Barry Ward (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I agree with everything Senator Black has just said. We cannot be strong enough on that issue. I am sorry I was not able to be there yesterday but I wholeheartedly support what has been said in regard to Palestine. Particularly in Ireland, we have a groundswell of support that needs to be recognised and activated in terms of Government policy as well.

Today is Bloomsday. I come from Dún Laoghaire and it and Blackrock, Sandycove and Glasthule are areas that are intimately associated not just with James Joyce himself, as a Blackrock native, but also with Ulysses, the first scene of which takes place in the Martello tower in Sandycove. Today, the streets of Glasthule will be closed down for Cavistons and other businesses in the area like the Wilton Gallery, Mitchell & Son, 64 Wine and the restaurants to put on great festivities and readings from Ulysses. We will probably see it on the news this evening. These are part of the fantastic community spirit that is commemorating Joyce and his work, which is of world renown. I will be going to Glasthule to continue those celebrations with people there.

It is worth recognising not just that James Joyce has achieved this global iconic status as a writer and that Ulysses has achieved that status, but that there are communities in that part of south-east Dublin that really took this novel - which is really not that digestible, we have to be honest about it, and has a particular tone - to their hearts. Every year, on 16 June, Leopold Bloom's birthday, they commemorate that novel and the scenes that take place in it in and out of the sea around Sandycove and Glasthule. They deserve our congratulations for their civic spirit but also for the commemoration of that great piece of art, that great novel that is Ulysses, on this day, Bloomsday.