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Molly Bloom is a fictional character in the novel Ulysses by James Joyce. The wife of main...

Molly Bloom is a fictional character in the novel Ulysses by James Joyce. 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, having an affair with Hugh 'Blazes' Boylan after ten years of her celibacy within the marriage. Joyce modelled the character upon his wife Nora Barnacle; indeed, the day upon which the novel is set — June 16, 1904, now called Bloomsday — is that of their first date. Critics also point to another possible model for Molly in Amalia Popper, one of Joyce's students to whom he taught English while living in Trieste. Amalia Popper was the daughter of a Jewish businessman named Leopoldo Popper. Joyce wrote about his affair with Amalia Popper in the (now published) manuscript Giacomo Joyce, whose images and themes he used in Ulysses and A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. Molly, whose given name is Marion, was born in Gibraltar in 1870, the daughter of Major Tweedy and Lunita Laredo. Molly and Leopold were married in 1888. She is the mother of Milly Bloom, who, at the age of 15, has left home to study photography.