James Joyce often portrays women as insignificant background characters because of the role of women during the period he wrote, but there are a few instances when a woman is essential to the story. “Araby”, “Eveline,” and “The Death” all are those cases where a woman is indispensable to the story.
In “Araby”, there is only one female character. As the love interest, Mangan’s sister Mangan’s sister prompts the narrator to travel to the Bazaar. She symbolizes the familiarity of Dublin, as well as the hope of love and the mysterious allure of new places. In some ways, the story is all about her, yet we do not learn her name. The narrator idolizes Mangan’s sister and sees her as an object of his desire more than a human. Joyce rarely describes Mangan’s sisters’ appearance, and since we do not ever learn her name, we can assume that Joyce implies that she is a minor character, with not much significance.
In “Eveline”, there are two pretty important female characters. This is a rarity in Joyce’s work since he mostly writes men as main characters. The main character, Eveline, faces a decision of whether or not she should leave with her love, Frank, or stay where her father and home are. Eveline wants to go with Frank because she thinks once she gets to Argentina; she will be respected more as a wife than a single woman. During this time period, women were seen as more valuable as a wife than an independent woman. She has a hard time making a decision because even though her father is abusive, she needs to take care of him implying that as a woman, she feels she has to take care of everyone. Frank loves Eveline and would have treated her right if she had gone to Argentina with him. In the end, Frank does not really matter to the story...
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...ent personal frustration through shrewish and manipulative behavior.” (Henke, 1986) The women of Dubliners are clearly portrayed as communal victims.
James Joyce often depicts women as minor characters because of the role women played during the period he wrote, but there are a few occurrences when a woman is central to the story.
Works Cited
Mays, Kelly J. “The Norton Introduction to Literature.” New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2013. Book. 592-638. October 27, 2013.
Henke, Suzette A. "Through a Cracked Looking-Glass: Sex-Role
Stereotypes." International Perspectives on James Joyce. Ed.
Gottlieb Gaiser. Troy, NY: Whitson, 1986. 2-31. October 27, 2013.
Ingersoll, Earl G. "The Stigma Of Femininity In James Joyce's `Eveline' And `The Boarding House'." Studies In Short Fiction 30.4 (1993): 501. Literary Reference Center. Web. 27 Oct. 2013.
Meyer, Michael. The Bedford Introduction to Literature. Ed. 8th ed. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin's, 2008. 2189.
Stone, Harry. "Araby" and the Writings of James Joyce. N.p.: n.p., n.d. EBSCO. Web. .
Carver, Raymond. Cathedral. “The Norton Introduction to Literature.” New York: W.W Norton &, 2014. Print.
In James Joyce’s “Araby” a young boy living in a dark and grave world develops an obsessive adoration with an older girl who lives in his neighborhood and his devotion towards her ultimately forces him to make a promise to her he is incapable of keeping, resulting in a life changing epiphany.
The narrator cannot stop himself from fantasizing about her perfections, such as when “the light from the lamp opposite our door caught the white curve of her neck, lit up her hair that rested there and, falling, lit up the hand upon the railing” (Joyce 2). Through his constant thoughts about Mangan’s sister and her physical beauty, the narrator reveals an intricate piece of his innate desires. It isn’t exactly Mangan’s sister that continually captivates his heart, but his idea of her and her greater embodiment of love. Ironically, despite the fact that she is the source of all the action that takes place in “Araby”, the narrator reveals very little about her. In “Exhibition and Inhibition: The Body Scene in Dubliners”, Sheila Conboy wrote, “While the boy narrates the process of his sexual awakening, the girl remains anonymous, merely the petticoated object of his desire, never given a voice to express a desire of her own” (Conboy 4). Because the narrator treats Mangan’s sister as only an object of desire -- as opposed to a person capable of desires -- reality is destined to disappoint him. Through Mangan’s sister, we come to understand that the narrator at the end of the story is not only distraught because his idea of love has been dashed, but ashamed that
In order to understand the effects that ideas of femininity have on literary texts, we must first acknowledge what the term means. Clearly both terms derive from the original sex of the being, whether male or female, and can be similarly tied in with notions of gender, either masculine or feminine, which are said to be constructs, or labels, created by society. However `masculinity' and `femininity' become, on some levels, dislodged from the idea of the biological makeup and gender constructs, and instead tend to be described in terms of discourse. It is not just the sex and gender of a being that determines their actions, but instead their thoughts and opinions.
Justin Levenstein. ‘Ulysses, Dubliners, and the Nature of Relationships in the Modern World’. Emergence: A Journal of Undergraduate Literary Criticism and Creative Research. Available from(WWW) http://journals.english.ucsb.edu/index.php/Emergence/article/view/21/100 Date Accessed: 11/12/13
Women play a key role in this novel in many ways. In the case of...
...om Joyce’s childhood. The young boy may have felt anguish, but the adult that looks back at himself sees someone who desires romance and happiness. Joyce explains “Araby” as the life of a young boy who has dreams and high expectations of the world, but instead the young boy gets a bitter taste of reality.
In order to discuss the relations between sexuality and linguistic versatility I have chosen the two female characters, Molly and Gerty. The major reason for this is because the female voice in Ulysses is heard at length on only two occasions but I would argue is very important. So important in fact, that Joyce chooses to conclude the novel with Molly’s monologue. I hope to convey some of the contrasts and similarities in these differing monologues (despite the fact that in Gerty’s case it is technically not ever her monologue). In addition, I have tried to take into account that one is perceiving relations between female sexuality and linguistic versatility through the eyes of a man.
The theme of light and darkness is apparent throughout Joyce's poetry. The dark, sombre setting of the story creates a sense of hopelessness within the narrator, an unnamed young boy. The negative connotations associated with the city of Dublin are used to illustrate the narrator's state of hopelessness. It is only through his illusions that he is able to catch a glimpse of light amidst the darkness. The introduction of Joyce's Araby immediately creates a dark, mundane setting for the story.
Mays, Kelly J. The Norton Introduction to Literature. New York: W.W Norton &, 2012. Print.
In the short story “Eveline “ by James Joyce, Eveline, the protagonist is given the opportunity to escape from her hard unendurable life at home and live a life of true happiness at Buenos Ayres with Frank, her lover. Throughout the story, Eveline is faced with a few good memories of her past from her childhood and her mother, but she also faces the horrible flashbacks of her mother’s illness and her father’s violence. In the end, she does not leave with Frank, Eveline’s indecisiveness and the burden of her family’s duties makes her stay.
Joyce emphasizes the unnamed narrator’s unrealistic view of life in “Araby” by showing his loss of vision. The boy is infatuated with his friend’s older sister, Mangan, and he often watches her in secret. Within the comfort of his own home, he habitually “lay[s] on the floor” and makes sure the blinds are “pulled down to within an inch of the sash so that [he] could not be seen” (Joyce 42). By using the blinds to cover his curious stares, he is taking away the vision of Mangan’s sister. He very purposefull...