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Ireland's political and cultural magazine
64 October-November 2025
On whom Bloom?
Though for long it was assumed that
Joyce’s Leopold Bloom was not based
on a Dubliner, he may have been based
on ‘Altman the Saltman’, a Republican
and prominent Jew, of Usher’s Quay
By Vincent Altman O’Connor
(with Frank Connolly)
So, when Dubliners asked
each other in trepidation
after the book appeared,
“Are you in it?” or “Am I in
it?” the answer was hard
to give
O
n Bloomsday each year,
enthusiasts the world over
celebrate Joyce’s fictional
Everyman, the Jewish Dubliner,
Leopold Bloom.
But they could be, unbeknown to
themselves, celebrating the life and times of
(of all things), a ‘Jewish Fenian’. It could be
that Joyce has contrived to execute an
audacious manoeuvre from beyond the
grave, a masterstroke never envisaged by his
readers — that ‘Altman the Saltman’ was
Joyce’s inspiration for one of the greatest
fictional characters of the twentieth century.
Fictional characters are, of course, the
product of a writer’s creative imagination and
are more often than not composites. Joyce’s
method in delineating his fictional characters
has become a critical obsession for many,
reaching its zenith in Vivien Igoe’s ‘The Real
People of Joyce’s Ulysses’ (2016). Through
years of painstaking research, she identifies
the living models behind many of the fictional
entities we meet in Dublin on Thursday, 16
June, 1904.
However, the real-life identity of Leopold
Bloom continues to challenge and haunt
Joyceans. Many of the contenders share
qualities with Joyce’s Jew, but none can be
described as an Irishman whose experience
as a Jew in fin de siècle Dublin was specific to
that time and place.
Politician, Joyce’s Dublin and Ulysses: The
Life and Times of Albert L Altman’ by Neil R.
Davison, published by University Press of
Florida in its celebrated James Joyce series.
Davison is one of the world’s leading scholars
of what has become known as ‘Jewish Joyce’.
Professor at Oregon State University. He is the
author of the influential study ‘James Joyce,
“Ulysses,” and the Construction of Jewish
Identity’ (1998).
In his new book, Davison reveals that
Leopold Bloom’s experience as a Jew in
Ireland and as an Irishman in the British
Empire is echoed in the lives of Moritz Altman
(1821–1881), his sons Albert (1851–1903)
“We want to know who are the originals of his characters, and what were the
origins of his episodes, so that we may unravel the web of memory and invention
and discover how far, and in what way, the crude material has been transformed.
Our interest extends, therefore, inevitably and justifiably, to Joyce’s family, to his
friends, and to every detail of the topography and the life of Dublin”
— TS Eliot
In 2012, the late Shane Mac Thomáis,
historian at Glasnevin cemetery, discovered
a photograph, the contents of which suggest
that — when ‘Ulysses’ was first published —
more than a few Dubliners would have
recognised that Leopold Bloom had a great
deal in common with a well-known Jewish
politician who had died in a blaze of publicity
in 1903. The photo includes Altman and his
acquaintance, Long John Clancy, who appears
as Long John Fanning in ‘Ulysses’.
Joyce’s biographer Richard Ellmann
captures the mood in Dublin in 1922. “So,
when Dubliners asked each other in
trepidation after the book appeared, ‘Are you
in it?’ or ‘Am I in it?’ the answer was hard to
give. A voice sounded familiar for an instant,
a name seemed to belong to a friend, then
both receded into a new being”.
Until recently, the notion that Leopold
Bloom was based on a Dublin Jew was
considered far-fetched. That is until the
publication in 2022 of ‘An Irish-Jewish
Albert L Altmn next to Joyce’s crtoon
drwing of Leopold Bloom.
CULTURE
October-November 2025 65
(1993), James Fairhall argues that the Phoenix
Park murders lie at the centre of ‘Ulysses’
insofar as Joyce uses the novel as a meditation
on Irish history. Just as Leopold Bloom’s
fixation with the Invincibles is writ large in
‘Ulysses’, Altman’s association with members
of the Invincibles is well-documented in the
newspaper archives.
Davison reveals that, in the 1880s, Albert
became spokesman for the Irish Home
Manufacturers Association (IHMA), an
organisation dedicated to the promotion of
Irish industries. Albert persuaded Parnell to
become patron, and the association attracted
many Fenians including the Invincible James
Carey who later turned Queen’s evidence.
In 1881, The Irish Times reported that at a
meeting of the IHMA, Albert was referred to
as “a Jewish dog”. This is but one of many
reports of the Altmans being racially abused.
After the May 1882 assassination by the
Invincibles of the Chief Secretary of Ireland,
Lord Frederick Cavendish, and the Permanent
Under-Secretary, Thomas Henry Burke, in the
Phoenix Park, suspicion fell on the IHMA. In
the wake of the assassination of Tsar
Alexander II by what were assumed to be
Jewish anarchists in 1881, it was inevitable
that Altman would enter the frame.
In ‘Ulysses’, Leopold Bloom is drawn into a
salacious exchange detailing the hanging of
Invincible, Joe Brady. During the trial The Irish
Times was more than eager to report that
Brady had revealed that the aborted attempt
on the life of William ‘Buckshot’ Forster was
to have taken place near the premises of
‘Altman the Saltman’.
While the IHMA passed a motion
condemning the Phoenix Park murders, it was
coupled with a denunciation of the Ballina
massacre where children had been killed by
the RIC. According to The Irish Times, Albert
Altman thundered: “The curse of this country
is the licence given to the constabulary to
bludgeon the people when they get the
and Mendal (1860–1915), and Mendal’s son,
Emmanuel (1889–1963).
Davison’s book has received great critical
acclaim. UCD Professor Emeritus Cormac Ó
Gráda, author of ‘Jewish Ireland in the Age of
Joyce’, writes that “knowledge of Altman
opens up a whole new vista on Joyce
scholarship”.
Newspaper archives reveal that between
1877 and 1915 the Altmans were Ireland’s
most newsworthy Jewish politicians. Davison
describes their politics as a synthesis of
Utopian Socialism, advanced Nationalism
and the ideology of Temperance.
Albert Altman represented Usher’s Island
on Dublin Corporation from 1901–1903 and
he was succeeded by his brother, Mendal,
who served from 1907–1912. The brothers
were personally acquainted with Charles
Stewart Parnell, Michael Davitt, Patrick Egan,
John Redmond, David Sheehy, William
O’Brien, William Field, Douglas Hyde, J.P.
Nannetti and James Connolly.
Indeed, the photo unearthed by Shane Mac
Thomáis in 2012 not only portrays Altman
alongside Dublin Corporation workers, but
also includes another man who bears an
uncanny likeness to Connolly who worked on
the Main Drainage Scheme in the city.
Furthermore, the personal lives of the
Altmans coincide in countless ways with
those of Joyce’s fictional character. Moritz
died after ingesting poison as did Bloom’s
father, Rudolph. Albert was expelled from
Mary’s Abbey synagogue for marrying a
Catholic, and after her death he married a
Protestant — echoing Bloom’s Jewish-
Catholic-Protestant allegiances.
Albert’s son, Bertie, died shortly after birth
as did Bloom’s son Rudy, and his only
daughter was Mimi (‘Mim’) not unlike Bloom’s
only daughter, Milly. Mendal’s close friend
was Joe Hynes, a name shared by one of
Bloom’s acquaintances. Most intriguing of
all, Emmanuel worked at Dublin’s Cattle
Market as did Leopold Bloom himself.
Seldom out of the headlines, the Altmans
were also acquainted with members of the
Invincibles, with the Fenian leader James
Stephens and with Arthur Grith founder of
Sinn Féin, all of whom are never far from
Bloom’s stream of consciousness.
The Altmans were Ireland’s leading salt
merchants and were based at 11 Usher’s
Island. Coincidentally, the Joyces had been
salt merchants in Cork, a city famous for its
butter industry. However, the Joyce firm went
bankrupt, at least in part because the salt
produced by the traditional ‘salt and lime’
method proved unpalatable to the
increasingly sophisticated consumers of Cork
butter. ‘Altman the Saltman’ had a significant
presence in Cork and his more refined product
was imported from England.
Interestingly, Ellmann reminds us that
Joyce believed that two books of the ‘Odyssey’
had been lost, one about Ulysses wanting
another son, the other about a country
without salt. “His mind was playing with
Bloom’s desire for another son, and perhaps
with the idea that the saltless country would
be Ireland in his own book”.
Albert Altman’s death in 1903 was one of
the most sensational stories of that year. On
14 October, the newspapers reported that
Councillor Altman had discovered
irregularities in Dublin Corporation’s Rates
Oce. The politicians accused of tax evasion
did not mourn Altman the Saltman’s sudden
death on 14 November.
Albert, his wife and infant son Bertie are
buried in Glasnevin cemetery, a stone’s throw
from the grave of Matthew Kane, the model
for the ‘Ulysses’ character Paddy Dignam.
Nearby, Mendal rests with his daughters
Cissy and Edy.
In ‘Joyce’s Politics’ (1980), Dominic
Manganiello writes that Joyce was fascinated
by the cunning escape of Fenian leader, James
Stephens, from prison. In ‘Ulysses’, Bloom
muses: “James Stephens’ idea was the best.
He knew them. Circles of ten so that a fellow
couldn’t round on more than his own ring.
Sinn Féin. Back out you get the knife. Hidden
hand. Stay in. The firing squad. Turnkey’s
daughter got him out of Richmond...”.
Davison discovered that Albert Altman’s
first wife, Susan O’Reilly, was a cousin of the
Fenian Denis F Burke, one of those who
masterminded Stephens’ escape from
Dublin’s Richmond Jail in 1865. Stephens had
been arrested at Fairfield House, Newbridge
Avenue, which later became the residence of
Joyce’s godfather, Philip McCann.
In ‘James Joyce and the Question of History’
Scandalised by his
depiction in ‘Ulysses’,
Reuben J. Dodd settled
for a substantial sum
in Dublin’s High Court in
1954, when he sued the
BBC after it broadcast
excerpts from the novel
Photogrph of Connolly, Altmn nd
Clncy (‘Fnning’ in ‘Ulysses’) t opening
of Dublin Min Dringe Scheme (1906)
Photogrph of Fenin Denis F. Burke.
66 October-November 2025
slightest permission because they are armed
with a little bit of authority”.
In ‘James Joyce and the Making of Ulysses’
(1933), Frank Budgen (with Joyce at his
shoulder), writes that Joyce was familiar with
Connolly’s politics, and in ‘James Joyce and
The Years of Growth’ (1992), Peter Costello
confirms that Joyce attended meetings of
Connolly’s Irish Socialist Republican Party.
Indeed Connolly took a particular interest
in Dublin’s Jewish community and during the
municipal elections in 1902, it emerged that
some of his leaflets were in Yiddish.
Not wishing to oppose ‘Altman the
Saltman’, Connolly’s ISRP did not contest the
Usher’s Quay ward which had a sizeable
Jewish demographic.
Both Joyce’s father John and his brother
Stanislaus, were employed as canvassers
and their experience forms the backdrop to
‘Ivy Day in the Committee Room’, Joyce’s
favourite story from ‘Dubliners’. Davison
argues that Albert Altman is the story’s
‘absent centre’.
Notwithstanding the fact the Leopold
Bloom is racially abused in Barney Kiernan’s
pub by the Irish nationalist known as the
Citizen, rumours abound that the Jew is, in
fact, advising Arthur Grith. “John Wyse
Nolan saying it was Bloom gave the ideas for
Sinn Féin to Grith to put in his paper all
kinds of gerrymandering, packed juries and
swindling the taxes o of the government and
appointing consuls all over the world to walk
about selling Irish industries”.
The notion of an Irish Jew advising the then-
antisemite, Arthur Grith, was considered
preposterous and the reaction of Bernard
Benstock in ‘On the Nature of Evidence in
Ulysses’ (1983) was typical. “It is not just that
reason prevents us from accepting an
historical movement founded by a fictional
character, but that all the pieces of the puzzle
conspire to show that no one is expected to
believe this delightful absurdity”.
Before long however, scholars began to
question this commonly held assumption. In
‘Joyce, Race and Empire’ (1993) Vincent
Cheng speculates as to whether the linking of
Bloom with Grith is a Joycean hint that there
may be some truth to Wyse-Nolan’s story.
The fictional John Wyse-Nolan was based
on the Fenian, John Wyse-Power, who lectured
on the ‘History of Ireland’s Jews’ at the Jewish
Literary Club, Lombard Street West, in 1909.
A friend of the Joyce family, and Ireland’s
leading philo-Semite, the journalist John
Wyse-Power was, without doubt, best placed
to identify Grith’s Jewish mentor.
In his ‘Ulysses’ (1980), Hugh Kenner writes
that the late Anthony Cronin believed that
Grith had, mirabile dictu, a Jewish adviser-
ghostwriter. Kenner was convinced that the
identity of this enigmatic Jew might well be
the key to Joyce’s great work but, despite his
best endeavours, he was unable to identify
Grith’s Jew.
Quite unexpectedly, Jean-Michel Rabeté in
‘James Joyce and the Politics of Egoism’
(2001) revealed that Michael Noyk was
Grith’s Jewish advisor. According to the Irish
Bureau of Military History, Noyk was
introduced to Grith by Joyce’s close friend,
James Starkey, and his Jewish partner, Estella
Solomons, in 1909. Obviously, Noyk was not
the Jew who had acted as mentor to Grith in
the years leading up to the founding of Sinn
Féin four years earlier, in 1905.
In a remarkable piece of research published
in the James Joyce Quarterly (2017), Marc
Mamigonian confirmed that while Ellmann
was aware that Joyce had modelled the
fictional Leopold Bloom on a ‘Mr. Hunter’,
Ellmann had also been informed that the
name ‘Hunter’ was but an alias. According to
Ellmann’s informant, ‘Mr. Hunter’ was the
nickname of a prominent Dublin Jew
associated with the Freeman’s Journal.
For whatever reason, Ellmann ignored this
crucial piece of information and went on to
insist that Joyce’s ‘Mr. Hunter’ was Alfred
Hunter, a friend of the Joyce family. However,
Alfred Hunter was not Jewish and had no
connections to the Freeman’s Journal. Had
Ellmann explored the newspaper archives he
would have discovered that Albert Altman
was Dublin’s most newsworthy Jew. A major
shareholder in the Freeman’s Journal, Albert
was endorsed by Griffith in the United
Irishman in 1902. Not until publication in
2020 of Colum Kenny’s ‘The Enigma of Arthur
Griffith’, did Joyceans learn of Altman’s
influence on Sinn Féin.
The question may well be asked as to why
Joyce fails to mention ‘Altman the Saltman’ in
his letters. In his memoir ‘Silent Years’, Joyce’s
friend the noted cryptographer, JF Byrne, who
lived in Leopold Bloom’s fictional residence
at 7, Eccles Street, writes, “I hope no person
will be foolish enough to assume from what I
have written that I mean to imply that Joyce
portrayed me in the character of Mr. Bloom...
One may consider the totality of Mr. Bloom as
a concoction dished up by a skilful chef...No
one has named either the constituents of the
concoction or its essence and it’s most
unlikely that anyone ever will. This is as Joyce
wanted it to be, although he himself sailed
more than once pretty close to the wind”.
Why then, might Joyce wish to keep the
real-life identity of Leopold Bloom under
wraps? In the United States, ‘Ulysses’ was
banned not least because of the scene on
Sandymount Strand where Leopold Bloom
masturbates in full view of a teenage girl. It
follows, according to Sean Latham in the ‘Art
of Scandal’ (2002), that “If Bloom had some
sort of clear historical antecedent of course,
or if a connection could be drawn to a living
person, then the grounds for a defamation
suit would have been quite strong, particularly
since the text delves so deeply into his sexual
habits and private thoughts”.
Joyce’s concerns were well-founded.
Scandalised by his depiction in ‘Ulysses’,
Reuben J Dodd settled for a substantial sum
in Dublin’s High Court in 1954, when he sued
the BBC after it broadcast excerpts from the
novel. Patrick Callan discovered that, before
transmission, the BBC took legal advice.
Unsuspecting of the litigious Mr. Dodd, the
broadcaster enquired of their Dublin contacts
as to whether the Blooms were based on ‘real
people’.
According to Richard Ellmann, “His work is
‘history fabled’...He was never creator ex
nihilo. He recomposed what he remembered...
Joyce relied chiefly upon his early life in
Dublin and the later visits...In thinking back
upon his native city, Joyce prepared his great
convocation of the city’s eccentrics”.
‘Altman the Saltman’ may well have
appeared eccentric to Dubliners, not least
because he was the most newsworthy Irish-
Jewish public figure during the decades of
Joyce’s youth. Altman was continually
positioned in the press as being at the centre
of both nationalist and municipal
controversies. He had a national reputation
for his politics, which included a left-leaning
labour commitment, a renowned allegiance
to the Temperance movement, and support
for the anti-colonial eort to establish native
Irish industries. He was an Irish Republican
and a member of the Gaelic League. Neil R
Davison superbly documents Altman the
Saltman’s extraordinary life and times in ‘An
Irish Jewish Politician, Joyce’s Dublin, and
“Ulysses” - The Life and Times of Albert L
Altman’.
Connolly’s Yiddish leflet
Drwing of rrest of Jmes Stephens t
Firfield House, Newbridge Avenue from
London Illustrated News (1866)
