All 11 Uses of
oblige
in
Ulysses, by James Joyce
- Oblige him, if possible.†
Chpt 10oblige = grant a favor
- Here the listener who was none other than the Scotch student, a little fume of a fellow, blond as tow, congratulated in the liveliest fashion with the young gentleman and, interrupting the narrative at a salient point, having desired his visavis with a polite beck to have the obligingness to pass him a flagon of cordial waters at the same time by a questioning poise of the head (a whole century of polite breeding had not achieved so nice a gesture) to which was united an equivalent but contrary balance of the bottle asked the narrator as plainly as was ever done in words if he might treat him with a cup of it.†
Chpt 14obligingness = helpfulness
- But O, oblige me by taking away that knife.†
Chpt 16 *oblige = grant a favor
- Mulveys was the first when I was in bed that morning and Mrs Rubio brought it in with the coffee she stood there standing when I asked her to hand me and I pointing at them I couldnt think of the word a hairpin to open it with ah horquilla disobliging old thing and it staring her in the face with her switch of false hair on her and vain about her appearance ugly as she was near 80 or a loo her face a mass of wrinkles with all her religion domineering because she never could get over the Atlantic fleet coming in half the ships of the world and the Union Jack flying with all her carabineros because 4 drunken English sailors took all the rock from them and because I didnt run into mass often en†
Chpt 18disobliging = ignoring someone's wishes or causing inconvenience or discomfortstandard prefix: The prefix "dis-" in disobliging reverses the meaning of obliging. This is the same pattern as seen in words like disagree, disconnect, and disappear.
- preach about womans higher functions about girls now riding the bicycle and wearing peak caps and the new woman bloomers God send him sense and me more money I suppose theyre called after him I never thought that would be my name Bloom when I used to write it in print to see how it looked on a visiting card or practising for the butcher and oblige M Bloom youre looking blooming Josie used to say after I married him well its better than Breen or Briggs does brig or those awful names with bottom in them Mrs Ramsbottom or some other kind of a bottom Mulvey I wouldn't go mad about either or suppose I divorced him Mrs Boylan my mother whoever she was might have given me a nicer name the Lord†
Chpt 18oblige = grant a favor
- Thanks, old chap: much obliged.†
Chpt 6 *
- —I'm deeply obliged, Mr Lambert, the clergyman said.†
Chpt 10
- —Ladies and gentlemen, I am most deeply obliged by your kind solicitations.†
Chpt 11
- 1883 had continued immutable, conceiving that to be possible, till then 1904 when Stephen was 22 Bloom would be 374 and in 1920 when Stephen would be 38, as Bloom then was, Bloom would be 646 while in 1952 when Stephen would have attained the maximum postdiluvian age of 70 Bloom, being 1190 years alive having been born in the year 714, would have surpassed by 221 years the maximum antediluvian age, that of Methusalah, 969 years, while, if Stephen would continue to live until he would attain that age in the year 3072 A.D., Bloom would have been obliged to have been alive 83,300 years, having been obliged to have been born in the year 81,396 B.C. What events might nullify these calculations?†
Chpt 17
- 1883 had continued immutable, conceiving that to be possible, till then 1904 when Stephen was 22 Bloom would be 374 and in 1920 when Stephen would be 38, as Bloom then was, Bloom would be 646 while in 1952 when Stephen would have attained the maximum postdiluvian age of 70 Bloom, being 1190 years alive having been born in the year 714, would have surpassed by 221 years the maximum antediluvian age, that of Methusalah, 969 years, while, if Stephen would continue to live until he would attain that age in the year 3072 A.D., Bloom would have been obliged to have been alive 83,300 years, having been obliged to have been born in the year 81,396 B.C. What events might nullify these calculations?†
Chpt 17
- The parties concerned, uniting, had increased and multiplied, which being done, offspring produced and educed to maturity, the parties, if not disunited were obliged to reunite for increase and multiplication, which was absurd, to form by reunion the original couple of uniting parties, which was impossible.†
Chpt 17
Definitions:
-
(1)
(oblige as in: I am obliged by law.) require (obligate) to do something
-
(2)
(oblige as in: I obliged her every request.) grant a favor to someone
-
(3)
(obliged as in: I'm much obliged for your kindness) grateful or indebted
-
(4)
(meaning too rare to warrant focus) meaning too rare to warrant focus:
Much more rarely, in classic literature you may see oblige as a synonym for ask as when Jules Verne wrote "I obliged the Professor to move his lamp over the walls of the gallery," in Journey to the Center of the Earth.