Eamonn Fitzgerald's Rainy Day

That ultimate work of modernist fiction, Ulysses by James Joyce, chronicles the meanderings through Dublin by Leopold Bloom during an ordinary day, 16 June 1904. The date is now celebrated by Joyce fans worldwide as Bloomsday and Rainy Day will be taking part in the festivities in Joyce's native city today. Exciting! Food and drink will be traditional: "Leopold Bloom ate with relish the inner organs of beasts and fowls. He liked thick giblet soup, nutty gizzards, a stuffed roast heart, liver slices fried with breadcrumbs, fried hencod's roe. Most of all he liked grilled mutton kidneys which gave to his palate a fine tang of scented urine." Yummy! It's best to wash that lot down with a pint of the "wine of the country" as Joyce termed Guinness in the "Cyclops episode:

— I've a thirst on me I wouldn't sell for half a crown.
— Give it a name, citizen, says Joe.
— Wine of the country, says he.
— What's yours? says Joe.
— Ditto MacAnaspey, says I.
— Three pints, Terry, says Joe

So, can Ulysses, give us any pointers that might be of help in preparing for tomorrow's great debate? Perhaps. Let's look at episode two, "Nestor", in which Stephen Dedalus, who teaches bored boys history and English, gets into a heated debate with Mr Deasy, the anti-Semitic headmaster. "History is a nightmare from which I am trying to awake," says Stephen as a goal is scored in the hockey game taking place outside the window. Deasy speaks of history as the movement toward the "goal" of God's manifestation, whereupon Stephen counters memorably that God is no more than "a shout in the street." John Waters will need to be quick on his feet if Christopher Hitchens throws that one his way.

Ulysses trivia: The lyrics of Kate Bush's hit song The Sensual World are actually Molly Bloom's soliloquy at the end of the novel. But if your life is too full to waste time reading Ulysses, here's the version for dummies. It's a classic.