Novels Read by Women and Girls in Ulysses
Molly Bloom
Novels by Charles Paul de Kock
"Yes. Get another of Paul de Kock's. Nice name he has." Molly in response to Bloom's asking if he should get her another book.
n/ Ulysses (Gabler) 4:358.
"He offered to send me through the post a work of fiction by Monsieur Paul de Kock, entitled The Girl with the Three Pairs of Stays." Statement of Mrs. Yelverton Barry as Bloom imagines it. Here Joyce combines two de Kock novels into one: La Dame aux trois corsets (The Lady with Three Corsets) and La Fille aux trois jupons. (The Girl with Three Petticoats).
n/ Ulysses (Gabler) 15:1023-24; Catalogue of Dulau & Co., London, c. 1898.
"he brought me Sweets of Sin by a gentleman of fashion some other Mr de Kock I suppose" Molly's thoughts.
n/ Ulysses (Gabler) 18:969.
The illustration below-right is from The Flower Girl of the Chateau D'Eau, Vol. I., drawn by Gustave Fraipont; below-left The Milkmaid of Montfermeil drawn by Octave Denis Victor Guillonnet.
"The Milkmaids' Wedding"
Paul de Kock, age 67
"Violet resists Gericourt"
The above link is to a one-page pdf file on Major Tweedy's Neighborhood that will open in a new browser window. It is the catalogue for Dulau & Co., London.
From the Hathi Trust. Catalog page for English translations of the novels. The page will open in a new browser window. Click here for a key to the volume numbers (titles don't appear on the Hathi Trust catalog page). The key sheet will open in a popup window.
Catalog page for English translations of 24 novels at the Internet Archive.
Amye Reade, Ruby :'Life of a Circus Girl'
"Ruby: the Pride of the Ring. Hello. Illustration. Fierce Italian with carriagewhip. Must be Ruby pride of the on the floor naked." Bloom's thoughts as he notices the book that his wife is reading.
n/ Ulysses (Gabler) 4:346-47
Joyce named Molly's book after Ruby, a Novel. Founded on the Life of a Circus Girl, by Amye Reade.
The above link is to the novel's page on the website of the Joyce Project. The page will open in a new browser window.
London: Authors' Co-Operative Publishing, 1889. From Google Books (free download). The title's download page will open in a new browser window.
Novels by James Lovebirch
"Mr Bloom, alone, looked at the titles. Fair Tyrants by James Lovebirch. Know the kind that is. Had it? Yes. He opened it. Thought so. A woman’s voice behind the dingy curtain. Listen: the man. No: she wouldn’t like that much. Got her it once.
n/ Ulysses (Gabler) 10:601-05.
"... Fair Tyrants he brought me that twice I remember when I came to page 50 the part about where she hangs him up out of a hook with a cord flagellate sure theres nothing for a woman in that all invention made up about he drinking the champagne out of her slipper after the ball was over ..."
n/ Ulysses (Gabler) 18:493-96.
James Lovebirch was the nom de plume of a French author of flagellation novels, though Fair Tyrants was not one of his works. Four of his novels are held by the French National Library and the titles are: Les Cinq Fessees de Suzette, Au Bon Vieux Temps, L'Avatar de Lucette, and Peggy Briggs, all published by Librairie Artistique between 1910 and 1913. Second editions were released in the 1920s. The Flagellation of Suzette, an English-language edition of Les Cinq Fessees de Suzette, was published in 1925. All the books were illustrated and the image on the right is from Au Bon Vieux Temps (the good old times).
n/ Blibliotheque nationale de France, Catalogue General, www.bnf.fr; Tristan Power, "Married His Cook to Massach: Masochistic fiction in Ulysses," Joyce Studies Annual (2017): 135-62.
Daniel Defoe, Moll Flanders
Bloom gave Molly a copy of this novel. In the "Penelope" episode she recalls the protagonist as "the one from Flanders a whore always shoplifting anything she could cloth and stuff." Note that the character Moll Flanders was English having been born in notorious Newgate Prison, London.
n/ Ulysses (Gabler) 18:658-59.
Click on the above link to download from Project Gutenberg. You can choose among EPUB, Kindle, and plain text formats. The menu page will open in a new browser window.
Marion Tweedy (young Molly) and Hester Stanhope
In Gibraltar, Hester Stanhope, the only friend there that Molly recalls in the "Penelope" episode, gave Molly several books. Those books are listed below.
n/ Ulysses (Gabler) 18:650-57; Luca Crispi, "Molly, Mr. Stanhope, and Hester: A Genetic Reading of a Love Triangle in Ulysses," James Joyce Quarterly 51, no. 1 (Fall 2013): 97-117.
To download a digital edition of a book, click on its title link or its website icon. The file will open from the other website in a new browser window. See Download Instructions if you're unfamiliar with the archival website. Books are in pdf files except for those from the Gutenberg Project.
London: Smith, Elder, & Co., 1886. First published in 1878. From the Hathi Trust. Partner login required to download the book.
London: Tinsley Brothers, 1868, 1906 reprint by The Century Co., New York. From the Internet Archive.
Philadelphia: T.B. Peterson & Brothers, 1863. From the Hathi Trust.
New York: Alden, 1883. First published in 1861. From the Gutenberg Project. The link is to the catalog page from which you can download the book in the following formats: Ebook, Kindle, and plain text.
London: John Maxwell & Co., 1864 (5th Ed.). Molly lent this book to Bloom. "... I lent him afterwards with Mulveys photo in it so as he see I wasnt without ..." Ulysses (Gabler) 18: 654-56. Link is to the catalog page of the Hathi Trust for this novel in three volumes. Partner login required to download a whole volume.
London: Routledge, Warne, & Routledge, 1862. First published in 1832. From the Internet Archive.
Gerty MacDowell - Maria S. Cummins, The Lamplighter
"... like she read in that book The Lamplighter by Miss Cummins, author of Mabel Vaughan and other tales."
n/ Ulysses (Gabler) 13:632-34.
The above link is to a page on the blog of The Forest Hills Educational Trust that has a biography of the author. The trust "sponsors a variety of events which explore the history, art, and spiritual qualities" of Forest Hills Cemetery, Boston, Massachusetts. The page will open in a new browser window.
Boston: John P. Jewett, 1854. From the Internet Archive. The document will open in a new browser window.
Miss Dunne (Blazes Boylan's secretary)
"Miss Dunne hid the Capel street library copy of The Woman in White far back in her drawer and rolled a sheet of gaudy notepaper into her typewriter. Too much mystery business in it. Is he in love with that one, Marion? Change it and get another by Mary Cecil Haye."
n/ Ulysses (Gabler) 10:368-72.
Like Marion Tweedy and Hester Stanhope, Miss Dunne is a reader of Wilkie Collins (author of The Woman in White, The Moonstone).
London: Smith, Elder & Co., 1871. A new edition of the 1859 novel from the Internet Archive. The title page will appear in a new browser window.
From the Hathi Trust. Catalog page for the novels. The page will open in a new browser window.
Related Books
All these documents are in .pdf files and are fully readable. To download the file click on the document name or its website icon. The file will open from the other website in a new browser window. See Download Instructions if you're unfamiliar with the website.
Boston: Frederick J. Quinby, 1903. Translated by Edith Mary Norris. From the Internet Archive.
London: F.V. White, 1893. From the Internet Archive.
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