People
Material on people known by Joyce, mentioned in, or models for, characters in Ulysses, and others referenced on this website.
Pages on Major Tweedy's Neighborhood
Friend of James and Stanislaus Joyce in Trieste. Part-model for the character Deasy and author of the notorious foot-and-mouth disease letter. It was through Joyce's efforts that the letter concerning the "Styrian cure" for the bovine disease appeared in the Irish Freeman's Journal and the Evening Telegraph (sister publications).
For twenty years Joyce's best friend in Ireland; an "old school fellow of benevolent and courteous friendship." Kettle was an economist, university professor, nationalist politician, MP for five years, organizer and gun-runner of the Irish Volunteers, a temporary officer of the Royal Dublin Fusiliers, and propagandist for the British war effort during the First World War. He was killed-in-action in France on September 9, 1916 after only 53 days of active service.
This Dublin labor leader and Irish nationalist politician appears in Ulysses multiple times. Nannetti was born in 1851 to an Italian father and Irish mother. He died of a stroke in 1915. He had served as Dublin Trade Council president, Dublin City councilor, Lord Mayor of Dublin, and Member of Parliament.
From 1832 through 1934, a Sprague served as US Consul in Gibraltar. The first was Horatio, then his son Horatio Jones, followed by his son Richard. Molly Bloom remembers Horatio Jones as "... old Sprague the consul that was there from before the flood dressed up poor man and he in mourning for the son ..." Ulysses (Gabler) 18:683-84.
Triestine man of letters who was also a successful man of business. Schmitz and James Joyce became friends in Trieste and their friendship endured until Schmitz's premature death in 1928. Schmitz was the principal model for the character Leopold Bloom.
Friend of Joyce since 1917 who typed manuscripts of several episodes of Ulysses and co-founded with Joyce the Zurich acting troupe, The English Players.
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Dictionary of Irish Biography entry for Joyce's "friend" who was the model for Buck Mulligan. Gogarty was a man of letters, otolaryngologist, revolutionary, and politician. His anti-Semitic writings inspired Joyce to plan a short story whose protagonist would have Jewish ancestry. Joyce never created such piece; instead, he wrote Ulysses.
Australian-born Irish physician, writer, journalist, nationalist, and MP. Commanded an Irish company in the Boer Army during the war in South Africa which led to a treason conviction (sentence commuted). Was a temporary colonel in the British Army during the First World War and served as a propagandist for Irish enlistment. Article by Geoffrey Serle in the Australian Dictionary of Biography, Volume 10 (Melbourne Univ. Publishing, 1986).
Article on the real-life model for Major Brian Tweedy. Andrew Tierney, " 'One of Britain's fighting men': Major Malachi Powell and Ulysses," James Joyce Online Notes (December 2013).
Three of Joyce's University Friends in the DIB
In addition to Tom Kettle, other university friends of Joyce have entries in the Dictionary of Irish Biography. Three of them are Constantine Peter Curran, Francis Skeffington, and John Francis Byrne. During Joyce's 1909 visit to Dublin, he called on Byrne at his home: 7 Eccles Street.
