ENGLISH LITERATURE (CBSE/UGC NET)

Detailed explanation-1: -The wife of main character Leopold Bloom, she roughly corresponds to Penelope in the Odyssey. The major difference between Molly and Penelope is that while Penelope is eternally faithful, Molly is not. Molly is having an affair with Hugh ‘Blazes’ Boylan.

Detailed explanation-2: -She was the queen of Ithaca and was the daughter of Spartan king Icarius and naiad Periboea. Penelope is known for her fidelity to her husband Odysseus, despite the attention of more than a hundred suitors during his absence. In one source, Penelope’s original name was Arnacia or Arnaea.

Detailed explanation-3: -Molly Bloom is the fictional wife of Leopold Bloom, the central character of the book. She was born in Gibraltar in 1870, the daughter of an Irish military officer and a Gibraltarian of Spanish descent. In Dublin, where the novel takes place, Molly is a well-known opera singer.

Detailed explanation-4: -Molly is extremely self-aware and perceptive-she knows without looking when she is being looked at. A man’s admiration of her does not cloud her own negative judgments about him. She is frank about topics that other people are likely to sentimentalize-intimacy, mourning, and motherhood, for example.

Detailed explanation-5: -Both Boyle and Kenner are of the opinion that Boylan is in fact Molly’s very first affair, that she put it off for as long as possible after Rudy’s death (Boyle 415, Kenner 67).