochford was a real man who was involved in the attempt to rescue a sanitation worker overcome by sewer gas. He was one of twelve men that went down in the att...

In Joyce's schema, the two barmaids are listed as correlating to the Sirens. Many of the men that come into the bar at the Ormond Hotel are quite attracted to them and flirt with them shamelessly....

Ben Dollard is a renowned tenor in Dublin. His main role in the story comes in "Sirens," when he sings The Croppy Boy in the Ormond Hotel at the command of Tom Kernan. Everyone becomes very sentime...

Goulding appears briefly in the "Sirens" episode. He is an attorney, and Bloom agrees to have dinner with him in the Ormond Hotel so that he can keep an eye on Boylan there. Goulding comes across a...

Cowley is something of a spoiled priest. He has drifted away from the callings of his vocation, but not enough to be excommunicated by the church and not enough to request a release from his vows....

Dodd is a notoriously stingy legal accountant in Dublin. In "Hades," Simon Dedalus calls out to him from the carriage on the way to Dignam's funeral. They all deride his Jewishness. Later, in "Sire...

Josie Powell was a former rival of Molly's. Bloom encounters her briefly in "Lestrygonians"' and tries to decide how she has aged. Josie's husband, Denis, is starting to lose his mind. Josie has to...

There was a real-life Alf Bergan who was assistant to the subsheriff in Dublin in 1904. He was a typical Dublin character and practical joker. In Ulysses, Bergan appears briefly in "Lestrygonians,"...

Doran appeared earlier in Joyce's work, as a character in "The Boarding House" in Dubliners. He is an out-and-out drunk, and Gifford points out in his annotations that Doran's drinking bender provi...

Nolan is a minor character that appears in "Cyclops." He agrees with many of the citizen's views, such as that the deforestation of Ireland is England's fault and that the British Royal Navy practi...

Horne was the former vice-president of the Royal College of Physicians in Ireland and one of the two "masters" of the National Maternity Hospital in Holles Street. The men gather at his hospital in...

Bannon is a minor character in the novel. He is an associate of Mulligan's. Buck Mulligan mentions him in the Episode 1, and then he appears later in "Oxen of the Sun." Bannon has met Milly Bloom i...

Callan and Quigley are nurses in the National Maternity Hospital. In "Oxen of the Sun," the women are made to correspond to Lamote and Phaethusa, daughters of the sun god Helios. They both come in...

Lynch has appeared earlier in Joyce's work, as a good friend of Stephen's in Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. Here, he appears as a medical student with the gathered men in "Oxen of the Sun."...

In "Oxen of the Sun," a number of medical students are gathered along with men about town. Dixon appears to be the most responsible among them. Callan comes to him to tell of Mina Purefoy's birth,...

In "Circe," two English Privates are wandering about Nighttown, flirting with Cissy Caffrey. When they go to the bathroom, Stephen drunkenly bumps into Cissy and they come and accost him. They don'...

In "Circe," two Irish policeman patrol Nighttown. Before entering Bella Cohen's brothel, Bloom imagines an elaborate encounter with them. They tell him they are concerned with animal cruelty, and a...

Bridie is a young prostitute who was the first girl that Bloom slept with. The novel suggests that it was not a very fruitful encounter. Bridie appears several times. He sees her in the street and...

Bella Cohen is the rather manly looking prostitute madame in "Circe." She herself is the double for the witch from the Odyssey insofar as she transfixes Bloom. Bloom is both disgusted and intimidat...

Zoe is the first one to lure Bloom into Bella's brothel. She steals his potato, which he later has to take back claiming that he keeps it in memory of his mother. Later in the episode, she reads bo...

John Howard was the brother of the famous Charles Stewart Parnell. In 1904, he was the city marshal of Dublin and registrar of pawnbrokers. Bloom sees him wandering the streets in "Lestrygonians,"...

Parnell was a Protestant Irishman who became the leading proponent of Irish Home Rule in the 1880's, and was later referred to as "the uncrowned king of Ireland." Though Parnell strongly resisted E...

Artifoni is named for the owner of the Berlitz language school where Joyce taught in Trieste. Here, he is Stephen's Italian voice teacher. In "The Wandering Rocks," he appears briefly and encourage...

Maginni was a well-known dancing professor around Dublin. He was known for being exceptionally well-dressed. Here, he appears briefly in "Aeolus"' then fails to salute the vicergal cavalcade in "Th...

Nannetti was an Irish-Italian master printer and politician. He was a member of Parliament from the College Division of Dublin in 1904, and was elected mayor in 1906. He appears briefly in "Aeolus,...

The late thrice-mayor of Dublin, who was particularly close to Charles Stewart Parnell in the 1880s. He appears in his role as mayor in one of Bloom's fantasies in "Circe."

Leonard appeared previously in the story "Counterparts" from Joyce's Dubliners. Here, he appears briefly in "Lestrygonians," and is one of the jury members in Bloom's masochistic court fantasy.

Lambert is a fictional character who works in a seed and grain store in Mary's Abbey in central Dublin. In "Hades," he goes to Dignam's funeral with the men and comforts Simon Dedalus when he gets...

Flynn appeared earlier, in Joyce's story "Counterparts" from Dubliners, where he is sitting up in his usual corner in Davy Byrne's. He appears again at Byrne's pub in "Lestrygonians," and later is...

In "Lotus Eaters," M'Coy asks after Molly, and asks Bloom to put his name in the ledger at Dignam's funeral. In "The Wandering Rocks" M'Coy appears as a companion of Lenehan's. He is one of the jur...

Mr. Power is attached to the offices of the Royal Irish Constabulary in Dublin Castle. He appears as a character in the story "Grace," in Dubliners. In Ulysses, he is a companion of Martin Cunningh...

Falkner was the real-life 1904 Dublin recorder, that is the chief judicial officer in Dublin. In "Circe," he appears in Bloom's masochistic court fantasy in his role.

Fanning is the fictional subsheriff of Dublin. He is referenced in the Dubliners story "Grace," and here is discussed in "Aeolus" and appears briefly in "The Wandering Rocks.." He also appears in h...

Coffey is the curate-in-charge and the chaplain who performs the absolution at Patrick Dignam's funeral.

The three women take their names from various Dublin public figures. Bellingham was a politician, Bellingham was a lieutenant in the Royal Scots Guards, and Talboys was a baronetcy that became exti...

O'Connell is the Superintendent of Prospect Cemetery, where Dignam is buried in "Hades." He is made to correspond to Hades, god of the Underworld. As he walks along with the men, they admire his ca...

Corny Kelleher is the undertaker's assistant. He appears in "Hades," and is lounging in a doorframe in "The Wandering Rocks," from which he spits grotesquely. Bloom sees him passing by at the close...

Gumley is a friend of Simon Dedalus's that appears in "Eumaeus," where he is paid to watch stones for the city. At one time he had quite a nice job, but gradually fell down the social ladder. Bloom...

Corley is an acquaintance of Stephen's and son of the Dublin Inspector. He appears in "Eumaeus." He tells Stephen that Lenehan and his other friends deserted him and now he has no place to sleep. H...

The keeper presides over the cabmen's shelter under Loop Line Bridge where Stephen and Bloom go around 1am. after Stephen's fight with Private Carr (in "Eumaeus"). There is a rumor that he is Skin-...

Murphy is a sailor from Carrigaloe Station that appears in the "Eumaeus" episode. Talking to Stephen, he claims to know (another) Simon Dedalus, and tells many tall tales of his travels around the...

Molly Bloom's father, who she remembers fondly back in Gibraltar. He was married to Lunita Laredo, and there are certain hints that a) he may not have actually been a Major and b) that he and Lunit...