Vision in James Joyce's Dubliners

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Recommended: How does James Joyce use real life happenings in Dublin to relate the themes of the Dubliners to the reader

Vision in Dubliners

James Joyce composed Dubliners to show the common Irish citizen and their problems. Many themes are shown throughout the book including eyes/vision and light/dark. The stories “Eveline” and “The Dead” are good examples of these themes. In “Eveline,” the main character is torn between whether or not she should stay in her comfortable home, Ireland, or leave for a fancier life with a man. In “The Dead,” the main character finds that you can sometimes know a dead person just as much as you know a living one. In “Dubliners,” Joyce uses what the characters see and envision as reason for choices they make or emotions they feel.

In the story “Eveline,” the main character must make an important decision about leaving Ireland, with a man her father doesn’t approve of, for a new life in Buenos Aires. Eveline ultimately uses her vision to give her faith to stay rather than her eyes giving her reason to leave. Sight is a theme in this story from the very first line, “She sat at the window watching the evening invade the avenue.” (JJ, 29) Eveline spends her time “looking over” her life in the past and present to decide on her future. When Eveline looks at different aspects of her life, the better parts seem to be visions, or feelings rather than physical, and the worse seem to be physical present day resentment.

Eveline sees many aspects giving her such reason to leave including a dead mother and brother, a drunken father, hard working conditions with little respect and a fancy life awaiting her in Buenos Aires. This is shown more as sight rather than vision by its present day feel in the story. They are things Eveline can physically recognize in her life, so it symbolizes sight and what the eye perceives.

What ends up keeping Eveline from leaving is what is more of a vision, or felt but not physically seen. She holds a promise with her mother, made right before her mother died that she would keep the house and family together. Also the familiarity and safety of “home” Eveline felt from when her father tried to help her get over a sickness, and the memories from her childhood playing in the field by her house with her friends.

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