Eveline : Critique Of James Joyce's Eveline

The unwanting desire to face reality and confront the isolation in which one is living is a struggle that both Gabriel and a little boy encounter. Jame Joyce’s works portray his characters to display both inner struggles and difficulty being socially accepted. During the party, Gabriel is anxious and nervous because he wants to uphold this reputation of a confident man. Therefore, he creates a script allowing him to have a sense control and comfort which he lacks. In Contrast, the little boy perceives himself to be self-assured and sociable when in reality these ideas are inflicted by his imagination. James Joyce’s “The Dead” and “Araby” features characters who struggle with internal emotions, revealing their alienation, separation with

Sexton’s curt style in “Cinderella” is used to convey a satirical tone. She approaches this piece by first telling four short stories; one references a nursemaid “some luscious sweet from Denmark who captures the oldest son’s heart” (line 7). By choosing “luscious sweet” to explain the maid, Sexton suggests the woman is beautiful and only uses her looks to win the man’s love. Implying the maid has nothing else to offer other than her aesthetics, Sexton questions a stereotype of women and shows her negative thoughts of this common assumption. Sexton begins to recant Grimm’s tale of Cinderella and the prince’s ball

I can’t help but wonder why she ends up feeling so guilty to leave her father for happiness with Frank. Eveline deserves to be happy and live a happy life with out being isolated and lonely.

Frank morphs his personality into whatever someone wants him to be. To others he has the perfect family; however, he has a secret. When he is with Kenny he is rude to Tub. But when he is with Tub he seems to be himself. His affair with the babysitter is killing this supposed family man. He doesn't want to leave his wife simply because she's been good to him. The obvious reason of love isn't even mentioned in relation to his wife. When Frank tells Tub about true love it's as if he is a fifteen-year-old girl himself. The way he describes it one could easily imagine the same conversation happening in the girls' bathroom of a high school after a first kiss. "`Tub, have you ever been really in love?' `Well-' `I mean really in love.' He squeezed Tub's wrist. `With your whole being.' `I don't know. When you put it like that, I don't know.' `You haven't then. Nothing against you, but you'd know it if you had.' Frank let go of Tub's arm. `This isn't just some bit of fluff I'm talking about'" (Wolff 88). Frank is extremely immature. His views on life and love make it evident that he would make a connection with a fifteen-year-old. He believes that a friend should be

Frank, the man she thinks she loves, to a faraway country in search of a

Joyce's modernistic view of Dublin society permeates all of his writings. The Irish experiences account for a large portion of Joyce's writings. Stephen Dedalus is sometimes Joyce's pseudonym and represents Joyce and his life in Joyce's works. Joyce plays a crucial role in the modernist movement in literature. Some of the well known innovative techniques used by Joyce are symbolism, realism and stream-of consciousness. James Joyce's writings contain autobiographical matter and display his view of life in Dublin, Ireland with the use of symbolism, realism, and stream-of consciousness.

A&P by John Updike and Araby by James Joyce are two short stories that have multiple differences and similarities. A&P is about a teenager and his lust for young ladies and Araby is about a young boy who had a crush on a older girl. I will be comparing and contrasting the portrayal of women, love and epiphany in the two short stories A&P and Araby.

Trapped in a world where mental anguish imprisons her, Eveline is another of James Joyce's paralyzed souls. Her life is full of ups and downs. Every day she struggles with burdens that she should not have to bear and when the opportunity comes for her to get away from this retched life, she denies herself the chance. The reasons why I feel Eveline did not leave for Buenos Aires with Frank is because she was obligated to her family, she was afraid of the unknown and she did not know how to receive love.

James Joyce, the author of both “Araby” and “The Dead,” exploits a sense of imagery throughout both short stories. “Araby” and “The Dead” both share and differ from each other in the ways the imagery is shown. The vivid imagery in “Araby” is applied to express feelings and expressions from one character to another. The main character, an unnamed boy, has an undying admiration for Mangan’s sister. James Joyce describes the boy’s obsession with Mangan’s sister in vast imagery. “The Dead” also includes many senses of imagery, but shows kinesthetic imagery rather than vivid imagery. Kinesthetic imagery is an imagery that is portrayed through the movement and physical tension. In “The Dead,” Gabriel, the main character, dislikes the country of Ireland he lives in, so he flees. Throughout this, Gabriel describes how Ireland is boring and cold, displaying kinesthetic imagery. “The Dead” and “Araby” both include vivid imagery, kinesthetic imagery, and auditory imagery.

change in her life by moving with her boyfriend Frank from her homeland of Ireland and making a life with him in Buenos Ayres. Joyce illustrates that one of our most inherent qualities as humans and one that Eveline displays is that we are resistant to change. Through Eveline's relationships with her father, Frank and various peripheral relationships, Joyce demonstrates to us how Eveline has come to have certain beliefs about change.

Eveline's internal struggle illustrates clearly how one struggles between the past and the future, leading to the failure to escape. While weighing her options as to whether or not leave Dublin, Eveline remembers her mother's wishes: "Her promise to her mother, her promise to keep the home together as long as she could" (Joyce 40). Even though Eveline's home contains an abusive father, absence of family members, and the struggles of domestic work, she is unable to let go. Awaiting her a promised adventurous and free spirited life with her respectful and kind lover, Frank. He has the ability to rescue Eveline from a troubling past and allow her to enter a new phase in her life, liberated from the ugliness of Dublin. However,

James Joyce’s short stories “Araby” and “The Dead” both depict self-discovery as being defined by moments of epiphany. Both portray characters who experience similar emotions and who, at the ends of the stories, confront similarly harsh realities of self-discovery. In each of these stories, Joyce builds up to the moment of epiphany through a careful structure of events and emotions that leads both protagonists to a redefining moment of self-discovery.

Recent trends in literature heavily rely on crossover between genres. Science fiction is becoming more integrated with young adult novels, and even murder mysteries are starting to incorporate romance. This crossover insures authors that they will be able to reach a broader audience, with the hopes that more people will read their books. Short stories have blended countless genres together for a long time, so it’s not surprising to see a short mystery, or a short romance. Poet James Joyce has recently become just as recognized for his prose, especially when that prose is in the form of a short story. His collection, Dubliners, includes a handful of well-recognized stories that have similar themes run throughout. One of the most famous, Araby, quickly melds between a mystery and a love story, famously ending on a cliffhanger that leads readers to interpret the finale for themselves. Throughout the brief entirety of Araby, James Joyce continues to create an aura of mystery and confusion, even going as far as to end the novel in a cliffhanger. This ambiguity allows for the reader to input their own experiences and ideas into the characters, which leads to the extensive feeling of relatability that most readers have with the little boy.

To all of us reading the story the choice is clear, Eveline has no reason to stay home. Frank on the other hand seems like a great guy. Her inability too choose going with Frank or even show him any signs of recognition as seen here “Her eyes gave him no signs of love or farewell or recognition.”(Joyce P.33)shows a clear moral paralysis. Eveline in contrast to most of the other main characters shows no realization about what she has learned, has learned nothing about her self to hate and is stuck in a seemingly more hopeless moral paralysis.

During the postcolonial times the presence of the Roman Catholic Church dominated the Republic of Ireland making Irish Christianity the largest religion. It is through marriage that Eveline is able to fulfill the personal desire enculturated within her through society. O’Brien identifies in Study: An Irish Quarterly Review that Eveline believes that by becoming Frank’s wife, she can “completely valorise her female identity” (207). By becoming a married woman she would gain ‘respect’, as Joyce explains, “then she would be married – she, Eveline. People would treat her with respect then. She would not be treated as her mother had been” (73). It is through Frank that Eveline can find her