Araby

Sarah Saoud

Professor Al Samarrai

20th Century English Literature

29 April 2007

Araby: Escaping Reality through Fantasy

Reality is often bleak. It is only natural when the bleakness becomes too much to bear, that fantasies of escape are born. These are latched onto, basked in, and consumed until they take over the senses and drive the spirit to the edge of feeling. Then, they hurl their owners into despair, for fantasy, in the very end, will slam into the harsh wall of reality, and dissolve, causing despair. In James Joyce's Dubliners, this particular theme: escape from reality through fantasy ultimately resulting in despair, is the major theme in Araby, the third story of the collection. In this paper, I hope to examine this theme closely and attempt to explain:

* The reasons that led the young protagonist of Araby to yearn for escape,

* The method of the boy's escape,

* And the outcome of his attempt to escape.

Nearly everything happens because of a reason, so it is worthwhile to first discover the reasons that pushed Joyce's young protagonist to wish for escape. The need for escape is born, as I see it, from two main contradictory issues: The protagonist's self that contains "life", and his surroundings that are 'lifeless'. What I mean exactly when I say that the young boy's self has 'life' is that he possesses spirituality and beauty. His surroundings, on the other hand, are deprived of this spirituality and the beauty that comes with it. The young boy in Araby is well aware of these two- even if only subconsciously- as is quite clear from his description of the environment around him and his own thoughts and actions throughout his narration of the story. From the very beginning of the story, the places in 'North Richmond' Street- where the protagonist lives- are shown to us as lifeless and lacking in the spiritual aspect. The very first line in the story describes 'North Richmond Street' as "quiet" (Joyce 21). There is an "uninhibited house of two storeys" (Joyce 21) that stands alone and away from the rest of the occupied houses. Yet there is no difference between the vacant detached house and the ones containing residents, for the boy describes the latter houses as "gazing at one another with brown imperturbable faces" (Joyce 21). Whether vacant or occupied means nothing, both- the uninhibited by the fact that it's empty, the occupied by their unexcitable state- are devoid of life. From afar, the houses are quiet and stoic, from close, they are poor and surrounded with dirt, mud and foul odours, as the protagonist points out in his narration. Then, to drive the point home, there is the description of the house in which the young protagonist himself lives. Books are scattered in the waste room, which is "littered" the young boy says, "with old useless papers" (Joyce 21). Literature, a by-product of spirituality, is literary equated with trash. The air of all the rooms in the house is thick and suffocating, indeed in their lifelessness, to the young protagonist. To make matters worse, this lifelessness isn't restricted to the housing areas; it is extended to the whole city of Dublin. Throughout the young boy's journey to the bazaar, there are numerous signs of the loss of spirituality in Dublin. The protagonist rides a third-class carriage of a deserted train that crept slowly "among ruinous houses and over the twinkling river" (Joyce 26). Among the lifeless ruins, for the train is part of them, and over the beautiful river, oblivious to the beauty and spirit-enriching part of nature below, or perhaps ignoring it because it has no place in the ugliness above. Even when the young protagonist reaches the bazaar, it is already almost empty and most of the place is shrouded in the darkness. The boy likens it to "a silence that which pervades a church after a service." (Joyce 26), which is suitable, as the hollowness of the silence that follows a time of worship and prayer is amplified by the preceding spiritual fest. So not only is the area where the boy lives affected, the whole of Dublin is. And yet, the lack of spirituality at 'home' is more devastating to a child and more keenly felt than that of the outside. It follows that perhaps the most telling sign of the loss of spirituality in Araby is that "The former tenant of our house, a priest, had died in the back drawing-room" (Joyce 21). In the back drawing room, a symbol of art, spirituality died, more or less. From this spirituality, nothing is left as the priest "had been a very charitable priest, in his will he had left all his money to institutions and the furniture of his house to his sister" (Joyce 21). So, no reminders of spirituality remain to provide the house any support after its death, it died and disappeared as if it was never there to begin with. To sum it up, the environment the young boy is surrounded with in Araby is extremely deprived of spirituality and beauty; thus, it is lifeless. Yet the lifelessness of the surroundings fulfils only half of the reason Joyce's young protagonist yearns for escape as mentioned before. The other half of the problem is the young boy's self. The protagonist of Araby is filled with life and spirituality. This spirituality can be sensed in his love for his friend's sister. His love is not like an ordinary love, as is clear from the text of Araby. The young boy describes how his "heart leaped" (Joyce 22) when he sees his love interest come out the door every morning, how affected he is by his love for her that even though he barely knew her, still: "her name was like a summons to all my (the boy's) foolish blood"(Joyce 22). His intense love for her that clearly shows his spiritual soul is seen in the scene in which he goes to the drawing room where the priest died. In that scene, everything around the boy capitalizes on the death of spirituality, but it is dark, and so he sees and senses so little of the lack of spirituality, fortunately. The darkness serves as a veil that protects the young boy from the lifelessness that surrounds him and gives him an opportunity to show his deep passion and love. The intense state of his love makes him "press the palm of my hands together until they trembled, murmuring: O love! O love! Many times" (Joyce 23), as if in a state of fevered prayer. In that room where the priest died, spirituality is revived for a little while as the protagonist pours his love and emotions in his actions.