Bloomsday in Seoul

The Irish Association of Korea, supported by the Embassy of Ireland, Republic of Korea pays tribute to the most renowned fictional date in Irish history: 16 June, 1904. Ulysses was banned on both sides of the Atlantic in the decade following its publication. Love’s Old Sweet Song, on 18 June at 8pm at The Craic House, Itaewon, embraces this scandalous history with a selection of readings from the novel that triggered initial outrage. As one early reader decried: “I think this is the most damnable slush and filth that ever polluted paper in print.”

Joyce chose June 16 as it was the first time he’d stepped out on a date with a young woman from Galway, Nora Barnacle; the relationship that blossomed altered the course of their lives. Our Bloomsday is a night when Nora shares centre stage with Joyce as we share letters from their intimate and convention-defying correspondence that reveal the creative obscenity of one of Irish literature’s great romances, which in turn helped give birth to one of Ireland’s most renowned novels.