Leopold Bloom is the fictional protagonist and antihero of James Joyce's novel Ulysses, assuming the role of the 'Odysseus' character. Like the Greek hero in The Odyssey, he is absent at the beginning of the story, and does not feature until episode four of the novel (itself the opening episode of part two). Joyce introduces Bloom to the reader with the distinctive (and now semi-famous) words: Born in 1866, Bloom is the only son of Rudolf Virág (a Hungarian from Szombathely who emigrated to Ireland, converted from Judaism to Protestantism, changed his name to Rudolph Bloom and later committed suicide), and of Ellen Higgins, an Irish Protestant.

They lived in Clanbrassil Street, Portobello. He married Marion (Molly) Tweedy on 8 October 1888. The couple have one daughter, Millicent (Milly), born in 1889; their son Rudolph (Rudy), born in December 1893, died after eleven days.

The family live at 7 Eccles Street in Dublin. Ulysses focuses primarily on Bloom and on the contemporary odyssey he embarks upon through Dublin over the course of the single day of 16 June 1904, and the various types of people and themes he encounters (although episodes 1 to 3, as well as 9 and to a lesser extent 7, concentrate more on Stephen Dedalus, who in the plan of the book represents the Telemachus to Bloom's Odysseus). Joyce aficionados celebrate 16 June as 'Bloomsday'.

As he goes about his day, Bloom's thoughts primarily portray him as somewhat preoccupied with the affair between Molly and her manager (Hugh 'Blazes' Boylan); and, prompted by the funeral of friend Paddy Dignam, the death of his child, Rudy. His absence of a son may be what leads him to take a shine to Stephen, whom he goes out of his way to take care of in the book's latter episodes, rescuing him from a brothel, walking him back to his own house and even offering him a place there to study and work. Also encountered are his sometime chauvinistic attitudes, his penchant for voyeurism and his unfaithful epistolary alter ego, 'Henry Flower'.

Bloom detests violence, and his relative indifference to Irish nationalism leads to disputes with some of his peers (most notably 'the Citizen' in the Cyclops chapter).

Similar to 0 things you like: