by Vivian Yuxin Wen and Manu Alcalá/
Having first appeared in “Calypso,” the potato resurfaces many times throughout Ulysses – both in Bloom’s preoccupied mind and in concrete physical presence – usually bringing the protagonist luck. For example, in the end of “Lestrygonians,” while Bloom accidentally runs into Boylan and attempts to downplay his own awkwardness while hiding away, he resorts to the potato in his interior monologue: “Try all pockets. Handker. Freeman. Where did I? Ah, yes. Trousers. Potato. Purse. Where? […] Safe!” (Joyce, 150)
In “Circe,” we learned that the potato was passed on to Bloom by his mother, Ellen Higgins Bloom – the emotional resonance attached to the potato is doubly affirmed through Bloom’s nostalgic declaration that “It is nothing, but still, a relic of poor mamma” (Joyce, 453) and Ellen Higgins Bloom’s re-enactment when she appears and saves Bloom out of danger, as indicated in the stage direction: “She hauls up a reef of skirt and ransacks the pouch of her striped blay petticoat. A phial, an Agnus Dei, a shrivelled potato and a celluloid doll fall out.” The potato’s talismanic dimension is further confirmed in Bloom’s dialogue with Zoe: “[It is] A talisman. Heirloom.”
Yet the meaning of the potato is not without its sinister ambiguities – it would be less interesting if the potato is simply a flat lucky charm. As Robert Merritt argues in “Faith and Betrayal: The Potato in Ulysses,” the potato has a dual significance for Bloom: “nagging reminder of his threatened masculinity and talismanic protector from violence, whores, drunkenness, and cynicism (Merritt, 270).” The dual tensions embodied by the potato are best articulated in “Circe” by Stephen, in the conspicuous parody of Hamlet: “To have or not to have [the potato] that is the question (Joyce, 453).” This comment follows Bloom’s gentle pleading to the whore, Zoe to get back the potato (“Give me back that potato, will you?”) “To have” the potato is to own the talisman, but also to evoke sentiments of guilt, sins, insecurities – mostly about sex. The gesture of Zoe passing the potato back to Bloom (“Here.”) is intensely sexually charged: “She hauls up a reef of her slip, revealing her bare thigh, and unrolls the potato from the top of her stocking.” (Joyce, 453) Given that the potato was passed on from Bloom’s groin to Zoe’s and back to Bloom’s, Merritt proposes that the object alludes to a “symbolic rite of sexual intercourse.” (Merritt, 273) He further suggests that the “symbolic” gesture, which “‘protects’ Bloom from fidelity with whores,” adds on to the talismanic dimension of the potato. Nevertheless, one might also argue the other way – as the potato dangerously evokes Bloom’s potential extramarital guilt, making the object all the more mysterious.
“Potato” is perhaps the most appropriate charm in the project here, buried underneath the surface of the Nighttown of “Circe” and underneath the consciousness of Bloom – it is the “earth apple” (“pomme de terre” in French) that literally grows in the dirt, and more importantly, pulls up “the tuber of Bloom’s unconsciousness to the surface” whenever it pops out (Merritt, 271).
Works Cited
Joyce, James. Ulysses: The Corrected Text. Ed. Gabler et al. (New York: Random House, Inc., 1986)
Merritt, Robert. “Faith and Betrayal: The Potato in ‘Ulysses.’” James Joyce Quarterly, Vol. 28, No. 1 (Fall, 1990), pp. 269-276.
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