One of the main landmarks of James Joyce's Dublin has been vandalised only days before today's centenary of Bloomsday.
Burglars last week kicked two holes in the 150-year-old ceiling of Sweny's Chemist on Lincoln Place (next to Westland Row in Dublin city centre), where the fictional Leopold Bloom stopped to purchase a bar of lemon soap in Ulysses.
When the burglars failed to gain entry by this route, they later forced a rear door of the building and robbed the premises while it lay unoccupied at night.
The attack is the latest indignity suffered by the landmark building, a protected structure which went on fire four times last year.
The blazes gutted the upper floors, which have remained unoccupied since.
Yesterday, the sole tenant, Ms Martina Quinn, who carries on a century-old tradition of dispensing medicines from the premises, said the building was "doomed" unless the authorities took action to protect it.
"We're wide open to this kind of vandalism yet no-one has lifted a finger. All we want is for the laws of the land to be applied; this is supposed to be a famous landmark and a protected building, after all," she said.
Ms Quinn said the shop had been busy in the run-up to Bloomsday, but the building remained "as vulnerable as it ever has been". After last year's fires, one of which caused serious injury to a tenant, Dublin City Council said it had "grave concerns" about the condition of the building.
The landlord, Mr Thomas Anderson, with an address at Ward Anderson, Upper Abbey Street, boarded up the upstairs windows and a front entrance after the council began enforcement proceedings against him.
Yesterday, a spokesman for the council's enforcement section said the matter had been referred to the law department.
He said he was unaware of the latest act of vandalism but that an official would visit the premises shortly.
Mr Anderson could not be reached for comment.
The building dates from the 1830s and has been a chemist since 1853. Its shopfront and mahogany fittings are the same as they were on the day Leopold Bloom's fictional visit on June 16th, 1904.
