Cassidy-Payson 9
Life?s Cruelty in James Joyce?s ?Araby?
While reading James Joyce?s ?Araby? you can see very vivid settings, characters and you can also find a lot of symbols with different meanings. In ?Araby? Joyce uses Ireland during the early 20th century as the setting of the story during a time that Ireland was a very dark and depressing place. Through Joyce?s use of symbols, unique characters and settings he captures how life can be dark and cruel at times. Joyce is able to describe the setting in this story due to the fact that he grew up in Ireland on North Richmond Street where a majority of the story takes place in.
In the beginning of the story the main character finds himself in love with a girl that he has only looked
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at from a distance. He daydreams about her daily and in the morning waits for her to leave her house and then follows her. He is so caught up in his daydreams that he does not spend the time to really find out who the girl is and makes up things about her that puts him deeper in love with her. Even when he talks to her for the first time he still is under the illusion that its the same girl he dreams about.1 When he learns that the girl would love to go to the bazaar but can not he has an idea to go to the bazaar and get a gift for the girl but when he goes there most of the shops were closed and it causes him to realize how all of the girl was an illusion and become angry at himself because of how he idealized the girl.2 In ?Araby?
the setting plays a huge role in portraying the mood of the story and shows the mood of Ireland and the boy. James Joyce has such vivid descriptions when making the setting of the story due to the fact that he grew up in Ireland on North Richmond Street where the majority of the story takes place. North Richmond Street, which Joyce describes by writing that ?North Richmond Street, being blind, was a quiet street except at the hour when the Christian Brothers? School set the boys free.?3 The layout that Joyce describes ?? consists of a row of houses on either side, forming a rectangle, so that the vacant house at the end ?? detached from its neighbors in a square ground,? serves as the removed portion of a gnomonic parallelogram whose flawed remainder will be the setting of the story.?4 In the story Joyce describes the street as ?brown? which can be seen as the color of decay.5 In the boy?s house he finds a room in which the previous tenant, a priest, left many yellowing books that the boy would read in his spare time. The fact that he describes the books as yellowing can be as another color for decay.
Another big part of the setting in ?Araby? was the bazaar. The bazaar was seen by the boy as the final destination to finally winning over the girl of his dreams but when he arrives there it is not what he imagined. When the boy arrives at the bazaar it is dark and nearly all the shops are closed which causes him to realize that life does not always work out. The boy
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does not spend much time at the bazaar but it is one of the most important places because it is where the boy realizes how life is cruel at times.6 In ?Araby? the setting of the story stays dark and dreary throughout the story. The boy doesn't enjoy the place that he lives and this is shown when he describes the other houses on the street that he lives on as gazing at one another with ?brown imperturbable faces.?7 The Priest?s room that only had a few old books and the backyard with the rusty bicycle pump and the lonely apple tree can all be seen as sad and dark. When the boy gets to the bazaar late he is greeted by darkness and closed shops. In one part of the story Joyce describes lanterns that are lighting the street ?feeble? because they are trying to light the street but the darkness is too much for them.8 Through Joyce?s symbolism he alludes to many stories that are cruel at times. In ?Araby? there are many different types of symbolism used as described by Smith ?The story is rich with the symbolism of romance, Roman Catholicism, and the orientalist popular at the end of the last century. The various allusions- to Sir Walter Scott, James Clarence Mangan, The Arab?s Farewell to his Steed, the Freemasons Mrs. Mercer- can enlarge the relevance and appeal of the boy?s private adventure for the attentive reader.?9 An example of religious symbolism used is the wild garden behind the boy?s house that contains a single apple tree in the middle can be seen as the Garden of Eden which is the story of the downfall of Adam and Eve.10 Also in the back garden there is a rusty bicycle pump that has been abandoned which can be seen as a symbol of decay.11 As the boy describes the girl that he is falling in love with he uses many symbols of religion when talking about her like when he says that ?Her name sprang to my lips at moments in strange prayers and praises which I myself did not understand.? In ?Araby? Joyce also writes that the boy ?? imagined that I bore my chalice safely through a throng of foes?12 which can be seen as Christ?s chalice at the Last Supper. Just as Jesus Christ died after the last supper the boy?s thoughts about the girl died after. The boy also thinks of his adventure to the bazaar as the adventure of the knights on their quest for the Holy Grail.13 In ?Araby? the main character is a boy whose name is never given. The boy finds everything in life to be sad except for the girl that he falls in love with. The girl he falls in love with is Mangan?s sister and it is shown by him laying in his front parlor watching her door every morning and following her when she left her house. The reason he does this is to try and escape the environment that he lives in.14 The boy can be seen as an outsider because of the way that he doesn't interact with the girl and only dreams about her.15 However, because of all the dreaming he does about the girl it causes the girl to be more fiction than fact. Before he even spoke to her his body was ?? like a harp and her words and gestures were like fingers running upon the wires.? When he finally does speak to her he learns about the bazaar that she really wants to go to but can not because of a retreat at her convent and the boy decided that he will get a gift for her at the bazaar. However, due to the boy?s uncle getting home late the boy arrives at the bazaar and nearly all the shops are closed which opens his eyes to see how cruel life can be. When he finds a open shop a lady asks if he wants to buy something the boy replies by saying ?no? instinctively.16 ?When the boy fails to buy the promised gift for Mangan?s sister at the bazaar, and implicitly, renounces his adolescent attachment to her.?17 The boy is crushed when he figures out how cruel life is at times but it is necessary so that he can move past is and truly understand love.18 Although the boy dreams about Mangan?s sister all the time he does not know a lot about her. This is due to the boy never talking to the girl until the time that they talk about the bazaar. The only things that the boy knows about the girl comes from one conversation that they had together. In this conversation she tells him that she really wants to go to the bazaar but can not because of a retreat at her convent. The boy imagines a perfect girl but in reality Mangan?s sister is just a normal girl which causes him to renounce his attachment to her when he realizes how stupid he was at the bazaar.19 David Robinson describes the boys imagination by saying that ?Balancing the symbolic afflatus of the story?s first half, the second half chronicles the steady collapse of the boy?s imaginative inflations as they are pricked on hard-edged reality. Each narrated event is in some way a disappointment.?20 The only thing that is not dark and depressing for the boy is Mangan?s sister.
From his dreams he is able to go to a place where he is happy and can leave the outside world where he sees as sad.21 The reason that the boy thinks about her all the time is due to him not having anything else in his life to make him happy. However, because it is the only thing that makes him happy he does it so much that over time that it morphs who she really is. In the end the girl is so far from who she really is that she can be seen as more fiction than fact.22 When the boy finally realizes what he had done at the bazaar he is hit with cold hard reality and is angered that he did this to
himself.23 Without Mangan?s sister the boy would have never had something to be happy about but with her he was happy until he realized his happiness was for something that is not there. The only reason that the boy made up this false identity for the girl is because he was lonely. The boy shows that he is lonely because he sits alone in the priest?s old room and reads his books.24 Joyce shows that life is cruel sometimes in ?Araby? through the boy?s outcome in his fantasy. Through his experience with this fantasy the boy will learn from his mistakes and hope to not make the same mistakes another day. However, the experience of the boy can relate to any mistake made in life that you learn from. In life we all experience dark times and cruelness but its about how we learn from it. From the mistake that the boy made he learned that he can not make false identities for people just so that they make him happy. Joyce was able to show how life really is at times by using the story of a boy with unrealistic ideals. Joyce shows that with unrealistic ideals you will ultimately be faced with defeat and anguish. Through the life and death of the boy?s dreams about Mangan?s sister it shows that life is tragic and that death is just a part of life. When experiencing the death of something you can not hold onto it forever or else you will experience that anguish forever. It is okay to have hopes and dreams but you must keep them within reach or when you realize that you can not reach that dream you will once again be faced with sadness. Through the errors that the boy made you learn that Life is about learning from mistakes and becoming a more experienced person from those mistakes. Notes 1 James Joyce, ?Araby,? Literature: The British Tradition (Hoboken: Pearson, 2015) 1237-1240. 2 Donald E. Morse, ??Sing Three Songs of Araby?: Theme and Allusion in Joyce?s ?Araby?? College Literature (Baltimore: John Hopkins U, 1978) 125. 3 Joyce 1237. 4 David W. Robinson, Texas Studies in Literature and Language (Austin: U of Texas, 1987) 388. 5 William York Tindall, A Reader?s Guide to James Joyce (Syracuse: Syracuse U, 1979) 20. 6 Joseph J. Egan, Romantic Ireland, Dead and Gone: James Joyce?s ?Araby? as National Myth (Waterville, Maine: Colby Library Quarterly, 1979) 190. 7 Shayes, ?Analysis of ?Araby,?? shaysessays.com, 6 Feb, 2016, Web. 8 Joyce 1238. 9 Patrick A. Smith, Thematic Guide to Popular Short Stories (Westport: Greenwood, 2002) 147. 10 Robinson 389. 11 Tindall 20. 12 Joyce 1237-1238. 13 Albert C. Baugh, A Literary History of England (Des Moines, Iowa: Meredith, 1967) 1561. 14 Lee Spinks, James Joyce: A Critical Guide (Edinburgh: Edinburgh U, 2009) 56. 15 Smith 146. 16 Joyce 1238-1241. 17 Egan 190 18 Morse 130-131. 19 Coilin Owens, Masterplots: Araby 20 Robinson 389. 21 Smith 148. 22 Joyce 1239. 23 Robinson 390. 24 Joyce 1240. Works Cited Joyce, James. ?Araby.? Literature: The British Tradition. Hoboken: Pearson, 2015. Robinson, David W. Texas Studies in Literature and Language. Austin: U of Texas, 1987. Spinks, Lee. James Joyce: A Critical Guide. Edinburgh: Edinburgh U, 2009. Baugh, Albert C., ed. A Literary History of England. Des Moines, Iowa: Meredith, 1967. Smith, Patrick A. Thematic Guide to Popular Short Stories. Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood, 2002. Morse, Donald E. ??Sing Three Songs of Araby?: Theme and Allison in Joyce?s ?Araby.?? College Literature. Vol. 5, No 2. Baltimore: John Hopkins U, 1978. 125-132. Egan, Joseph J. Romantic Ireland, Dead and Gone: Joyce?s ?Araby? as National Myth. Vol. 15, No. 3. Waterville, Maine: Colby Library Quarterly, 1979. Owens, Coilin. Masterplots: Araby Tindall, William York. A Reader?s Guide to James Joyce. Syracuse: Syracuse U, 1979. Shayes. ?Analysis of ?Araby.?? sayessays.com 6 Feb. 2016.
Joyce, James. “Araby”. The Norton Anthology of Short Fiction. Eds. R.V. Cassill and Richard Bausch. Shorter Sixth Edition. New York: W.W. Norton and Company, 2000. 427 - 431.
“Araby” tells the story of a young boy who romanticizes over his friend’s older sister. He spends a lot of time admiring the girl from a distance. When the girl finally talks to him, she reveals she cannot go to the bazaar taking place that weekend, he sees it as a chance to impress her. He tells her that he is going and will buy her something. The boy becomes overwhelmed by the opportunity to perform this chivalrous act for her, surely allowing him to win the affections of the girl. The night of the bazaar, he is forced to wait for his drunken uncle to return home to give him money to go. Unfortunately, this causes the boy to arrive at the bazaar as it is closing. Of the stalls that remained open, he visited one where the owner, and English woman, “seemed to have spoken to me out of a sense of duty” (Joyce 89) and he knows he will not be able to buy anything for her. He decides to just go home, realizing he is “a creature driven and derided with vanity” (Joyce 90). He is angry with himself and embarrassed as he...
Joyce, James. "Araby." Backpack Literature: An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, Drama, and Writing. By X. J. Kennedy and Dana Gioia. 4th ed. Boston: Pearson, 2012. 316-21. Print.
It has been such a joy reading “The Norton Introduction to Literature” by Kelly J. Mays. Of all the stories that I was assigned to read, one story in particular stood out to me because of how the author used words to create a vivid image in my mind. The story I’m talking about is “Araby” by James Joyce. James Joyce does a great job creating vivid images in the readers mind and creates a theme that most of us can relate. In this paper I will be discussing five scholarly peer reviewed journals that also discusses the use of image and theme that James Joyce created in his short story “Araby”. Before I start diving into discussing these five scholarly peer review journals, I would like to just write a little bit about “Araby” by James Joyce. James Joyce is an Irish writer, mostly known for modernist writing and his short story “Araby” is one of fifteen short stories from his first book that was published called “Dubliners”. Lastly, “Araby” is the third story in Dubliners. Now I will be transitioning to discussing the scholarly peer review journals.
In "Araby," Joyce works from a "visionary mode of artistic creation"-a phrase used by psychiatrist Carl Jung to describe the, “visionary" kind of literary creation that derives its material from “the hinterland of man's mind-that suggests the abyss of time sepa-rating us from prehuman ages, or evokes a superhuman world of con-trasting light and darkness. It is a primordial experience, which sur-passes man's understanding and to which he is therefore in danger of succumbing." 1 Assuredly this describes Joyce's handling of the material of "Araby." The quest itself and its consequences surpass the understanding of the young protagonist of the story. He can only "feel" that he undergoes the experience of the quest and naturally is con-fused, and at the story's conclusion, when he fails, he is anguished and angered. His "contrasting world of light and darkness" contains both the lost spirituality and the dream of restoring it. Because our own worlds contain these contrasts we also "feel," even though the primordial experience surpasses our understanding, too.
Although “Araby” is a fairly short story, author James Joyce does a remarkable job of discussing some very deep issues within it. On the surface it appears to be a story of a boy's trip to the market to get a gift for the girl he has a crush on. Yet deeper down it is about a lonely boy who makes a pilgrimage to an eastern-styled bazaar in hopes that it will somehow alleviate his miserable life. James Joyce’s uses the boy in “Araby” to expose a story of isolation and lack of control. These themes of alienation and control are ultimately linked because it will be seen that the source of the boy's emotional distance is his lack of control over his life.
A love sick, or obsessed, boy? Or a little bit of both? Either way, James Joyce's story, Araby, is about growing up, and how things do not always turn out how we would like, or expect them to. The main character, a young boy, seems to be about twelve or thirteen years of age. He lives on a dead end street with his aunt and uncle in the Irish city of Dublin. The author is constantly using imagery to convey how mundane the young boys life is, and how dark it is living in Dublin. An example of Joyces word choice to create a dull image would be the line through the dark muddy lanes behind the houses, where we ran the gauntlet of the rough tribes from the cottages, to the back doors of the dark dripping gardens
The short story “Araby” by James Joyce is told by what seems to be the first person point of view of a boy who lives just north of Dublin. As events unfold the boy struggles with dreams versus reality. From the descriptions of his street and neighbors who live close by, the reader gets an image of what the boy’s life is like. His love interest also plays an important role in his quest from boyhood to manhood. The final trip to the bazaar is what pushes him over the edge into a foreshadowed realization. The reader gets the impression that the narrator is the boy looking back on his epiphany as a matured man. The narrator of “Araby” looses his innocence because of the place he lives, his love interest, and his trip to the bazaar.
The theme of light and darkness is apparent throughout Joyce's Araby. 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 visual and emblematic details established throughout the story are highly concentrated, with Araby culminating, largely, in the epiphany of the young unnamed narrator. To Joyce, an epiphany occurs at the instant when the essence of a character is revealed, when all the forces that endure and influence his life converge, and when we can, in that moment, comprehend and appreciate him. As follows, Araby is a story of an epiphany that is centered on a principal deception or failure, a fundamental imperfection that results in an ultimate realization of life, spirit, and disillusionment. The significance is exposed in the boy’s intellectual and emotional journey from first love to first dejection,
How the Setting Reinforces the Theme and Characters in Araby. The setting in "Araby" reinforces the theme and the characters by using imagery of light and darkness. The experiences of the boy in James Joyce's The "Araby" illustrates how people often expect more than ordinary reality can. provide and then feel disillusioned and disappointed.
The narrator in “Araby” is a young man who lives in an uninteresting area and dreary house in Dublin. The only seemingly exciting thing about the boy’s existence is the sister of his friend Mangum that he is hopelessly in love with; “…her name was like a summons to all my foolish blood.” (Joyce 2279) In an attempt to impress her and bring some color into his own gray life, he impulsively lies to her that he is planning on attending a bazaar called Arab. He also promises the gi...
In the story of, "Araby" James Joyce concentrated on three main themes that will explain the purpose of the narrative. The story unfolded on North Richmond Street, which is a street composed of two rows of houses, in a desolated neighborhood. Despite the dreary surroundings of "dark muddy lanes" and "ash pits" the boy tried to find evidence of love and beauty in his surroundings. Throughout the story, the boy went through a variety of changes that will pose as different themes of the story including alienation, transformation, and the meaning of religion (Borey).
At the beginning of “Araby,” the narrator’s young self is stuck in a dreary old neighbourhood and believes that there is more for him out there; however what he does not realise just yet is that this is what reality looks like. The story opens with a description of North Richmond Street, where the boy lives with his aunt and uncle. His neighbourhood is described as a “blind,” street with “brown imperturbable faces (287)” resembling that of those who live there. Only the boy companions "glow (287)"; they are still too young to have succumbed to the spiritual decay of the adults of Dublin. Everywhere in his dark surroundings the boy seeks the "light (287)." For example, he looks for light in the room of his home where the former tenant, a priest, had died, but the only objects left by the priest were books, yellow and...
The boy goes through many small epiphanies throughout his journey that change his perspective from love to despair and display growth and maturity. It’s certain right away that he is obsessed over this girl and was the center of his