Given this opinion, and the understanding that Joyce faced - in some way or another - many of the problems that the characters in Dubliners faced, it is almost impossible to say that Dubliners is not just a touch autobiographical in some ways. This is not meant to imply that Joyce used himself for characters in the book, but only that much of what he was thinking and feeling carried over to the feeling and tone of the book while it was being written. Another good indication of this is the length of time that it took Joyce to write Dubliners, which would indicate that he likely struggled with the book to some degree. It seems as though most writers do struggle with books that are 'close to home' as opposed to those that are purely fictional and have no ties to the real life of the individual that is writing them. While there is no proof that Joyce took so long with Dubliners for this reason, there is a...

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Joyce, James. (1991). Dubliners. Dover Publications, Unabridged Edition.

Valente, Francesca (1995). Joyce's Dubliners as epiphanies. The Modern Word.com. http://www.themodernword.com/joyce/paper_valente.html.

Walzl, Florence L. (1965). "The Liturgy of the Epiphany Season and the Epiphanies of Joyce," PMLA, LXXXX.

Duncan