Ulysses Prejudice Quotes

How we cite our quotes: Citations follow this format: (Chapter.Paragraph), except for the "Circe" episode, which is (Chapter.Line) and the "Penelope" episode, which is (Chapter.Page). We used the Vintage International edition published in 1990.

Quote #4

Mr. Deasy halted, breathing hard and swallowing his breath.

"- I just wanted to say," he said. "Ireland, they say, has the honour of being the only country which never persecuted the jews. Do you know that? No. And do you know why?"

He frowned sternly on the bright air.

"- Why sir?" Stephen asked, beginning to smile.

"- Because she never let them in," Mr. Deasy said solemnly.

A coughball of laughter leaped from his throat dragging after it a rattling chain of phlegm." (2.191-196)

As an Englishman, why would Mr. Deasy find the joke funny? Do you think that the disgusting description of his laughter afterward might capture the fact that Stephen is repulsed by what he says?

Quote #5

Mr Dedalus looked after the stumping figure and said mildly:

"- The devil break the hasp of your back!"

Mr Power, collapsing in laughter, shaded his face from the window as the carriage passed Gray's statue.

"- We have all been there," Martin Cunningham said broadly.

His eyes met Mr Bloom's eyes. He caressed his beard, adding:

"- Well, nearly all of us." (6.111-116)

In "Hades," Simon Dedalus shouts out at the Jewish moneylender Reuben J. Dodd as they ride in the carriage on the way to Dignam's funeral. The prejudiced comment is clearly directed at Dodd, but Dedalus doesn't consider that Bloom is also Jewish, which Martin Cunningham clearly does. How is prejudice different when it's directed at one person of a group and not another? How does this reveal the lie about prejudice?

Quote #6

"- Whose God?" Says the citizen.

"- Well, his uncle was a jew," says he. "Your God was a jew. Christ was a jew like me." (12.542-3)

For the record, Bloom is right. Why is this the most enraging thing that he could possibly say to the citizen?