“M'appari,” a love song expressing a man’s hope that the title character of
Martha will return to him, appears to refer to Bloom’s desire for the absent Martha Clifford. But this is actually a bit of a red herring, because even though he’s just bought paper to write Martha back, Bloom clearly doesn’t care much about her: all he can think about is Molly. So “M’appari” and the scene from
La Sonnambula both represent Bloom’s hope that Molly will give up on Boylan and return to him. Meanwhile, the titles “All Is Lost Now” and
La Sonnambula (“The Sleepwalker”) are both apt jokes about Goulding’s ill health. Of course, he’s only one of perhaps a dozen men in this novel who ruin their lives by drinking. Joyce is clearly trying to show that this was a significant social problem in Dublin.