I have to agree that Dubliners was bleak, much bleaker than Ulysses which I read before it. I don't want to say James Joyce has a pessimism about it all but it's hard to stay away from that word.
However, overall I still really liked it. My favourite story was the last one, The Dead. It was more like a short novella really. Here's a quote I really liked from it:
Quote:
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Like the tender fires of stars moments of their life together, that no one knew of or would ever know of, broke upon and illumined his memory. He longed to recall to her those moments, to make her forget the years of their dull existence together and remember only their moments of ecstasy.
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After Ulysses I read up a little on Joyce again and in the course also happened to read some on Dubliners before I began the book, so while reading the book I was on the lookout for themes and symbolism. I noticed a main theme of the book was, appropriately to the bleakness and the last story's title, death. The book begins with a death (the priest) and ends with a death (the revelation of the boy who loved Mrs. Conroy who had died). I think a general theme of the book was also paralysis, introduced literally in the very first story by the priest who was paralysed.
I'm not so sure about the later stories but I also think the some of the stories were symbolic, usually about Ireland itself. It seems that someone sometimes represented either an idealised Ireland or a realistic and bleak Ireland. Similarly I think Joyce was trying to make a point about how he felt that Ireland as a whole was in a state of paralysis, by the Church, by England and by themselves.
I think "Araby" is a good case in point. I think the girl was symbolic of an idealised Ireland, but when the boy wanted to do something for her he was thwarted by Ireland itself (his uncle who was drunk and didn't give him money in time and the aunt who was innefectual), the Church (the bazaar was run by the Church and the boy had to pay a lot of his money to get in and it had mostly closed by the time the boy got there and so was useless) and England (the one stand left open when the boy arrived was manned by an English girl who didn't really want to help him anyway).
I think the snow in The Dead also symbolises this paralysis, and that's why in the final paragraphs Joyce makes a point of widening his scope to describe it snowing on all of Ireland.
Quote:
Originally Posted by BelleZora
Upon reflection, I have to say that I appreciate James Joyce's apparent view in this book that epiphanies happen and they have little practical value. In other books they are a handy literary device, but in real life they are pretty much a dime a dozen and about as life-changing for most of us as they are for Joyce's Dubliners.
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Very nice, ahem, epiphany.
