Thursday, 22 December 2016

The next reading will be on Thursday, 5 January 2017, resuming the “Ithaca” episode with the long list of books following the command “Catalogue these books” (17.1361).

Catherine Meyer sends a painting to render one of the scenes encountered during the last reading. She writes: 

For the first time I chose the topic of reunion (when Odysseus and Telemachos first meet again after 20 years) and of separation (of Bloom and Stephen) and painted the scene as an inverse relationship. I tried to capture a feeling of both joy and sadness and painted the white spot with a drive towards the interior and the green and orange surface with strokes leading horizontally out of the picture's margin.

Catherine Meyer © Zurich 2016

Thursday, 15 December 2016

The reading stopped at: “an insistent vesicle pressure” (17.1198)

Catherine sends a painting and a comments:

Like children who are full of anticipation for Christmas, Fritz couldn’t  wait to tell us that we were getting to the funniest part of the book: the peeing passage. He really was enthralled and told us all kinds of stories, such as how men stand and pee, how they look at each other while doing so, and how wonderful the many s‘s in the text make the sound audible. We laughed superbly and the women were more than impressed with all those different peeing-descriptions.

For this topic I painted a very romantic peeing-scene: in Bloom's garden, under the dark sky, with stars and the moon.

Looking at the moon, which is only a scythe, Bloom maybe thinks of his relationship with Molly: her splendour when visible, her attraction when invisible.

Catherine Meyer © Zurich 2016

Thursday, 8 December 2016

The reading has reached: “advanced by the latter to the former” (17.959)

Catherine Meyer sends a visual rendering with these words:

My picture depictes the following:

Bloom and Stephen in one person

God the Father as Bloom and Stephen as Jesus Christ

Past and future (Bloom looking back and Stephen looking to the right into the future)

Father and Son

Bloom with his mustache and hat, and of rather short height

Stephen tall, white skinned with winedark hair

Bloom down-to-earth and realistic

Stephen having his head in the clouds beeing intellectually out of touch with the real world

Sometimes I think that Stephen is not a real person but only imagined by Bloom.

 

Catherine Meyer © Zurich 2016

Thursday, 1 December 2016

The reading stopped at, “a rabbinical philosopher, name uncertain” (17.718).

Catherine Meyer sends an illustration for this blog-entry. She writes that for her (despite the complicated and somewhat confusing biblical and political references to ancient times and contemporary Dublin) “the most painterly scene was A Pisgah Sight of Palestine or The Parable of the Plums” (17.640). About her painting she says:

In Bloom’s kitchen Stephen and Bloom are sitting apart from each other, separated by the plums that are lying on top of each other forming a pyramid.  In the background are Mount Pisgah and Nelson's Pilar.

Catherine Meyer © Zürich 2016