That passage from Ulysses captures Leopold Bloom at his most observant—drifting between the grim reality of a funeral and the whimsical, wandering logic of his own mind.
Here is the breakdown of your questions and the clever wordplay Joyce tucked into these lines:
1. Caesar and the Ides of March (or June)
Bloom’s mind jumps to the famous line from Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar: “I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him.” * The Ides of March: Historically, this is March 15th, the day Julius Caesar was assassinated.
* Why “or June”?: This scene takes place on June 16, 1904. Bloom is cheekily modernizing the tragedy. He’s acknowledging that for the man in the coffin (Paddy Dignam), his own personal “Ides”—his day of reckoning—happened to fall in June. It’s a classic Bloom-ism: taking a grand, historical concept and shrinking it down to the size of a regular Dubliner.
2. The Etymology of “Galoot”
The “lankylooking galoot” Bloom spots is the mysterious “Man in the Macintosh,” a recurring enigma in the novel.
* Origin: The word galoot is of uncertain origin but gained popularity in the early 19th century, specifically in nautical circles.
* Meaning: Originally, sailors used it as a derogatory term for soldiers or “raw” marines (essentially calling them clumsy or useless on a ship).
* Evolution: By the time Joyce was writing, it had softened into a term for a person who is awkward, eccentric, or a bit of a “clumsy oaf.” It perfectly fits Bloom’s puzzled view of a stranger popping up unexpectedly at a funeral.
3. “Every Friday buries a Thursday”
This is one of Joyce’s most poetic puns. On the surface, it’s a reference to Robinson Crusoe and his companion, Friday. But deeper down:
* Temporal Burial: It’s a metaphor for the passage of time. Each new day effectively “buries” the one that came before it.
* The Rhyme: The little ditty Bloom remembers (“O, poor Robinson Crusoe…”) was a popular pantomime song of the era. Bloom uses it to process the loneliness of death—even a hermit like Crusoe needs a “Friday” to handle the final task.

The Man in the Macintosh is one of the most famous “riddles” in Ulysses. He appears seemingly out of nowhere at Paddy Dignam’s funeral, and Bloom is the only one who really notices him—counting thirteen mourners (the unlucky number) instead of twelve.
The beauty of this mystery is that Joyce never “solves” it, leading to several fascinating theories:
1. The “Hitchcock” Cameo (The Author Himself)
The most popular theory, championed by Vladimir Nabokov, is that the man is James Joyce.
* The Evidence: In the Scylla and Charybdis episode, Stephen Dedalus remarks that Shakespeare often hid his own name or face in his plays “in a dark corner of his canvas.”
* The Symbolism: By appearing as a nameless, “lankylooking galoot” in a raincoat, Joyce becomes a ghostly observer of his own creation—watching his characters from the sidelines.
2. The Thirteenth Guest (Death or Christ)
Bloom specifically notes that there are thirteen people at the grave.
* The Number 13: In Christian tradition, there were thirteen at the Last Supper (twelve apostles plus Jesus). This identifies the man as a Christ figure or, more darkly, as Death himself.
* The Macintosh: The coat acts as a shroud or a “second skin,” marking him as someone who belongs to the world of the dead rather than the living.
3. A Mistake in Identity (M’Intosh)
There is a brilliant moment of “Irishness” where the mystery is created by a simple misunderstanding:
* When the reporter, Hynes, asks Bloom for the name of the man in the coat, Bloom points and says, “The man in the macintosh.” * Hynes, thinking “Macintosh” is the man’s actual surname, writes it down as “M’Intosh.” Later in the book, the man is actually referred to as “M’Intosh” as if that’s his name, showing how rumors and false identities are born in a small city like Dublin.
4. James Duffy (from Dubliners)
Some scholars believe he is Mr. Duffy from Joyce’s short story “A Painful Case.” * In that story, Duffy is a lonely man who “loves a lady who is dead.”
* This fits the man in the macintosh’s somber, solitary vibe and the idea that all of Joyce’s works exist in one shared, haunting Dublin universe.

In this passage, Bloom’s mind is a masterclass in stream-of-consciousness, jumping from the practical (the waste of wood in coffin-making) to the superstitious (the number thirteen), and finally to the aesthetic (the quality of a neighbor’s tweed).
Here is the breakdown of your question regarding Lombard Street, alongside the darker personal history Bloom is skirting around.
1. Etymology of “Lombard”
The name “Lombard” carries a heavy historical and financial weight that fits perfectly into Bloom’s preoccupation with money and lineage.
* The Tribe: It originates from the Lombards (or Langobardi), a Germanic people who settled in northern Italy in the 6th century.
* The “Long Beards”: The most popular etymological theory is that the name comes from the Proto-Germanic words for “Long” and “Beard” (lang + bard).
* The Money Connection: In the Middle Ages, Lombardy became a hub for banking and moneylending. Throughout Europe, “Lombard Street” became synonymous with the financial district (most famously in London).
* Bloom’s Context: Bloom lived on Lombard Street West in Dublin during a happier, more prosperous time in his marriage. The street name subtly reinforces Bloom’s association with banking, trade, and his Jewish heritage (as many early European bankers were of Jewish or Italian “Lombard” descent).
2. “Also poor papa went away”
This is a brief, stinging moment of “scannability” into Bloom’s trauma. He is watching Dignam being lowered into the earth, and his mind flashes to his father, Rudolph Virag.
* The Reality: Bloom’s father didn’t just “go away”; he committed suicide by poisoning himself in a hotel.
* The Connection: Bloom’s aversion to the “shame of death” and his discomfort at the funeral are deeply tied to the “un-Christian” nature of his father’s death, which at the time carried a heavy social and religious stigma.
3. “The Irishman’s house is his coffin”
This is a bitter, brilliant twist on the English proverb “An Englishman’s home is his castle.” Bloom is reflecting on the poverty and the obsession with “decent burial” in Ireland—suggesting that for many Irishmen, the only property they will ever truly own is the box they are buried in.

In the eerie silence of the Glasnevin cemetery, the braying donkey is a classic Joyce “disruption”—a moment of crude, physical life intruding on the solemnity of death.
Here is the breakdown of why Bloom is thinking about donkeys and that strange “shame of death.”
1. “Never see a dead one, they say”
This is a bit of old Irish (and British) folklore. The saying goes that “you never see a dead donkey or a dead postman.”
* The Practical Reason: Donkeys are incredibly hardy animals. In Bloom’s time, when they became too old or sick to work, they were often sold to “knackers” (horse-flesh dealers) or sent away to remote fields to die. Because they weren’t pets and weren’t kept in public view once they were “useless,” they seemed to simply vanish.
* Bloom’s Interpretation: He links this to the “shame of death.” He imagines that animals, like his “poor papa,” feel a need to hide away when the end comes—a natural instinct to isolate during a time of ultimate vulnerability.
2. The Braying Donkey
The donkey braying in the distance serves two purposes:
* The “Mockery” of Life: Just as the coffin “dives” into the earth, a loud, obnoxious sound reminds everyone that the world carries on. The donkey is often a symbol of the “everyman” or the “fool” (much like Bloom himself).
* The Ass and the Funeral: There is a subtle religious irony here. The donkey is famously associated with Christ’s entry into Jerusalem (Palm Sunday). Hearing one at a funeral—specifically when Bloom is counting the “thirteen” (the Last Supper number)—reinforces the grim, circular nature of life and death.
3. “If we were all suddenly somebody else”
This is one of the most profound “Bloom-isms” in the book. Standing over a grave, Bloom experiences a flash of radical empathy.
* He realizes that the “I” is fragile. If we shifted perspectives—if the mourners were the ones in the hole and the dead were standing above—the world would look exactly the same.
* It’s a moment of ego-dissolution. Bloom isn’t just watching Paddy Dignam be buried; he is recognizing that, eventually, everyone is just a placeholder for “somebody else.”

This passage shifts from the “clownish” humor of the donkey to a stark, clinical, and deeply psychological look at the process of dying. Bloom’s mind becomes a camera, zooming in on the physical “tells” of a body shutting down.
1. Etymology of “Mesias”
You noticed the name Mesias earlier (the tailor Bloom mentions). In a book as layered as Ulysses, even the tailor’s name is a pun.
* Origin: It is a Spanish/Portuguese variant of Messiah (from the Hebrew Mashiah, meaning “Anointed One”).
* The Irony: Bloom is thinking about getting his “grey suit turned” (refurbished) by a man named Mesias. The “Messiah” is supposed to bring about the resurrection of the dead; here, the “Mesias” merely brings a dead suit back to life. It’s a classic Joyce touch—the divine reduced to the mundane.
2. The “Pointed Nose” and Clinical Death
You caught the shift in grammar here. Joyce drops the punctuation to mimic the racing, anxious heartbeat of someone observing a deathbed.
* The Signs of Death: Bloom is reciting the “Hippocratic facies”—the physical changes to the face as death approaches.
   * Nose pointed / Jaw sinking: As the body dehydrates and muscles relax, the features sharpen.
   * Soles of the feet yellow: A sign of failing circulation.
* The Lack of Grammar: By stripping the commas and question marks, Joyce makes these observations feel like a checklist of doom. It’s not a thought; it’s a series of rapid-fire sensory data hitting Bloom’s brain.
3. “The Last Act of Lucia”
Bloom’s mind jumps to the opera Lucia di Lammermoor.
* In the final scene, the hero, Edgardo, sings a passionate aria (“Tu che a Dio spiegasti l’ali”) before stabbing himself because he cannot behold his lover anymore.
* The “Bam!”: Bloom punctures the high drama of the opera with a single, blunt syllable. To Bloom, death isn’t a beautiful aria; it’s a sudden, silent “Bam!” and then… nothing.
4. Ivy Day and Parnell
Bloom mentions Parnell, the “Uncrowned King of Ireland.”
* Ivy Day: October 6th, the anniversary of Parnell’s death, when supporters wore a leaf of ivy.
* The Reflection: Bloom is being cynical. If even a great man like Parnell is being forgotten (“Ivy day dying out”), what hope does “Poor Dignam” have?

Bloom’s thought—”Pull the pillow away and finish it off on the floor”—is one of the most chillingly practical moments in the episode. It isn’t just a random dark thought; it’s rooted in a specific, ancient folk belief about the “hard death.”
1. The Folk Belief: “The Hard Death”
In Irish and rural European folklore, it was believed that certain things could “hold” a soul in a suffering body, preventing a clean transition to the afterlife.
* Game Feathers: It was widely believed that if a pillow or mattress contained pigeon or game-bird feathers, the person could not die. They would linger in agony.
* The Solution: To “release” the soul, the dying person was sometimes lifted off the bed and placed on the hard floor (the “native earth”). Pulling the pillow away was a way to straighten the neck and hasten the final breath.
* Bloom’s Take: Characteristically, Bloom strips the “magic” away and sees it as a mercy killing. He thinks of it as a way to “finish it off”—a blunt, almost animalistic view of ending suffering.
2. “Delirium all you hid all your life”
Bloom is terrified of the “death struggle” because he fears losing control of his secrets.
* Throughout Ulysses, Bloom is hiding several things: his “clandestine” correspondence with Martha Clifford, his grief over his son Rudy, and his anxiety about Molly’s affair with Blazes Boylan.
* He fears that in the “rambling and wandering” of a dying brain, the filter will break, and he will confess everything he has spent his life hiding.
3. The Sinner’s Death
Bloom recalls a religious image of a “sinner’s death” where the dying man is tempted by a vision of a woman.
* This represents the struggle between the spirit and the flesh.
* Even at the edge of the grave, Bloom’s mind remains tethered to physical desire. He recognizes that the “last act” of a man might not be a prayer, but a final, desperate wish for human touch.

The tension in this scene is palpable. Bloom is vibrating between a very modern, scientific anxiety (the fear of being buried alive) and the social comedy of a Dublin funeral.
1. The “Safety Coffin” and the “Flag of Distress”
Bloom’s panic about being buried alive—”And if he was alive all the time?”—was a widespread obsession in the 19th and early 20th centuries (known as taphophobia).
* The Telephone/Clock: Bloom’s mind races toward practical inventions. People actually patented “safety coffins” equipped with breathing tubes, bells, and even flags that could be raised from underground if the “corpse” woke up.
* “Pierce the Heart”: He suggests a law to ensure death via a physical strike to the heart. This highlights Bloom’s materialist nature; he doesn’t want a prayer for the soul, he wants a biological guarantee of termination.
2. The Birth of “M’Intosh”
Here we see the hilarious birth of a legend.
* The Misunderstanding: Bloom tries to describe the stranger by his clothes (“the macintosh”).
* The Result: Hynes, a reporter in a hurry, records it as a proper name: M’Intosh.
* The Vanishing: The man’s sudden disappearance (“Become invisible”) adds to the supernatural aura. Bloom’s thought—”Has anybody here seen? Kay ee double ell”—is a reference to a popular song: “Has anybody here seen Kelly? K-E-double-L-Y.” Even in a cemetery, Bloom’s brain is a jukebox of pop culture.
3. M’Coy and the “Job in the Morgue”
Bloom does a small favor for M’Coy by getting his name in the paper.
* The “Job”: M’Coy works at the morgue. Bloom’s mind immediately connects this to postmortems.
* The Critique of Doctors: “Find out what they imagine they know.” Bloom has a healthy skepticism of authority. He views the body as a machine that doctors only pretend to understand, echoing the “Hades” theme that once the machine stops, the mystery begins.
4. Is Bloom Delirious?
You mentioned Bloom might be delirious. While he isn’t hallucinating, he is experiencing sensory overload.
* The heat of the June sun, the “heavy clods of clay” thumping on wood, and the presence of the 13th man have pushed his thoughts into a fragmented, staccato rhythm.
* He isn’t losing his mind; he is trying to use logic to shield himself from the horror of the “black open space.”

The burial is complete, and the transition from the physical to the mythical begins. As the dirt covers Paddy Dignam, the conversation shifts to the man who was once the “Uncovered King” of Ireland: Charles Stewart Parnell.
1. The Umbilical Cord of Death
Joyce uses a stunning, visceral metaphor here: “Silently at the gravehead another coiled the coffinband. His navelcord.”
* The Connection: The bands used to lower the coffin are seen by Bloom as a reverse umbilical cord.
* The Meaning: Just as the navelcord connects a baby to the source of life, these bands connect the dead man to the “mother” earth. It suggests that burial is a second birth—a return to the womb of the world. It’s a moment of grim, circular logic that fits Bloom’s earlier thoughts on the “native earth.”
2. The Messianic Myth of Parnell
Mr. Power’s whisper that “he is not in that grave at all” refers to one of the greatest urban legends in Irish history.
* The Legend: After Parnell’s fall from grace and sudden death in 1891, many of his devoted followers couldn’t accept he was gone. Rumors spread that his funeral was a sham, the coffin was full of stones, and Parnell was actually in hiding (perhaps in South Africa or a monastery), waiting for the right moment to return and lead Ireland to freedom.
* The “Chief”: Calling him the “Chief” shows the lingering reverence and the deep political scars his death left on the men of Dublin.
3. “All that was mortal of him”
Hynes’s response is more grounded. He is a Fenian and a nationalist, but he is also a realist.
* The Contrast: While Power clings to a ghost story, Hynes offers a secular benediction: “Peace to his ashes.” * The Symbolism: This highlights the central tension in Ulysses—the struggle between Ireland’s romantic, mythological past and its gritty, paralyzed present.
4. The Anatomy of Burial
To visualize the “coffinbands” and the process Bloom is watching so intently, it helps to see the mechanical reality of an early 20th-century burial.

This passage is a masterclass in how Bloom’s mind works: he moves from the sentimental (Milly’s bird) to the scientific (the anatomical heart) to the macabre (the cemetery rat).
1. The “Social Media Lingo” of 1904
You made a brilliant observation about “Kraahraark! Hellohellohello…” being the “lingo” of the era.
* The Technology: Bloom is imagining a phonograph (or gramophone). In 1904, this was cutting-edge tech. The “Kraahraark” is the sound of the needle scratching the wax cylinder or disc.
* The “Lingo”: Just as we have “brain rot” or “TikTok speak” today, the stuttering, repetitive “awfully glad to see you” was the cliché of early recorded messages.
* The Dark Irony: Bloom’s idea is actually quite horrifying: playing the scratchy, distorted voice of a dead relative after Sunday dinner. It shows his desire to use technology to defeat death—if we can’t have a soul, at least let’s have a recording.
2. The Anatomy of the Sacred Heart
Bloom looks at a statue of the Sacred Heart of Jesus and, as a pragmatist, finds it medically inaccurate.
* “Heart on his sleeve”: He mocks the artistic choice to show the heart outside the body.
* “Ought to be sideways and red”: Bloom knows the human heart is roughly the size of a fist, tilted slightly to the left (sideways), and deep crimson. To him, the religious icon is a poor “biological” diagram.
3. Robert Emmet vs. Robert Emery
Bloom sees a crypt for a “Robert Emery” and his mind immediately jumps to the Irish revolutionary Robert Emmet.
* The History: Robert Emmet was executed in 1803. His “Speech from the Dock” is legendary, ending with: “When my country takes her place among the nations of the earth, then, and not till then, let my epitaph be written.”
* The Mystery: Because of this, Emmet was buried in an unmarked grave. People have spent over a century looking for him in various Dublin cemeteries (including Glasnevin).
4. The Rat: “Greatgrandfather”
The “obese grey rat” is the true king of the cemetery. Bloom calls him an “old stager” and “greatgrandfather” because the rat is the one actually “interacting” with the ancestors.
* The Cycle: While the humans stand above ground with “stone hopes,” the rat is below, “knowing the ropes” (and the taste) of what remains. It is a stark, “un-poetical” reminder of the physical reality of death.

This passage marks Bloom’s emotional “resurrection.” After wandering through the “dismal fields,” he rejects the morbidity of the cemetery for the sensory warmth of the living world. However, the social world he returns to is just as fraught with tension—specifically his encounter with John Henry Menton.
1. “The Love That Kills” and Mrs. Sinico
Bloom mentions Mrs. Sinico. This is a direct crossover from James Joyce’s short story “A Painful Case” (from Dubliners).
* The Connection: Mrs. Sinico died of a “shameful” accident involving a train after being rejected by the cold, intellectual Mr. Duffy.
* The Contrast: Bloom connects her death to his father’s (“Poor papa too”). Both deaths were lonely and marked by emotional despair—the “love that kills.”
2. “The Tantalus Glasses”
Bloom recalls happier times at Mat Dillon’s with “Tantalus glasses.”
* Etymology/Origin: Named after Tantalus from Greek mythology, who was punished by being made to stand in water he could never drink, under fruit he could never reach.
* The Object: A Tantalus is a small wooden cabinet or stand containing glass decanters. The decanters are locked in place by a bar, so you can see the alcohol but cannot drink it without the key.
* Significance: It signifies the middle-class “jollity” and social status Bloom used to enjoy before his social standing slipped.
3. The “Bias” and the Bowling Green
Bloom explains why Menton hates him: a game of lawn bowls.
* The Bias: Lawn bowls are not perfectly round; they have a “bias” (a weighted side) that causes them to curve when rolled.
* The Fluke: Bloom “sailed inside” Menton (beat him) by pure luck. Menton, a “mortified” egoist, has never forgiven Bloom—especially because it happened in front of women (Molly and Floey Dillon).
4. “The Irishman’s Heart” vs. “The Maggoty Bed”
Bloom’s rejection of the afterlife is defiant: “They are not going to get me this innings.” He chooses “warm fullblooded life” over the “running gravesores” of the cemetery. It is a moment of pure, stubborn vitality.

Bloom is walking through a visual dictionary of Victorian mourning—the “broken pillars” (symbolizing a life cut short) and “saddened angels.” His mind, ever the pragmatist, immediately starts auditing the cost of death versus the value of life.
1. Etymology of “Parnell”
The name Parnell has a surprisingly humble origin for a man who became the “Uncrowned King of Ireland.”
* Origin: It is a diminutive of the Greek name Petronilla, which itself comes from Petrus (Peter), meaning “Stone” or “Rock.”
* Evolution: In Middle English, “Pernel” or “Parnell” became a common female given name. Over time, it transitioned into a surname.
* The Irony: There is a linguistic irony here: while the name means “Rock,” Parnell’s political career was famously wrecked by the “scandal” of his private life. Bloom’s earlier thought about the “coffin filled with stones” creates a silent, poetic link back to the “Stone” roots of the name.
2. “Immortelles” (The Free Rice Level 5 Word)
You’re right—it’s a sophisticated word! In this context, Bloom is looking at the graves and seeing Immortelles.
* Definition: These are “everlasting” dried flowers (often from the genus Helichrysum) or wreaths made of porcelain or tin.
* Bloom’s Critique: He finds them “tiresome” because they never wither. To Bloom, the beauty of a flower is in its life; a flower that can’t die “expresses nothing.” It is a fake tribute.
* Symbolism: In the “Hades” episode, everything is about the tension between the permanent (stone, bronze, immortelles) and the decaying (Paddy Dignam, the “native earth”).
3. “Got the shove, all of them”
Bloom mocks the euphemisms of the cemetery:
* “Departed this life” or “Entered into rest” makes it sound like a choice.
* “Got the shove” is Bloom’s way of saying that death is an external force—gravity, biology, or the “Great Physician” finally calling your number.
* The Poem: He’s trying to remember Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard. It wasn’t Wordsworth or Campbell; it was Thomas Gray. Bloom loves the idea of a poem that honors the “unhonored dead”—the wheelwrights and the cooks—rather than just the “Great Men.”

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Let’s look at the “ant” theory and those classical references.
1. Is Emmet an “Ant”? (Etymology)
You have a sharp ear for linguistics! There is a direct connection between the name Emmet and the insect.
* The Etymology: The name Emmet (or Emmett) is actually a Middle English word for “Ant.” It comes from the Old English word æmette.
* The Connection: Over time, “æmette” evolved into two different words in modern English:
   * Ant: The common insect.
   * Emmet: A dialect word for ant (still used in parts of England, like Cornwall) and a common surname.
* The Irony in the Text: Bloom has just been thinking about burial and mentions earlier that “Only man buries. No, ants too.” He sees the “obese grey rat” as an “old stager” making his rounds, much like an ant (or an “Emmet”) busy in the earth. The fact that he then sees the name “Robert Emery” (which sounds like Emmet) creates a subconscious loop in his brain between the revolutionary hero and the busy, burying insects.
2. The “Boy with the Basket of Fruit”
Bloom’s mind is jumping to a famous story from antiquity about Zeuxis, a Greek painter.
* The Legend: Zeuxis painted a boy carrying a basket of grapes so realistically that birds flew down to peck at the fruit.
* The “Apollo” Confusion: Bloom misremembers the artist as “Apollo.” (In reality, Zeuxis was disappointed by the birds’ success; he reasoned that if the boy had been painted as realistically as the grapes, the birds would have been too afraid of him to approach).
* Why it matters here: Bloom is looking at the statue of the Sacred Heart. He’s wondering if the statue is “realistic” enough. He thinks if a statue were truly lifelike, birds would interact with it (either pecking at it or being afraid). It’s Bloom’s way of testing “faith” against “physical reality.”
3. “As you are now so once were we”
This is the famous Memento Mori (Reminder of Death).
* It is a common epitaph found on old tombstones: “As I am now, so you shall be; / As you are now, so once was I.”
* Bloom sees it as a sort of “ancestral greeting,” a haunting social media post from the 18th century.
4. Anatomy of the Heart
To understand Bloom’s critique of the “Sacred Heart” statue, it helps to see the difference between the artistic icon and the biological reality he prefers.