Annually, lovers of Joyce’s Ulysses read, revisit, and celebrate the novel on its central day (June 16) on a pseudo-holiday we call “Bloomsday.”  Essentially, we make a “feast day” of this canonical work of literature.
But how problematic is it that we make a feast of a work of Irish literature, bearing in mind that Irish history bears the marks of famine maybe more so than feasting?

This year, The Rosenbach Museum and Library in Philadelphia (which holds the original, handwritten manuscript of Ulysses) asks this very question.  Phrased another way: Why does Ulysses, in its very earthiness, provide its readers with such literary sustenance in the face of an Irish history that is literally starving?

Ironically, the answer may be this: More impressive than the enviable, centuries-long agricultural products of Ireland (wool, potatoes, herbs, and liquor, to name a few), there is Ireland’s greatest product and most viable export: the printed word.  Literature (Ulysses being an ideal example) is the premium export of this island nation.

Accordingly, the Rosenbach Museum and Library’s Bloomsday exhibit this year is titled “A Taste for Ulysses” and celebrates the centrality of food, feasting, and fine (and unfine) dining in Joyce’s most famous novel.