Mr. Duffy finds romance -- love, even -- but he is too unaware to realize what this could mean for him and for the woman he realizes he loves too late. Both Mr. Duffy and this would-be lover are isolated, caught in their own middle-aged loneliness through what are essentially a series of cowardly choices, while Araby's hero is somewhat brave if ultimately ineffective (Corrington, 182). The differences between these two protagonists and the stories themselves are made more interesting by the many similarities they share. Both characters end up regretting the decisions they made regarding love and romance, and end up feeling their loneliness and isolation more sharply than they had before. Despite their difference in ages and situations, both characters also end with little seeming hope of correcting their mistakes and finding true love. In fact, it is suggested in both stories that there is no really way to know or understand another human being, and thus no way for love to ever be fully and...
Knowing someone requires bravely opening your heart to them, and even then the return of this openness is not guaranteed. In "Araby" and "A Painful Case," two very different characters come to the same internal end, one by opening his heart and the other by failing to do so." In Two Gallants, the "fine tart" (p. 58) of a woman that Corley picked up is likely a prostitute or at least a woman; or, as Jackson points out on page 43, a woman "...in low milieux" (or, she could be "an attractive girlfriend" and be know as "free with her favours"). This woman may have been an easy sexual mark, but she was more than that for Corley; she
Eveline's Conflict James Joyce, in Dubliners, explores the internal conflict that paralyzes his female protagonist, Eveline, as she stands upon the event horizon of a new life, and a new set of possibilities. At this particular moment in her life, Eveline finds herself at a crossroads, considering whether or not she should leave her home and her abusive, alcoholic father in order to travel to a far away and exotic land
James Joyce's The Dead James Joyce develops strong female characters in his short story "The Dead" and uses them in contrast to the men. The primary contrast is that between Gretta and Gabriel, and while Gretta is described in feminine terms related to the image of the Blessed Virgin, Gabriel is described in the same terms, creating an interesting shift which carries through the story and brings out differing perspectives on
Thus, in 1714, Swift returned to Ireland, "to die like a poisoned rat in a hole," as he reported (Hunting 22). Yet Swift slowly reconciled himself to his life in Ireland and the 1720's proved to be an incredibly creative time for him, including his famous "Gulliver's Travels" in 1726 (Hunting 23). In his seventieth year he wrote that walking though the streets of Dublin, he received "a thousand hats
Joyce Guinness, rashers, and slatterns, rather than wine women and song Women are the best of a bad, all too human collection of Irish characters in Dubliners James Joyce, an Irish modernist of the early 20th century, took a deflationary but compassionate view of the sexual urges both men and women over the course of his collection of short stories Dubliners. However, although he took a dim view of both men and women
James Joyce's "The Dead" and a Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man Entrapment and escape are common themes uncovered in James Joyce's literature. Joyce often utilizes society as a symbol of entrapment for his characters, and through moments of realization, they often experience an epiphany that allows them to escape their paralysis. In his novel, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and his short story, "The
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