Structure of a Meditation

Recently, my little sister went on a meditation retreat in Montreal. She meditated for ten days, stopping only to eat and sleep from four in the morning until sunrise. This afternoon, she called me and told me about her experiences.

She said that after awhile she began to see images. She told me that the images she saw first were of advertisements and icons of pop culture, then the images progressed to distortions of reality, and finally became pared down, sweet, and uncomplicated.

I couldn’t help but think of this novel, and began to wonder if Joyce was influenced by the experience of an intense meditation. In this chapter, there are many images of advertisements. The narratives of the next chapters will grow more complicated-- reality will be presented in a more complex way. And the book will end with a romantic scene of early romance.

In this chapter, we really see Bloom alone for the first time in the novel, with nothing to do. Earlier he had the distractions of tasks to accomplish. Here we see him looking out at the ocean-- an image often used by film directors to connote meditation on reality. In this contemplation of reality, and his thoughts, the progression of Bloom’s thoughts seem to parallel my sister’s.

Most importantly, Odysseus returns home from a war, and this could imply a meditation, or a sort of inward journey.