13 Virtual Atlases | The Sandy Cove Atlas

13 Virtual Atlases

The Marks

At least twice in Ulysses, Bloom’s train of thought only makes sense if he is thinking in terms of a world atlas. His first memory of his father is of consulting a map of Europe to identify business opportunities. Later, ‘Woolgathering’ as an old salt rambles on, he considers a globe map which shows the vastness of the oceans.

Many of the marks on the Atlas can be interpreted as showing business opportunities. We have already suggested the marks by English resorts could relate to Joyce’s plan for a singing tour. Other marks around Europe seem to identify congenial places to get teaching work, such as at a Berlitz school. Meanwhile, Plate 1 of the Imperial Globe Atlas supports Bloom’s woolgathering with an image which suggests the oceans are even vaster than they are. The 1903 edition of the Atlas failed to keep up with the growing realisation that Antarctica was a fifth continent; its image of the South Polar regions is unchanged from the 1899 edition. Instead of land it shows Antarctica as mostly sea. This supports the repeated assertion in Ulysses that the earth’s surface is three-fourths (75%) sea, whereas we now know, and Joyce probably knew by the time Ulysses was published, that the World Ocean actually covers just 71% of our planet.

The Texts

Ithaca
What first reminiscence had he of Rudolph Bloom (deceased)?

Rudolph Bloom (deceased) narrated to his son Leopold Bloom (aged 6) a retrospective arrangement of migrations and settlements in and between Dublin, London, Florence, Milan, Vienna, Budapest, Szombathely with statements of satisfaction (his grandfather having seen Maria Theresia, empress of Austria, queen of Hungary), with commercial advice (having taken care of pence, the pounds having taken care of themselves). Leopold Bloom (aged 6) had accompanied these narrations by constant consultation of a geographical map of Europe (political) and by suggestions for the establishment of affiliated business premises in the various centres mentioned.

Had time equally but differently obliterated the memory of these migrations in narrator and listener? In narrator by the access of years and in consequence of the use of narcotic toxin: in listener by the access of years and in consequence of the action of distraction upon vicarious experiences.

Eumaeus
—I’m tired of all them rocks in the sea, he said, and boats and ships. Salt junk all the time.

Tired seemingly, he ceased. His questioner perceiving that he was not likely to get a great deal of change out of such a wily old customer, fell to woolgathering on the enormous dimensions of the water about the globe, suffice it to say that, as a casual glance at the map revealed, it covered fully three fourths of it and he fully realised accordingly what it meant to rule the waves.

Discussion

Do the various hints in Ulysses amount to a deliberate attempt by Joyce to suggest that a ‘book of maps’ was one of the mothers of memory he drew on in composing his great novel? Certainly it can be made to look like it. Early on, with the Pyrrhic War anecdote, he writes of a gorescarred book and daughters of memory. At the other end of Ulysses, in Penelope, he makes clear that a map was part of his relationship with Nora. His letter to Nora, on September 12, 1904, asks ‘have you found that place on the map’. The marks on the map of Ireland can readily be interpreted to reflect that question.