Chapter 4

Calypso Summary

It is 8 a.m. Leopold Bloom prepares breakfast for himself and his wife. He plans to attend Paddy DignamÂ’s funeral. He is visited by thoughts of death as he works through the conventional activities of morning. Bloom has a pet cat and a faded wife, Molly, both to be routinely fed their breakfasts. As he watches the cat lap its milk, thoughts pass through his mind of food, of popular cat stories, and of the creaking bed upstairs which he believes was bought by MollyÂ’s father in Gibraltar. Getting no clear reply from his sleepy wife, he checks a mysterious piece of paper in his hat.

Bloom leaves the house on a brief errand to the butcher. He has no key with him. The day is warm, and he realizes how hot he will be in his funeral suit. In his daydream, the hot streets of Dublin turn into an oriental bazaar. The sights and smells around him pull him back to reality. He spots Larry OÂ’Rourke in the window of his tavern. He exchanges greetings with him, broods on the wealth of the brewers and the frequency of pubs in Dublin. When he comes to DlugaczÂ’s butcher shop, he pauses to take in the scene and admire a neighborÂ’s servant girl, standing in front of him in the queue. He rapidly buys three pence worth of kidney. He hopes to be in time to walk back behind her. But he is too late to see the girl. He walks back reading a piece of newspaper taken from the pile of wrapping paper at the butcherÂ’s. As an advertising man, he is interested particularly in the advertisements. He recollects the exotic Mediterranean scene as he reads of orange groves. The sky clouds over and Bloom hurries home, mindful of breakfast and his wifeÂ’s presence recollecting her past girlish beauty.

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