Araby Essays (Examples)

I chafed against the work of school."

These "follies" are also seen by the boy's school master as "idleness," which juxtaposes the perceived importance of the feeling for the boy with the more rational views of outsiders.

This rational view is also represented by the boy's uncle, who is reminded more than once that the boy plans to go to the bazaar. The climax of the story occurs with the boy's wild excitement on the day of the bazaar: "On Saturday morning I reminded my uncle that I wished to go to the bazaar in the evening. He was fussing at the hallstand, looking for the hat-brush, and answered me curtly..."

The Uncle was obviously busy with his own work, perceived by himself as much more important than the boy's need to go to the bazaar, which deserves no more than a curt reply. The first brush of reality then…

"I had never spoken to her," he admits (30). hen finally he does he is at a loss for words. "hen she addressed the first words to me I was so confused that I did not know what to answer," (31). He communicates better in a fantasy world, just as he sees better in his fantasy world: "Her name sprang to my lips at moments in strange prayers and praises which I myself did not understand," (31). Sensory deprivation is at times total: "All my senses seemed to desire to veil themselves," (31). Silence and muteness, while not as prevalent as blindness, contribute to an overall sense of darkness and death in "Araby." Sensory deprivation is also a part of religious esotericism. At Araby, the narrator "recognized a silence like that which pervades a church after a service," (34).

His lack of real or symbolic sight indicates his lack of…

John Updike's "A&P" and James Joyce's "Araby" are very alike. The theme of the two stories centers on a young men who are concerned over thinking out the dissimilarity between reality and the imaginations of romance that dance in their heads. They also examine their mistaken thoughts on their respective world, the girls they encounter, and most importantly, themselves. One of the main comparable aspects of the two stories is the built up of the main characters' idealistic expectations of women. Both characters set their sights on one girl which they place all their fondness in. Both Sammy and the boy were rebuffed in the end. Both stories do a good job of immersing the reader into unstable minds of young men faced with difficult life lessons. In their instance being, life is not what one expects.

Continuing the comparison in both "Araby" and "A&P," the stories are written in…

Araby," by James Joyce, "The Aeneid," by Virgil, and "Candide," by Voltaire. Specifically, it will look at love as a common theme in literature, but more often than not, it does not live up to the romantic ideal of love. Various authors employ this emotion as a theme that allows them to demonstrate some truth about the human condition that lies outside of the terrain of love.

ARABY"

The third story in Joyce's "The Dubliners" is "Araby." At first it seems simply a story of a young boy experiencing his first love. However, there is much more to the story. The boy reveals his feelings about the Church in the first paragraph, when he says the Christian Brothers' School "set the boys free." The girl he likes cannot go to the fair with him because she has a "retreat at her convent." These simple statements show the restrictions of the…

The following quotation, in which he leaves the bazaar empty-handed, emphasizes the fact that the narrator had egregiously deluded himself about his perceived romance. "Gazing up into the darkness I saw myself as a creature driven and derided by vanity; and my eyes burned with anguish and anger" (Joyce). The "anger" the narrator experiences is understandable and is in reaction to this dearth of money and inability to produce a talisman that is a token of his affection for Mangan's sister. hat is far more meaningful, however, is the "anguish" he feels, which is demonstrative of his despair in knowing that he cannot afford presents for Mangan's sister and will not consummate his feelings for her ever -- and is instead headed for a life of poverty, dinginess and mediocrity.

The existence of the narrator's aunt and uncle confirm the fact that more than likely, the narrator will share their…

Illusion and Reality in "Araby"

In James Joyce's short story "Araby," written in 1905, but first published in 1914 in Dubliners (Merriam ebster's Encyclopedia of Literature, p. 611) a young boy experiences his first sexual awakening, and finds himself endlessly fantasizing about "Mangan's sister," who lives in a house near his own. As Joyce describes Mangan's sister, from the boy's perspective "Her dress swung as she moved her body and the soft rope of her hair tossed from side to side." He cannot pull his image of Mangan's sister from his mind, even long enough to say his prayers. Thoughts of Mangan's sister interfere impede his concentration at school. ithout understanding why, the picture inside his head of Mangan's sister, distorted or real, takes on iconic significance, substituting for reality in a way far more, in fact deliciously, exciting. However, by the end of the story, the young boy's axis…

Benstock notes because "Araby" is narrated in first-person "Araby," we are experiencing what life might have been like for Joyce as a young boy. The boy, while we do not know his age, is still young enough to be influenced by certain "larger than life" images of the girl and the priest. Barnhisel maintains that the narrator in this story is a "sensitive boy, searching for principles with which to make sense of the chaos and banality of the world" (Barnhisel). This is a sensitive age because the mind is open to experience and knowledge but without reason. The events he experiences are also "well within the framework of ordinary childhood occurrences" (Benstock). One of these occurrences is the disappointment of his puppy love with Mangan's sister. The narrative, since told through his perspective is "recorded by the limited perception of an intelligent but nonetheless inexperienced and susceptible consciousness" (Benstock).…

He realizes that this infatuation for Mangan's sister is an illusion, and simply a wistful idea that serves as escape from his discontentment: "I lingered before her stall, though I knew my stay was useless, to make my interest in her wares seem more real. Then I turned away slowly and walked down the middle of the bazaar" (Joyce *). He allows the coin to fall from his pocket, and in a denouement that indicates Joyce's message, he hears a voice calling "the lights are out" casting the upper part of the hall in utter darkness.

Norris (1995) sees the story in a more positive light as indicating merely a momentary shift towards disappointment but that 'light' will return at the end of the day. To me it seems as though Joyce wishes to indicate that the 'runt of the litter' may never have an opportunity to bathe in this…

And that includes me."

It is with a Wild Sheep Chase, his third novel published in 1982, that Murakami begins to delve more into the surrealistic, dream world of the opposite sex. A girl whose unusually beautiful and super-sensitive ears confer extraordinary pleasures: "She'd shown me her ears on occasion; mostly on sexual occasions. Sex with her ears exposed was an experience I'd never previously known. When it was raining, the smell of rain came through crystal-clear. When birds were singing, their song was a thing of sheer clarity."

Murakami's fiction that include characters' with workaday mundane lives are often abruptly interrupted and sent irrevocably off course into some dreamlike worlds by the most apparent insignificant events. For example, in the Wind-Up Bird Chronicle the narrator is searching for a missing cat and comes to a vacant lot and later to the bottom of a well, through which he travels…

James Joyce’s short story Araby is definitely a quest per Thomas Foster’s definition of a quest in How to Read Literature Like a Professor. There are five distinct criteria the author outlines for this definition; Araby adheres to each of them. It has someone seeking something (a quester), a place for the protagonist to go, a stated reason to go there, trials along the way, and a real reason to go there. A close examination of the Joyce’s text in the context of these parameters reveals how the elements of fiction are used by the author for the purpose of sending his protagonist on the quest.
The element of fiction pertaining to setting certainly reinforces this thesis statement. The short story is set in Ireland, presumably in Dublin because it is part of the collection entitled Dubliners. The protagonist is a young boy smitten with a young woman who talks…

When the day of the bazaar finally arrives the narrator begins experiencing one disappointment after another, which slowly chip away at his idealistic notions towards romance. First, he is unable to spy on his beloved from his window like he always used to. Second, he starts having uneasy feelings about the day as he walks to school that morning. Third, his uncle's late return home significantly delays him from attending the bazaar at its busiest moment. Finally, when he reaches the bazaar he finds that its shops are on the verge of closing down and there is nothing magical and exciting about it. This major disappointment prevents him from purchasing his beloved's gift, thereby making the trip altogether useless. As the story ends the narrator is found to be predictably bitter and disappointed towards the intrusion of reality into his dreams for love and romance.

Importance of the setting in understanding the story

A successful story needs to have several components linked together in order to help the reader build up the story in their minds. The setting of a story is one of the powerful elements that are often used as a link of symbolism between the character and his life. It sets the mood for the story as well as depicts the mental state of the character's mind in consonance with the theme of the story. Araby is based on the oppression people are facing in the name of religion which causes them to have a very false perspective of reality.

Description of the setting

Araby is set in Dublin, Ireland and the story locale is a North Richmond Street that is depicted as 'blind' and quiet. The word blind is chosen to imply 'without a vision' or 'a dead end.' The house…

PAUL'S CASE AND AABY

Character Analysis

Paul's Case and Araby

In the short stories titled Paul's Case and Araby, both talk about the challenges that Paul and the young boy faces in the world around them. This is showing how different events and perceptions influence the way others see them and the opinions of themselves. These themes are designed to illustrate those factors that are affecting their attitudes, actions and behaviors. To fully understand what is happening requires conducting a detailed character analysis of Paul and the young boy. Together, these elements will illustrate how this is influencing the two characters and the lasting effects these concepts are having on them.

A character analysis of Paul in Paul's case

Paul is someone who has problems with authority. In Paul's Case, this is used to demonstrate his issues with authority figures and the way this holds him back. Throughout the entire…

Araby

The diction employed by Joyce in his short story "Araby," just one of the many works in his collection of tales known as Dubliners, is critical to the interpretation of this story. Beyond everything else, the author's choice of wording helps to reveal critical elements about the narrator. These elements are not related to the basics of characterization: who he is, what he is doing and why. Instead, Joyce's diction is an important determinant in evaluating how the narrator does what he does, and how he is actually feeling through the various stages of the plot. A careful analysis of the author's word choice reveals that more than anything, the narrator's character is that of a hopeless romantic, for whom life can never hope to be as pleasant as his romanticized perception of things.

The chief cause of the narrator's romantic characterization, of course, is the sister of his…

Traditions and traditional ways of doing things are considered good or moral, while modern times are considered worse than the past and immoral. At the end of the short story, it is the grandmother who is continually insisting that "The Misfit" is actually good inside, begging for him to find his own sense of morality.

"Araby," however, offers an almost opposite view of morality. While readers of "A Good Man is Hard To Find" are barraged with the grandmother's ideas of morality and instructions on how to be more moral, the main character in "Araby" practices an internal monitoring of his morality. For instance, the main character assesses the Priest who lived in the family's home as a tenant, thinking him generous because he gave away all of his possessions upon his death. Further, at the end of the story, the main character has the chance to evaluate his own…

Ignorance Bliss? A Comparison and Contrast of the Characters and Themes of Sandra Cisneros' "The House on Mango Street" and "Araby" by James Joyce

Plot Summary

Character Summary

Ignorance, although comfortable is not bliss at all.

Character

Gender

Age Difference

Culture

Catholicism and sexuality in Joyce

Catholicism and family in Cisneros

Home

Significance of home in Cisneros

Significance of leaving home in Joyce

Both the protagonists of Sandra Cisneros and "Araby" by James Joyce are young adolescents, poised upon the brink of realizing that older people do not have all of the answer in life. The tales detail the coming of age of the young protagonists, as they realize that the adults in their respective worlds are not as good or wise as they seem to be. Cisneros's female heroine comes to her realization when she is contrasting the promises of her family about the house on Mango Street her…

The boy has begun to understand something different about the nature of literature -- goodness is not the only standard by which to judge others, at least the goodness of the Church.

The man, however, only smiled. I saw that he had great gaps in his mouth between his yellow teeth. Then he asked us which of us had the most sweethearts. Mahony mentioned lightly that he had three totties. The man asked me how many I had. I answered that I had none. He did not believe me and said he was sure I must have one. I was silent." (3) the boy feels, however, that he is lacking in front of his friend Mahoney because he lacks for female affection. Desiring to seem different in all ways from Mahoney, he comes up short. Yet the older man, by identifying a different means of measuring the moral nature of…

Money:

The adolescent perspective as depicted in the short stories of Joyce, Faulkner, and Cather

The search for higher social status as a form of personal fulfillment and self-definition all mark the coming-of-age stories of James Joyce, illiam, Faulkner, and illa Cather, despite the distinct differences between the three male protagonists created by the authors in their seminal short stories "Araby," "Barn Burning," and "Paul's Case." All three short stories feature a young protagonist whose illusions of finery and higher class status are shattered. Because these aspirations are also often connected to sexual desires, this fall from grace is particularly difficult for the young men to tolerate.

In "Araby," the young male protagonist becomes enamored with a young woman who seems innocent, above his own class, and charming. hen she professes to wish to go to the Araby bazaar but cannot because she must go on a retreat with her…

Her disappointment is passed on to Frank and they both suffer because of her inaction and resulting fear.

In "The Boarding house," we discover disappointment connected to two characters, Polly and Mr. Doran. In this story, disappointment is wrapped up with victimization and manipulation. Mrs. Mooney is the one holding the cards in this game and she is determined to see that her daughter does not suffer for the sake of a man. Mr. Doran becomes her victim Mrs. Mooney deals with her own misery. hile Polly is accustomed to having her way with the men of the boarding house, her mother is intent on her having some semblance of a good life. Mr. Doran is a victim of circumstance. He happens to be at the proverbial wrong place at the wrong time and ends up paying for it - perhaps for the rest of his life. e read, "There…

The boys play in the neighborhood streets until their skin "glowed" (382) and their "shouts echoed in the silent street" (382). Here we see a glimpse of Ireland that is not fantastic or glamorous. It is just the kind of setting a young boy needs to be consumed with a mysterious girl. hen the narrator finally makes it to the bazaar, he is met with disappointment, which forces him to be honest and realize Mangan is simply a fantasy that will let him down as well. He also realizes he is a "creature driven and derided by vanity" (386). Like Gabriel, he realizes not all things are what they seem

In "Counterparts," the epiphany is painful because it involves us taking a look at a seedier aspect of life. Farrington realizes the dreadful routine in his life. For Farrington, there is no escape from any of the stresses in his…

extend the lines, if necessary, without being wordy.

Three specific instances of irony in "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been" are:

a) ____The title: no one ever asks Connie these questions.

b) ____Connie is the one preyed upon in this tale, but she invites in this demonic provocation.

c) Arnold Friend's remark about holding her so tight she won't try to get away because it will be impossible, is an ironic remark as it represents much of the symbolism at work throughout the story.

In "Young Goodman Brown," a) Brown represents ____The easily corruptible human.

b) the forest represents ____The practice of evil.

c) the peeling, cacophonous sounds represent ____Temptation

3. Explain the mother's attitude towards Emily in "I Stand Here Ironing"; what specific EVIDENCE supports your position? ____The mother's attitude towards Emily in the story is one of distance, rather than motherly attention. She regards Emily as…

Handsomest Drowned Man in the World by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

Point-of-View -- the author presents the perceptions of the villagers who live in isolation and are suddenly shaken by the arrival of someone so unlike them in stature and appearance. First, the women, then the men, construct an ideal from the tallness and overall attractiveness of the drowned man. He represents a myth, which mingles with their collective sense of reality and is moved by it. Even when they decide to throw him back into the sea as their burial tradition, they design their future according to the image of this admirable drowned man so that they too may one day be admired by others.

Genre -- Magical realism fuses magic and reality. The reality part is the everyday and routine ways of the villagers in the isolated island. The magic is the sudden arrival of the dead body of…

In "The Secret Life of alter Mitty," Mitty escapes the reality of his manhood with daydreaming. He does this because his wife emasculates him. For Mitty, daydreams are better than dealing with a bothersome wife. Mitty is a real man in his mind as he fantasizes about saving the Navy hydroplane. Mitty is not happy and he argues with his wife over such things as overshoes. He is no doubt a curmudgeon, as we see when he calls the parking lot attendant "damn cocky" (Thurber 1361). Mitty is unlucky in life but we have to wonder how much of this is his fault. Many would look at him and see nothing that resembles a real man. His imagination is his escape, which makes Mitty happy, as he declares himself "undefeated" and "inscrutable" (1364). Mitty might know how to escape his awful world but he is taking a chicken's way out.…

The characters have faults, the endings are not happy, and the characters have real emotions and feelings. Just like real life, the young boy cannot fulfill his desire to buy the girl he loves a present, he is too afraid. And similarly, the young girl tries to kill herself, only to be rescued by a young doctor who then feels "obligated" to love her. The similarities here are that love is complicated, and does not always end happily.

The biggest difference in these two stories is the innocence of the young boy and the darker, more sinister "love" of the doctor and Mabel. Mabel manipulates the doctor, even if she does not realize it, while the young boy is not manipulative in his love, he is just young, naive, and afraid. It seems he will have another, more grown-up chance at love, while Jack and Mabel will not.

eferences

Joyce,…

The overall effect is like slogging through sucking mud -- there is a depressive inertia in the poem, as if one does not want to go on but must.

2) What does he mean by "blind skyscrapers"? What does this mean symbolically? The line before this one comments on the "neutral air" in New York (this is before they entered WWII), making the blind skyscrapers perhaps "blind" in the sense that they aren't taking sides; blind like Justice is blind. They are also blind to the evils being committed in Europe where war has been going on for awhile. All of this is symbolic; it is also possible that Auden is alluding to tall buildings of a bygone era, where towers and lighthouses -- the tallest building -- were built specifically to see.

3) in the seventh stanza... what is the "ethical life" of which he speaks in the first…

Charles Fort's We do not Fear the Father and Louise Edrich's the Lady in the Pink Mustang, what are the metaphors, similes and allegories in these two poems? How do they enhance the meaning of the poem?

A pink car signifies that she wants to be a girly-girly with a simple life, but the car, proud, and different. The car is a mustang, which is a wild, fast, and promiscuous creature. "The sun goes down for hours, taking more of her along than the night leaves with her," reflects the kind of empty work that she does during the night, and that she only belongs to herself in the day time when she is not performing. "It is what she must face every time she is touched, the body disposable as cups." Could the girl in the pink mustang be a stripper, a showgirl, or a prostitute? Regardless, she feels…

Mr. Duffy finds romance -- love, even -- but he is too unaware to realize what this could mean for him and for the woman he realizes he loves too late. Both Mr. Duffy and this would-be lover are isolated, caught in their own middle-aged loneliness through what are essentially a series of cowardly choices, while Araby's hero is somewhat brave if ultimately ineffective (Corrington, 182).

The differences between these two protagonists and the stories themselves are made more interesting by the many similarities they share. Both characters end up regretting the decisions they made regarding love and romance, and end up feeling their loneliness and isolation more sharply than they had before. Despite their difference in ages and situations, both characters also end with little seeming hope of correcting their mistakes and finding true love. In fact, it is suggested in both stories that there is no really way…

While we are shown the fact that Sammy, ogles the girls and makes a queen of the leader. On one hand while he feels no pang in doing so he is disgusted by the butcher's lustful gaze. (Saldivar, 214)

There is rebellion when the manager who is a puritan rebukes the girls. The only outrage that the manager, Lengel, seem to have done is to make the queen blush. Thus Sammy quits his job against an authority that demeans people. The girls seem neither to have noticed the managers' consternation or admonition nor have they noticed Sammy standing up for them. Sammy gains nothing but loses his job in the bargain. (Saldivar, 215)

There was parody of other works for which Updike is noted. Here in this story too, apart from Araby we find the parody of the classic Vanity Fair. Parody of the Vanity Fair can be seen in…

Lengel says, "That's all right...but this isn't the beach." And after a counter-protest by another of the three girls, Lengel lectures, "e want you decently dressed when you come in here." For all the readers know, Lengel himself is turned on by the lovely young women, and is only ranting at them in order to gaze at the splendor on display. In any event, Queenie says, "e are decent"; she is definitely becoming agitated, and as the narrator reminds readers, she is acutely conscious of her apparent high social standing, and needn't put up with a pious loser manager in a store "pretty crummy" store. The Sunday school pedagogue has his last say; "Girls I don't want to argue with you. After this come in here with your shoulders covered. It's our policy." He turns his back on the girls. Sammy hasn't rung up the herring fillets yet; but the…

Databases and their relational file structures have also progressed to the point of being open in architectural structure enough to allow for real-time updates via XML calls and integration points throughout individual and shared files (oth, Hernandez, Coulthard, Yan, et al., 2006). This open architecture-based approach to XML integration is also making databases ideally suited for transaction-intensive environments throughout e-commerce websites and throughout complex transactions involving multiple selling partners through a supply chain as well (Smyrlis, 2005). As a result, databases are the foundation of distributed order management, enterprise content management, enterprise resource planning (EP) and Customer elationship Management (CM) systems.

Databases and Security

Databases in organizations and governments often hold the most confidential data that exists and therefore need to be protected extremely well. The dominant standard for database security is ACID (atomicity, consistency, isolation, durability) compliance (Dolgicer, 1993). When an ACID test of compliance is completed on a…

Design citeia exist at the levels of the technical, system integation aspects of the database to othe systems though XML. This integation is citically impotant to ensue that the applications ceated can be effectively used ove time and not have any scalability issues. Thee is also the need fo designing the databases at the pesentation laye to povide fo scalability and flexibility of being able to ceate applications elatively quickly at the potal level. This is especially impotant fom a Business Pocess Management (BPM) standpoint as databases must be able to suppot the vaious pocess wokflows as defined as pat of business pocess e-engineeing effots ove time. Thee is also the need fom a design standpoint to have a continued development initiative going to captue use needs ove time and include them into the next geneation of database updates. The use of councils to ceate update plans and define the…

Although "Midsummer" is a shot work, in keeping with more of the original modernistic style of poetry writing, it is no less poignant in the message it conveys.

Conclusion

In many ways, DH Lawrence is a visionary that offers the reader imagery and creativity that engulfs the reader into the world in which he creates with his words. As with Walcott, it was not necessary for Lawrence to achieve cadence in his writing though the use of rhyme. There is a balance that is struck that clearly reads as poetic. Lawrence's expressive language and use of interesting characters helps to tell the stories of dehumanization that only comes with man's lack of recognition for the power of nature, and moving too fast in directions unknown under the call for modernization.

"If one thinks a poem is coming on… you do make a retreat, a withdrawal into some kind of silence…

" There is a more calm feeling to his description. This is not to say that the author was portraying war as being a patriotic act, but the author was not as graphical in his describing what the soldiers were seeing and going through. The reader is more connected to the actions of the poem and not the fact that someone is dying. He ends his poem by referencing "hell" and the reader is left wondering whether the hell that he is referring to the war that is being left behind, or to dying itself.

3) Rites of Passage Activity

In speaking to my grandmother, I was able to find out what it was that she took when she first left her home. At the age of sixteen, she was married to my grandfather and was getting ready to start her knew life as a wife and very soon, as…

ordsworth and Frost

Nature and the Individual

One's relationship with nature is a theme that has been explored often in poetry and across global borders. In "The orld is Too Much ith Us," illiam ordsworth writes about the disconnect that individuals have with nature and a desire to reestablish a relationship with it. On the other hand, in "The Road Not Taken," Robert Frost looks to nature in order to help him to make life decisions and uses it as inspiration for the future. ordsworth and Frost use nature as a means of defining whom they are and what they choose to do.

In "The orld is Too Much ith Us," ordsworth feels as though people have become disconnected from nature and wishes that he could find a way to reconnect. ordsworth laments, "The world is too much with us; late and soon,/Getting and spending, we lay wasted our powers:…

Victorian Female Sexuality

Victorian Sexuality: George Bernard Shaw's Mrs. arren's Profession and Thomas Hardy's "The Ruined Maid"

omen in the Victorian era must have suffered enormously under the massive double standards and the shameful image of a woman who wanted to be on her own. It is clear from examining the literature of the period how much discrimination was placed on women in the era. George Bernard Shaw's Mrs. arren's Profession and Thomas Hardy's "The Ruined Maid" show the intense sexual and gender discrimination that women in the Victorian era had to endure and the extreme consequences that were reserved for them upon breaking such strict traditions on sexuality and love relationships; however, George Bernard Shaw does allow for a greater sense of freedom for his female characters as his work was written much later at the tail end of the Victorian era, as long as they avoid the contact…

Minor Characters and Themes

Minor characters in any play act as supporting foils and help to advance the plot. Without these foils, it would be impossible for the play to progress in the way that playwright has envisioned. Besides carrying the play forward, they also help in highlighting the major themes of the literary piece. In almost every piece of fiction, whether a play or short story or novel, we come across certain important minor characters that are minor because while they lend support to the plot, they are not directly influenced by the intentions of the author. The people who remain in the forefront and bear the brunt of all action are the major characters, and thus their in the story is obvious and needs little discussion. However it is the minor characters that need to be closely analyzed or discussed to see why they have been placed in…