Ep. 80 - The Language of Flowers

“Angry tulips with you darling manflower punish your cactus if you don’t please poor forgetmenot how I long violets to dear roses when we soon anemone meet all naughty nightstalk wife Martha’s perfume.”

Kelly and Dermot untangle the mysterious language of flowers. Topics include James Joyce’s affair with Marthe Fleischmann, the pitfalls of method acting, Kate Bush, the tonal shifts in Martha Clifford’s letter to Henry Flower, narcissism and self-gratification, Martha’s connection to the Otherworld, whether or not Bloom will ever meet Martha in person, the Victorian language of flowers, an angry vagina, a manflower and a Flower Man, cactuses v. lianas, coactus volui, nightstocks, how Martha’s letter defies Chekhov’s gun, a cigar that’s not just a cigar, the correspondence of James Joyce and Nora Barnacle, Martha topping from the bottom, Martha as a talented kinkster, Giacomo Joyce, a possibility for that “other word,” Bloom’s dirty letters to Molly, and the worst pick-up lines.

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Further Reading:

1. Burgess, A. (1968). ReJoyce. New York: W.W. Norton & Co.

2. Eastman, J. (1989). The Language of Flowers: A New Source for "Lotus Eaters". James Joyce Quarterly, 26(3), 379-396. Retrieved October 20, 2020, from http://www.jstor.org/stable/25484964

3. Ellmann, R. (1972). Ulysses on the Liffey. Oxford University Press. Retrieved from https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.65767/page/n39 

4. Gordon, J. (2002). Bloom at Woodstock: (Henry) Flower Power. James Joyce Quarterly, 39(4), 821-828. Retrieved November 5, 2020, from http://www.jstor.org/stable/25477934 

5. Herring, P. (1974). Lotuseaters. In C. Hart & D. Hayman (eds.), James Joyce’s Ulysses: Critical essays (71-90). Berkeley: University of California Press. Retrieved from https://tinyurl.com/yy2gpfhs

6. Kenner, H. (1987). Ulysses. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press. Retrieved from https://books.google.com/books?id=Ajlz5rzPBOkC&lpg=PP1&pg=PA19#v=onepage&q&f=false 

7. Williamson, A. The Lotus Eaters. Modernist Commons. Retrieved from https://modernistcommons.ca/islandora/object/yale%3A454 

8. Naked Man Orchid image source: https://www.1001gardens.org/orchis-italica-naked-man-orchid/