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James Joyce's Araby Essay

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The Tragedy of Araby


In James Joyce’s Araby, a young boy finds himself in love with an older girl. The girl, Mangan’s sister, refuses to love him back and instead ignores him. This crushes the boy and makes his hunger for her even more stronger. He sometimes finds himself hopelessly alone in the darkness thinking about her, awaiting for the day she would recognize his devotion to her. “ At night in my bedroom…her image came between me and the page I strove to read (805).” “At last she spoke to me (805).” She asked him if he was going to attend a popular carnival called Araby. Unfortunately, she was unable to go, and it was up to him to bring her something back. This …show more content…

The blind was pulled down to within an inch of the sash so that I could not be seen” ( ). Even the boy’s house is isolated from the whole neighborhood because it’s located at the end of the street. The bicycle is rusty and does not work, therefore, there is no transportation; in a sense they are trapped. When the boy was traveling to the carnival he was all alone in the carriage. Finally when he got to Araby it was unfortunately closing down and he was alone again. Being alone in the carriage and at the carnival diminishes him as a person, and lowers him to a level, which makes him feel like he is a pariah; different and alone from the world. At the time he got to the carnival every one were already gone. “ The people are in bed and after their first sleep now. ( )” Not only is he feeling alone but he finds himself surrounded by darkness and other dark/light images.
There are many dark and light images throughout the story. The dark imagery seems to speak for itself. It has a joyless, gloomy, sad, and obviously devoid of light type of message, to it. Even the tone of the story has this kind of impression. However, this is exactly how the boy describes the aura of the neighborhood. The majority of the objects, people, and places are described through darkness. For example, the houses are illustrated as having “brown imperturbable faces”, meaning that there are traces of darkness both

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