Consider the view that the possible parallels between Ulysses and The Odyssey have only a limited application, and are at best a ludic addendum, at worst an irritating distraction.
             Homer's The Odyssey is considered to be the second work of Western literature, preceded only by his Illiad. It is a classic heroic tale, involving as it does great warriors and kings, witches and sorcery, sea monsters and the gods of Greek myth. It tells the tale of the epic ten year long homeward journey by the aristocratic warrior Odysseus after the fall of Troy. In his struggle to return to his home in Ithaca he is delayed many times and even wilfully hindered in his quest by various characters. The Odyssey has influenced many other works of literature in the millennia since it was composed, including Shakespeare's Troilus and Cressida and of course, James Joyce's Ulysses.
             A complex masterpiece, the plot of Ulysses is loosely based on the events depicted in The Odyssey. Odysseus' turn of the century counterpart is the Irish Jew Leopold Bloom, and the Greece of Ithaca and Sparta finds its modern day equivalent in Dublin. Without question an author possessing such an immense ability and talent as Joyce's hardly had the need to borrow the plot of the earlier work: so why, one wonders, include it at all. One must ask oneself whether it adds, detracts or perhaps even obscures Joyce's own work. The use of one of the definitive works of ancient times as the structural base of probably the
             definitive modern novel is puzzling at first examination. One must ask oneself what application such parallels can possibly have: further, we must scrutinize whether they function as merely an amusing codicil to a stand-alone work or if, in fact, they merely distract us from the task in hand, i.e. analysing the content of Ulysses itself.
             As mentioned earlier, Joyce was not the first to employ the Odyssean form to his own work; such examples can be found throughout th...