Ordinary Dubliners declaimed their favourite passages from 'Ulysses' on every street corner of Dublin on Wedensday in order to celebrate Bloomsday 2004. The readings, which happened en plein air, were in defiance of the veto exercised by the James Joyce Estate on public performances of the author's work.
It would have taken a veritable army of copyright lawyers to track the multitude of impromptu readings which occured in a variety of locations, such as Duke Street, that had featured in Joyce's Magnum Opus.
Until this vox populi, the only place you could have heard excerpts of 'Ulysses' was in a television advertisment for Denny's meat products. Dennys are mentioned in 'Ulysses' and are believed to have paid a considerable financial consideration to the James Joyce Estate for the sychronisation license. On the other hand, senior academics and writers such as Professor Seamus Deane were forbidden to quote from the work during the events they attended to celebrate Bloomsday 2004. Speaking to The Irish Times from The Centre Cultural Irlandais, Professor Deane said, "We couldn't read a word of it because of the Stephen Joyce handcuff".
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