WHEN BLOOM ENTERED THE MAIL ROOM on that fatal morning he knew it would be for the last time. Not that he was able to fully focus his normally imperturbable analytical powers on that most sobering of facts for a man whose entire social life was confined within the walls of his working place. This rare unraveling of Bloom's composure was the direct result of his latest ambulatory ruminations—which depressed him so completely he found it impossible to engender that state of "philosophical equilibrium" he usually regained when "yet another of life's nastier surprises" left him "momentarily off balance." In simpler terms: Having run on its fumes alone since he turned ninety his "moral177 gas tank" had finally gone bonedry. And, of course, no sooner did he lose his moral momentum than the law of gravity began exerting its downward pull on him. Like one of those cartoon characters who struggle desperately to maintain a horizontal flight path by sprinting in midair for what seems to be an eternity since they inadvertently traversed the edge of a cliff—Bloom was now freefalling his way toward a crashlanding on the rocky bottom of a milehigh chasm no animator could ameliorate without fatally overstretching even the superelasticity of his "artistic" credibility.178
But beyond these more or less metaphysical concerns there were some pressing practical problems Bloom needed to deal with immediately despite the deep funk into which he had fallen. First and foremost there was the threshold question of whether he had enough physical strength to start—let alone finish—the routine tasks comprising what would be his final day on the job? Marshaling the remnants of his onceformidable intellectual faculties, Bloom tried to critique that fundamental issue in his customarily fastidious fashion; with the following results:
A. There being little or no doubt about what the handwriting he had read on the wall during his morning's ambulatory ruminations meant and;
B. That in any event, since he was on the verge of suffering a complete physical, mental and/or psychological collapse, his only options were to:
1. Capitulate forthwith, return by cab to his flat and promptly blow out what little remained of his brains with the General George S. Pattonstyle pearlhandled pistol he kept in a desk drawer for just that purpose;2. Write a suitably apologetic note explaining the reasons for his "unprecedented dereliction of duty"—but one including a statement to the effect that: "If the recent past is any guide to the immediate future, postponing the delivery of today's mail until tomorrow will scarcely be noticed by those who fail to receive it!"—and then carry out the execution of Option #1;
3. In accordance with Standard Operating Procedures, telephone his immediate supervisor at home and let him decide how to handle this "personnel emergency" with all that "managerial expertise" he was so highlytrained (and -paid) to have;
4. Wait for Jayne Playne's early arrival on the scene179 and recruit her help in separating the unsolicited MMS from the other oversized mail—whereupon as a team (like all women, lurking behind her feminine facade were the sexdrive of an Arabian stallion at stud and, more relevantly, the pullingpower of an AnheuserBusch Clydesdale!) they could manhandle these latest 5 or 6 trolleysfull of "literary landfill" to her "private little Hell Hole;"
(a) The success of this scheme, of course, depended on whether she perceived what was in fact a sincere plea for help as just another of those "sinister VDOM ploys" for luring her into his "lecherous clutches;"(b) About which there was not the slightest doubt in his mind she would (such is the price a Very Dirty Old Man must pay for all his previously foiled wolfinsheep'sclothing attempts at exploiting some prime piece of virginal180 tail's gullibility to make a meal of her);
(c) On the other hand: Did she have any choice but to accept this riskiest of propositions? Her refusal to do so would mean waiting a full 24 hours before she could read through the next stack of novelistic hay—a pattern of behavior to which (all those "slaving my life away in a f**king salt mine" complaints notwithstanding) she had become addicted in the obsessive search for that "Golden Literary Needle" of hers, or, finally;
5. Carry on alone in the glorious tradition of all those other unsung soldiers who sacrificed themselves in the valiant but vain attempt to deliver letters whose contents they knew (more often than not) "weren't worth the price of their postage."181 Moreover, from a literary182 point of view could Eugene Ionesco, Samuel Beckett, Louis-Ferdinand Celine, Ivan Goncharov, Stanislaw Witkiewicz or even Franz Kafka have scripted a more farcical end to his fiascoed existence than this consummate act of absurdity by which he actually drops dead in the middle of an act whose folly far surpasses any performed by such fictitious fools as Oblomov, Josef K., Parsifal, Candide, Willy Loman, Othello and Krapp?
HAVING CONJURED UP AN IMAGE OF ANTIheroic grandeur from the thinnest of delusionary air (Bloom was in fact having trouble breathing) whereby his mail room became the stage of some longdefunct theater from which—like the proverbial tree falling in a witnessless wasteland—he would tell his Idiot's Tale to an empty auditorium, Bloom had no difficulty in choosing Option #5. As a result of which he set about at once sorting the bundles of regular mail delivered by the post office during the night—a task he could carry out while sitting. And one made even easier by the last 3 digits of those "newfangled" 7digit ZIP codes. When this relatively undemanding chore was finished he used one of the empty trolleys to lean on for the trip that would take him across the cityblockwide basement to Jayne's broomclosetsized Publisher's Reader's Office. Arriving there a few minutes before eight he was devastated to find she was nowhere in sight!
Unbeknownst to him, for several months Jayne had been arriving at work a few minutes later than the previous day so that by now she didn't show up until it was close to 8:30. And, since she had learned long ago never to reveal anything to him he could even remotely construe as being one of her "innermost secrets," Bloom was left totally in the dark about the cause of this radical departure from that "earlybirdgetstheworm" credo Jayne practiced so faithfully since becoming a publisher's reader. It was only several weeks after their two "separate but equally bleak destinies were fused into one historymaking alliance"183 that Jayne felt sufficiently at ease with her "former nemesis" to reveal the "extremely personal" reasons184 why she was absent from the "stage" when Bloom made (what he assumed would be) the Dramatic Entrance for his speech imploring her to help him make his last delivery of mail. Staggered by this latest in the series of body blows he suffered since setting out for work that morning Bloom was barely able to collapse into Jayne's swivel chair. And there he sprawled; like the spineless bag of bones he had so suddenly become, trying to collect the scattered remnants (if there were any) of his wits. But try as he might the only "battleplan" he could formulate in such a catatonic state was to remain sitting where he was in the hope Jayne would show up before the Grim Reaper did (if, that is, she wasn't being ambushed on her way to work by the same kind of calamities which were befalling him).
With nothing else to occupy what little was left of his mind Bloom passed the time rummaging among the papers strewn across Jayne's desk, rifling its drawers and ransacking a nearby footlocker labeled: "KEEP OUT! PRIVATE PROPERTY OF J. PLAYNE." As a result of these devious activities185 and the recuperative effect produced by the passing of the 15 or 20 minutes he spent engaged in them Bloom's backbone (among other things) stiffened sufficiently for him to think he might just be capable of hobbling his way back to the mail room. If in fact he was fated to die with his boots on he preferred doing so among surroundings more familiar to him—and far less likely to cause the scandal arising when, as he reasoned, even the most cursory inquest would conclude that: While superficially Bloom's demise was attributable to advanced old age, the following facts could not be ignored, to wit: (1) His corpse was found in the office of a young lady upon whom his predatory designs were well documented by the sexual harassment complaints she drafted but never filed for (to her everlasting credit) "considerations of a compassionate nature," and; (2) According to the aforementioned young lady said office showed signs of being recently rifled, ransacked and/or rummaged through by the decedent; WHEREFORE THE OFFICIAL CAUSE of Leopold Bloom's death is HEREBY CERTIFIED as having been A MISADVENTURE entirely of his own (dastardly) making.
FOR A CHANGE BLOOM WAS PLEASANTLY surprised by the (relative) ease with which he completed his return journey to the mail room. Indeed, the adrenaline rush brought about by his (if not criminal then morally reprehensible) violation of Jayne's privacy had stimulated him to such an extent he began entertaining the possibility of sorting the morning's oversized mail on his own. And, after that, to maybe even put in a full day's work. Or at least make the effort to achieve what not that long ago seemed like an utterly unthinkable proposition.
And then it happened.
While glancing over his shoulder for a last look at the line of trolleys before finally deciding if he was really up to the daunting task their cargo represented something caught the corner of his eye. Among the hundreds of manuscripts sealed in those standard manila envelopes which identified them as belonging in the "unsolicited" category there was one that stood out like a sore thumb. To begin with its dimensions approximated those of a Manhattan telephone directory. But beyond that obviously eyecatching characteristic was the even more remarkable nature of its packaging. Not only was it wrapped in a paper whose particular shade of butterscotchbrown and unique patina he recognized as the legendary kunstlerkraft186 used by painters and writers since medieval times for wrapping their work when submitting it to an art dealer or book publisher; the very string securing this archaic wrapping paper was itself a modern rarity187 once commonly known in publishing circles as "literary twine."188
Moreover, upon closer inspection Bloom could plainly see how both the folding of the kunstlerkraft and tying of the literary twine conformed in the minutest detail to the traditional procedures specified for such matters.189 But the most mysterious of this enigmatic parcel's inscrutable properties was the following "information" all of it written by hand directly on the kunstlerkraft in Carter's "Old Muddy brand"190 ink with a #5 (extra broad) italic nib affixed to a Mount Blanc Invicta191 model fountain pen:
FROM: C. Prince
711 Fairytale Lane
Dreamland,
Ca.192
9 2 2 3
9
TO: WHOM IT† MAY CONCERN‡
c/o R***** H**** Publishing
*** EAST **th St., NEW YORK, N.Y.
10022
†"It" being the decline of western civilization as evidenced by the everwidening spread of America's cultural wasteland. Assuming she/he became a "lowly" publisher's reader for the loftiest of all reasons.
‡Assuming she/he became a lowly Publisher's Reader for the loftiest of all reasons.
Intro Part 15 Return to Index
Footnotes
177 Bloom was never able to find a better word for describing whatever it is that provides us with that (probably fictitious) feeling we all have about there being some "larger purpose" in our daytoday struggles for survival. His use of "moral" can be traced to this definition he marked in his Bookofthe MonthClub copy of The Compact Edition of the Oxford English Dictionary—"7. (d) Moral courage: that kind of courage which enables a person to encounter odium, disapproval or contempt, rather than depart from what he deems to be the right course (as) contradistinguished from physical courage."
178 As adults, of course, we (may) take those endless resurrections of the Roadrunner's always fatallyfoiled coyote nemesis with a grain of salt; but who's to say the effect of such "harmless" Hollywood nonsense on our childhood weltanschauung (view of the world) doesn't linger in the belief most Morons (and Americans) have in the comical consequences of the tragic mistakes they might (and frequently do) make.
179 As it was her practice to do an hour or so before any other salaried employees showed up for their standard 9-4 stints. Not because she was that much more dedicated (which I nevertheless happen to be) than her fellow workers but because as a Publisher's Reader it took her a minimum of 10 hours to dispose of those mountainous piles of unsolicited manuscripts she found dumped on her desk every morning in a manner that permittedd her to maintain the myth she was giving every one of her aspiring Great American Novelists his "day (or at least a good 5 minutes) in court."
180 Whether Jayne was really all that "prime"—and/or "virginal"—in Bloom's bloodshot eyes any woman under the age of 60 represented a potential answer to his predatory prayers.
181 A phrase appearing frequently in the letters Albert Camus wrote to Antoine Saint-Exupéry criticizing him for "risking his literary neck to fly mail between people who, if they ever did have an intelligent idea, certainly wouldn't be able to put it down on paper!" Just as frequently Saint- Exupéry's response to Camus would be: "Were it not for some other 'idiotic air mail pilot' my friend, just think how long I would have to wait before receiving the benefits of your next installment of epistolary wisdom?"
182 As you will discover when you finally do get around to actually reading Morons Awake!—Bloom's thinking along these lines closely parallels those expressed by Jack F. Klutz in his Sermonette On The DownToEarth Application Of Artistic Principles To Everyday Life. Wherein he states: "No matter how humdrum his (or her) life might seem to be, the intelligent Moron should act as if it were (at the very least) a minor work of art. Hence when making even the most 'inconsequential' decision (ie., whether to weed one's turnippatch or spend the day fishing in the Mainstream) you should do so in accordance with the aesthetic principles observed by Mozart in composing The Magic Flute, Michelangelo when painting the Sistine Chapel ceiling, and/or Tolstoy for the writing of War and Peace."
183 By the events about to unfold on this most momentous of mornings. As they will most assuredly do when this storywithinanintroduction tothe readingofaliterarymasterpiece draws to its close.
184 Reasons which, despite their prurient nature, I have relegated to (yet another!) Appendix (D) in order not to diminish the head of climactic steam we are presently in the process of building—without depriving those of you whose suspense over this collateral matter is already "bursting at its seams" the chance to satisfy their curiosity before coping with the truly cataclysmic pressures being generated as these Introductory Remarks of mine approach their explosive consummation.
185 I have itemized most of the items he found in Appendix H for reasons more or less the same as those pertaining to Appendix D. But a few of his "discoveries" constitute such an outrageous violation of my privacy I am exercising my editorial prerogative to censor them—even though by doing so you might think them "smuttier" than they would otherwise seem it not for the "figleafs" Bloom's snooping has forced me to hide them behind.
186 Medieval German meaning "very strong paper painters and writers use for wrapping their work products when sending them to an artdealer or bookpublisher."
187 The last time Bloom had seen it used was in 1929 when the manuscripts of Faulkner's The Sound And The Fury and Hemingway's A Farewell To Arms passed through his hands.
188 Also known as "prynter's strynge," and/or "publysher's ryggynge" this scarletcolored silken cord was used to tie the galley proofs sent to an author for his final approval before publication. Since a parcel so tied usually meant fame and fortune for its recipient, over time this oncehumble binding material evolved into the Order Of The Scarlet Sash—the highest of all the honors England still bestows on her "most distinguished men (and women) of letters."
189 See Appendix G for illustrations of these protocols as they appeared in Ye Wryter's Gyde of 1774.
190 According to its label "Old Muddy was originally designed especially for Mark Twain's exclusive use and derives its distinctive tint from pigments found only at the bottom of a 'secret' swimming hole near Hannibal, Missouri. once frequented by an 'incorrigibly rambunctious' youth named Sam Clemens." Authentic bottles of "Old Muddy" (discontinued in 1942 when Carter's "went to war") turn up occasionally in the "gen'ral stores" still surviving in America's cultural backwaters where the fountainpen never did become entirely extinct. With the fountain pen's renewed popularity designer bottles of "Faux," "Makebelieve" and/or "Mock Old Muddy" can be found in the tonier "stationary boutiques" of Beverly Hills, Chelsea, Georgetown, Oak Park and Upper Montclair.
191 During his early "days" (1920-50!) as a mailboy—when almost every manuscript he delivered was addressed in its author's own handwriting (or that of his "private secretary")—Bloom gained a considerable "professional" expertise in identifying the various instruments used for that purpose.
192 With his knowledge of American Geography and his own flair for symbolism this bogus address and obviously allegorical pseudonym didn't fool Bloom.
