Bell Dubliners Blog 1

Blog 1: "Araby"

The short story “Araby” is a narrative about a young man’s yearning for the love of a neighbor. The young man is infatuated with the young girl who lives next door even though they have never spoken. He waits for her every day and walks behind her so that he can see her, and plans his route so that he may pass her. The main character in this story is clearly in the working class of Dublin, and he describes the houses in his neighborhood as: “conscious of decent lives within them, gazing at one another with brown imperturbable faces” (Joyce 23). By using the color brown to describe the houses and calling the lives “decent” this creates a feeling of dullness. The story is written in first person, one of three in Dubliners to be written in this style, and this makes the story feel more personal to the reader rather than detached. The main character, the young man, describes many views of Dublin and its scenery, recalling memories from when he used to play in the streets with other young people: “When we met in the streets the houses had grown somber. The space of sky above us was the color of ever-changing violet and towards it the lamps of the street lifted their feeble lantern” (Joyce 15). Even though the narrator had previously described his neighborhood as duller and monotonous, he sees the beauty in it at these moments. This shows Joyce’s possible attitude towards Dublin. He knows that the lives being lived within it often fall to monotony, but that the city itself can often be beautiful in the most unexpected moments.

            The narrator is overly infatuated with his neighbor, a beautiful young girl. He states that “Her image accompanied me in even in places the most hostile to romance” (Joyce 16). The young girl is always on the narrator’s mind, even when he is doing mundane tasks like getting the groceries, he makes sure to go out of his way so that he can see her. These encounters with the young woman are clearly the highlight of the narrator’s day. This emphasis on the almost pathetic infatuation the young man has is perhaps Joyce’s way of highlighting the simple monotony of this particular narrator’s life. When the narrator eventually speaks to the young girl, it’s a very important moment for him, so much so that he hardly knows what to say to her. He tells her that he will bring her something from Araby, a bazaar that the narrator previously had no intention of attending. The narrator counts on his uncle to give him money in order for him to be able to attend the bazaar, and bring back said gift he had promised the young woman. His reliance on his uncle shows the immaturity of the young boy, for he does not even have his own money to be able to attend the bazaar. The young boy grows impatient when his uncle does not return from work on time to give him money, but goes to the bazaar anyway in hopes that it would still be open. He finds that most of the stalls are closed, and sadly leaves to walk home without anything for the young girl. However, the narrator seems to have a moment of clarity at the end of the story, seeing himself as a “creature driven and derided by vanity” (Joyce 19). This seems to be a rather introspective thought for such a young man. This shows the narrator’s realization that his main interest in the young girl is her beauty, and that he went through a lot of trouble to obtain her a gift when he barely knows her. He calls himself a “creature” which is relevant because it shows that he feels slightly dehumanized. Because he went through so much trouble to obtain her a gift and came out empty handed, his crush perhaps has faded when he realized that the feelings were most likely not returned, which made the narrator’s “eyes burn with anguish and anger” (Joyce 19).