Dubliners by James Joyce is a short book
Dubliners by James Joyce is a short book that consists of short stories where each story has up to ten pages. James is also referred to as the “forefather of the stream of consciousness novels.” In his stories, James represents the lives of people in Dublin in the 19th and 20th centuries, which include but are not limited to young people, drunkards, priests, and aunts, among others. It allows me to understand how the classes interacted in that era. The author’s efforts in this collection are geared on the state of Dublin, and he hopes to awaken it as all the stories are melancholic and somehow depressing. The beautiful writing styles intrigue me and are worth noting, and the book opens people’s minds to Joyce’s other works. The power and command of English are mostly felt in the first two stories; “An Encounter” and “The Sisters.” People live and experience life with all its ups and downs, but they sometimes need other people to make them realize the things they are going through.
In his writing technique, James uses names of real churches, hotels, and pubs in Dublin and uses his characters to bring out different themes, the main one being paralysis. At the turn of the century, the political and religious plights bring about the issues of death, loneliness, and paralysis, which I find educative. The paralysis is seen to be in different forms, including psychological, physical, emotional, and moral paralysis in Dublin. For instance, the bicycle pump in the short story, “Araby” and the uninhibited distillery in the story “A Painful Case” are all examples of how dysfunctional the city has become. There are corruption and frustration, and the characters are unable to fully live their lives and grab the opportunities that present themselves (Joyce et al. 56). Men and women have ineffective relationships as betrayal happens often, and hope is only seen in emigration in the effort to get better lives. James explores modernism, where he follows and comments on the experiences and lives of the Irish. This writing technique aims to illustrate the actual lives of the people in modern Dublin through the resignation, depression, and confusion of the characters. These themes of death and paralysis are also modernistic.