According to
Robert Anton Wilson in
Cosmic Trigger vol II the reason
James Joyce chose
June 16, 1904 as the day on which to set
Ulysses is actually because that was the day on which Joyce and
Nora Barnacle first had
sexual relations of a sort (she
masturbated him).
As Wilson puts it "
Ireland remains
Catholic and very, very,
puritanical.It is Joyce's last and funniest joke that he has, by the sheer force of his
genius and
international reputation, tricked them into commemorating a
Hand Job every year on
June 16".