Faubourg Saint Patrice - ScholarsArchive at Oregon State University

2. Stephen Dedalus: Inside the Panopticon
In the "Eumaeus" episode of Ulysses, as the two protagonists recover at the
cabman's shelter after the chaos of Nightown, Leopold Bloom questions his younger
companion, Stephen Dedalus, about his relationship with his father. Responding to
Bloom's inquiry as to why he left his "father's house," Stephen, with typical Dedalean
irony, answers: "To seek misfortune" (16.252-3)1. Noting Stephen's curious response,
Bloom, with his characteristic pragmatism, kindness, and naiveté, attempts to console
him: "He takes great pride, quite legitimate, out of you. You could go back perhaps"
(16.261-2). The narrative meaning for this discussion is obviously Stephen's relationship
with his father, Simon Dedalus, and why Stephen will not return to his father's home. In
the context of Stephen's spiritual journey, however, the discussion carries heavy symbolic
significance. Stephen, beginning in A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, has
abandoned both his biological father, Simon, and spiritual father, the Judeo-Christian
God of his youth, and exiled himself from their homes. This conversation directly
addresses the dilemma which Stephen faces: on the one hand, his guilt over abandoning
the Roman Catholic faith which formed his consciousness; and, on the other, his quest
to free himself from those same forces.
Stephen's apostasy, in part, situates him as a deviant within the Catholic culture
of Dublin. By examining cultural orthodoxies through the prism of such a deviant, Joyce
is able to reflect the power mechanisms which permeate the culture, predominantly the
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