Really, j.d.? I've always thought of it as the literary equivalent of Jackson Pollock's "art"......
Funny thing about
Ulysses -- at least where I'm concerned -- is that I'd always been told what an "important" book this is, and how influential it was, etc., etc., etc. So I approached reading it with some trepidation, as most things that have that sort of reputation tend to be a bit tedious, in my experience. And lo and behold, I had a blast! The first section of the book is a bit slow-paced, yes; but you're having the thematic set-up there, and once you have that in place, the rest of the novel (and I'll address whether it is or not, in my opinion, in a moment) proved to be very engaging; and it covered the gamut, from quirky to warm to hilarious to somber to touching, depending. And the title is well chosen, I'd say, as it really is a modern odyssey, with the landscapes more internal than external, a Penelope awaiting her husband's return and fending off those who are to supplant him in her life (her various thoughts showing her battle to maintain something of the emotional attachment despite disillusion, disappointment, grief, anger, a romantic temperament at odds with reality, etc.), and so on.
As for whether this is a novel -- and the Mrs. Brown argument has relevance here, too -- I'd say yes as, though the structure is by no means the conventional one, nor is the development what we'd seen (usually) in literature to that point, nonetheless we are seeing the interaction of characters, the growth and changes involved, a journey of realization not only on the part of one, but several, and an emotionally satisfying resolution (of sorts). It's a very
human novel, and the Mrs. Brown argument comes into play because none of the characters are particularly exceptional; they are all very much everyday people; Bloom's very grandiosity in his own thoughts shows how very mundane yet complex he is, being the "hero" of his own odyssey even to the point of some of his thoughts being cast in the heroic mold of the
Le Morte d'Arthur and other romances -- such thoughts being very much at odds with the pedestrian level at which he thinks... yet he does have a dash or two of the chivalrous to him, nonetheless (think of the episode with the hare-lipped girl, which veers from the erotic to the deeply compassionate and moving). It has all the earmarks of a novel, even if unconventional in style and (apparent, rather than genuine, as the genuine structure of the novel is, I'd say, extremely controlled) structure.
As for the difference between plot and story and plot elements being cliché... while there is some truth to that, I'd say it is also taking the argument to an extreme level. For one thing, there are X number of
basic plots -- the variations on those plots (whether mixtures of elements from different ones, alterations in the approach, etc.) makes the actual number of available plots considerably more. When one takes it to the level given, we're dealing with the sort of thing that reduces
Moby-Dick to "a story about a really big fish". And once again, we're back to dealing with archetypes here, rather than clichés, in both the storytelling and the psychological senses of the term. Reducing plot to that level ignores what individual writers bring to a plot, the things that aren't yet story, but are still concerned with the development of plot elements (and plots) themselves. Complete originality, indeed, is impossible; but if a writer brings something of himself or herself to their work -- something of their own unique experience and perspective, something of what they've learned in their journey through life -- then clichés tend to be avoided, because they aren't simply "what's been done before", but a shared experience as seen through a unique individual's eyes.
