English 50

(Fiction)

MTh 9:00 AM - 10:30 AM

Section: 703B

Written Report
“Elements of the Short story; Araby by James Joyce”
 Discussants:
Baclaan, Angienette - Background of the Author & Historical background of the
Story
Piedraverde, Lariza - Plot Structure & Setting
Nillas, Yhona Lea - Characters, Conflict & POV
Baque, Gem Brian - Style, Narrative Devices, Tone & Theme

Submitted to:
Prof. Donna Alna Cortez
Background of the Author:

1. James Joyce was born on February 2, 1882 in Dublin, Ireland. He

published "Portrait of the Artist" in 1916 and caught the attention of Ezra Pound.
With "Ulysses," Joyce perfected his stream-of-consciousness style and became a
literary celebrity. The explicit content of his prose brought about landmark legal
decisions on obscenity. Joyce battled eye ailments for most of his life. He died in
1941.
2. Joyce came from a big family. He was the eldest of ten children born to John
Stanislaus Joyce and his wife Marry Murray Joyce. His father, while a talented
singer (he reportedly had one of the finest tenor voices in all of Ireland), didn't
provide a stable a household. He liked to drink and his lack of attention to the
family finances meant the Joyces never had much money.
3. Joyce's relationship with his native country was a complex one and after
graduating he left Ireland for a new life in Paris where he hoped to study medicine.
He returned, however, not long after upon learning that his mother had become
sick.
4. There, Joyce taught English and learned Italian, one of 17 languages he could
speak, a list that included Arabic, Sanskrit, and Greek. Other moves followed, as
the Joyce and Barnacle (the two weren't formally married until some three
decades after they met) made their home in cities like Rome and Paris. To keep
his family above water (the couple went on to have two children, Georgio and
Lucia) Joyce continued to find work as a teacher.
5. Sadly, Joyce never saw the conclusion of World War II. Following an intestinal
operation, the writer died at the age of 59 on January 13, 1941 at the
Schwesternhause von Roten Kreuz Hospital. His wife and son were at his
bedside when he passed. He is buried in Fluntern cemetery in Zurich.

Historical Backgroud of the Story

The Araby bazaar was a highly anticipated, annual event in Dublin in the 19th
century that introduced foreign concepts such as music, literature, styles, and
goods. Joyce's bazaar, Araby, was called "A Grand Oriental Fete: Araby in
Dublin" and was held in May, 1894, to benefit a local hospital. This paragraph
exemplifies an important modernist technique: Joyce shows the boys confusion
after she speaks to him by making the prose itself abrupt and fragmented
(stunned).

The shift from the previous scene to this one occurs without a transitional
paragraph; in fact, Joyce doesn't try to portray the story of "Araby" within a
continuous time frame; we don't know how much time occurs throughout this
entire narrative. This is characteristic of modernist writers, who prefer to focus on
intense, emotional moments rather than the 19th-century, Victorian style of
providing specific details about weather, clothing, food, views, houses, etc.
Characters:

MAJOR CHARACTERS
The narrator: The protagonist of the story, a young, imaginative boy who lives with
his aunt and uncle. The narrator attends a Catholic school (as does essentially
every other school age child in Ireland), and is surrounded more generally by the
Catholic Irish world.
The Narrators Uncle: The narrator’s uncle is an authoritative figure who seems to
incite a bit of fear in the narrator and his friends, as they routinely hide from him
when they see him coming home for dinner.

The Narrators Aunt: The aunt is the narrator’s mother figure. She seems to be a
very religious Catholic, worrying that the Araby bazaar is a Freemasonevent.

Mangans sister: The older sister of the narrator’s friend, Mangan. The narrator
has a powerful crush on her. She routinely interrupts the boys playing in the street
when she comes outside to call her brother in for tea.

MINOR CHARACTERS
The Priest:
The former tenant of the narrator’s house, who died in the drawing room. He is
mentioned because some of his belongings still remain at the house, including
three books that the narrator takes interest in: The Abbot (a romance novel by Sir
Walter Scott), The Devout Communicant(a work of Catholic devotional literature),
and The Memoirs of Vidocq (a detective’s memoir)

Mrs.Mercer: The pawnbroker’s widow who waits for the narrator’s uncle to come
home on the night of the Araby market, presumably to ask for the money he owes
her. She is described as an “old, garrulous woman” who collects used postage
stamps to sell to collectors to earn money, usually for a religious cause.

Young female Shopkeeper: A young woman who is flirting with two men as the
narratorapproaches her stall at the Araby bazaar. The narrator notices that she
and the men she talks to all have English accents.

Mangan: The narrator’s friend from school, possibly based on the Irish romantic
poet, James Clarence Mangan. He lives across the street from the narrator and
often plays in the street with him and the other boys before dinner.

Plot Structure:
Introduction - The narrator lives on a quiet, blind street with several brown
house. Living with his aunt and uncle.
 Rising Action - The narrator who is always with his friends and one of his
friend is Mangan. Mangan has a sister.

Climax - The narrator becomes infatuated with Mangan’s sister. The narrator
begins to lose focus in school.

Falling Action - The narrator waits for his uncle to get halfway through his
dinner before he ask for the money to go to the bazaar.

Denouement - The narrator leaves his house, arriving just ten minutes before
10pm, when the market closes.

Unhappy Ending - He realize that both the bazaar and his feelings for
Mangan’s sister are something more in common than what he had built them up
to be.

Setting

a) Location:
• North Richmond Street in Dublin, Ireland
• In the house
• In the bazaar

b) Time:
• when the Christian Brother’s school set the boys free
• at nine o’clock
• 10 minutes before 10 pm

c) Mood/Atmosphere:
• Winter / Cold air
• Anger

Conflict

The conflicts in the boy of "Araby" arise between his fantasy and reality.
Discontent in his "brown" neighborhood, in his home that once belonged to a dead
priest, living with his uncle and aunt,the boy embraces the escape that watching
through his window affords him as he can see Magan's sister in her house and
watch walk down the street, murmuring like Romeo, "O love! O love!"

Point of View

The short story “Araby” by James Joyce is a first-person narration with the
storyteller being a young Irish boy.

Style
Imagery
Auditory Imagery

Eg:
- “We walked through the flaring streets, jostled by drunken men and
bargaining women, amid the curses of the laborers, the shrill litanies of
shop-boys and nasal chanting of street singers .” [Paragraph 5, lines 2 - 5]
- In the scene, where the boy is in the priest’s house late at night.
“there was no sound in the house”, but outside boy heard the rain
“impinge upon the earth” with “fine incessant needless of water.”
[Paragraph 6, line 3]
- When the boy enters the bazzar, he recognizes “a silence like that
which pervades a church after a chuch service.” [Paragraph 18, line 4]

Visual Imagery

Eg:
- “sky is ever-changing violet” [Paragraph 3, line 3]
 - “.. dark muddy lanes behind the houses .. to the dark dripping
gardens” [Paragraph 3, lines 5 - 7]

Figure of Speech
Personification

Eg:
- “When we met in the street, the houses had grown somber”
[Paragraph 3, line 2}
- “Our shouts echoed in the silent streets.” [Paragraph 3, line 6]

Joyce is emphasizing just how lifeless the Dubliners must be such

that even their houses are somber and their streets are silent.

Simile

Eg:
- “... her name was like a summons to all my foolish blood.”
[Paragraph 4, lines 9 - 11]

Joyce compares Mangan’s sister’s name to “foolish blood” indicating

that the narrator is new to love and the lust as well as foreshadowing the
ending where his pursuit of her ends foolishly.

- “ my body was like a harp and her words and gestures were like
fingers running upon the wires.” [Paragraph 5, lines 19 - 21]
Joyce draws a comparison between the way the narrator interprets
the girl’s actions and the music of a harp.

Symbols
 Blindness
The story uses the word “blind” to draw attention to the narrator’s
naivete and isolation.

Brown

Eg:
- “the houses are brown” [Paragraph 2, lines 6 - 9]
Mangan’s sister describes as “brown-lad figure” [Paragraph 4, lines 3
- 4]
- “.. gazed at one another with brown impertubable faces” [Paragraph
1, line 3]

Color brown is used repeatedly in the story to symbolize the dullness

of everyday Dublin. The houses are brown and even Mangan’s Sister is
described as a “brown-lad figure”.

Narrative Devices
Foreshadowing - The priest’s experience foreshadows the awakening of the
narrator from his dreamy adolescent idealism to the harsh reality of Dublin life.

Epiphany - The narrator experience both great and small revelations in their
everyday lives. These allow them to better understand their particular
circumstances, usually rife and tragedy and disappointment.

Tone

Sympathetic

Theme
 “
What most people see as love usually springs from vanity or the desire for the
approval of others.”