James Joyce: 1882 –1941 |
“The Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man” is one of the greatest novels of the 20th century. The novel is about the protagonist, Stephen Dedalus, as a child, as an adult and as a grown man of twenty years. Stephen Dedalus is the son of Mr. Simon Dedalus and Clairet.
The Dedalus family belongs to the catholic Ireland
and it was the time of Ireland’s nationalistic movements and their struggle for
independence from Britain. Stephen undergoes various situations in his life,
which awakens inside him numerous questions. The novel completely revolves in a
first person perspective and stream of consciousness. The author also uses
third person narratives rarely, however leaves it up to the reader to
differentiate and understand the plot.
The novel initially starts with a day of Stephen’s
childhood in which his mother sings the song of young men, Stephen gets
confused about how different people lead their life, he keeps thinking about
it, and then he is threatened by his aunt for bed-wetting that God would pull
out his eyes.
“First
time when you wet the bed it is warm,
Then
it is cold and then God will punish you
And
pull out your eyes...”
Stephen sings it rhyming “Wet the bed, pull out the
eyes”. Stephen is then sent to a boarding school where his friends ask him if
his father was a magistrate although he was not. He is then pushed into a dirty
stream at the gutters by Naughty Wills. He is again distracted about why he was
sent out of his home to a boarding school. At the night, as a child he thinks
of the ghosts and to distract his thought from the fearsome dream of ghosts he
thinks about his mother, his home and he awaits the Christmas vacation.
Stephen then leaves home for Christmas and his
father Mr. Dedalus is very much happy about spending time with him at the
dinner. Two of Ireland’s nationalists also join the dinner and they are Mr. Dedalus’
friends. Stephen’s aunt is a strict catholic and they speak of politics where
in aunt supports the church and the friends including Mr. Dedalus oppose her
that Paranoll must be punished for his ill deeds. Stephen is again disturbed by
the thoughts of politics of which he knew nothing and about Paranoll and his
sin of going behind a mean woman. Stephen is advised by aunt to adhere to Catholicism
and Stephen was neither a Catholic nor a Protestant Nationalist.
He again goes to school where he keeps thinking of
the arguments at home. He then thinks about death. He thinks, “What would
happen if he is going to die?” Stephen is disturbed by all thoughts that he
rarely listened to his classes. One day Stephen broke his glasses and Father
Adlen excused him from doing his homework. However, the perfectionist Father
Dolan who arrived then did not excuse him and trashed him with the ‘band’ made
of thick leather on his hands. Stephen was very much upset about being wrongly
punished and the small boy reports to the head of Father Dolan and he says that
he would speak to Father Dolan to punish him not, even in the next days until
he gets his glasses. After the rebellious success, Stephen was liked by all his
friends including the Naughty boy Wills.
Throughout the chapter, we can find that Stephen speaks
more of what is running inside his mind or his thought process, which is known
as the stream of consciousness technique.
As Stephen grows, the financial situation of his
family goes down that at one point of time his father gets bankrupt. Hence, Stephen
was sent to a poor school at Jesuit. Stephen was considered as a very good and
cultured student at Jesuit. He gave the money he earned as prizes through his
essays to his family. Stephen as an adult thought of women. He was distracted by
his bad companions that he even went to the house of the prostitutes. He sinned
many occasions. One day Father Allen gave a serious speech on death, sin, hell
and the fury of hell. He gave a series of sermons and said that one who fails
to repent their sins would not escape from the fury of hell.
The author again brings in the stream of consciousness.
Stephen is evoked by the sermon and he thinks that for all his sins he would be
paid hell. He adheres to strict Catholicism and repents his sins at the church.
He stops doing any more of such a sin. He is advised by his mom to take the
life of a Christian monk. Stephen thinks of Virgin Mary and thinks why she was
put to a situation that she can stay only as a virgin forever. He discusses
with his mother about this on March 4 he says. Stephen also says, “I
have understood very less and I have read a little.”
Throughout the novel we can see that the author
brings before us, the plot in the way of Stephen’s thought process. The author
gives us the entire novel in Stephen Dedalus’ perspective and thus it appears
to readers as though we can hear Stephen’s inner voice speaking loudly. Stephen
is now in the thought of what he wants to be. He is not strictly Catholic. Hence,
he feels that he is not the right person to be a monk. He has interest on a
girl names Emma. He has even written a poem for her. He thinks of her. He is
called by his friends, who are the nationalists to join the battle against
Britain. However, Stephen is not a Nationalist either. He thinks of what he
wants to be and on March 16, he meets Emma. She asks him why he does not visit
her and why he does not write poems anymore. He replies that he writes them
only for reviews and some for income. He then says that he does not want to be
in Ireland. He says that he wants to be alone. All these are Stephen’s thoughts,
which question him of what he is interested to do. He wants to do something in
which he can throw whole of himself into it.
Stephen wanders everywhere
and the author speaks out his thoughts loudly through the stream of consciousness
technique. He sees people praying for Jesus. He sees the oceans, the tides and
his friends. He then sees a girl on the shore and that is the moment, that one
moment where Stephen feels his interest is Art. He feels that only in Art he
can express the whole of himself. On April 5th, Stephen leaves
Ireland and goes to France to lead an isolated life by which his Art can be
expressed to the fullest.
Thus, James Joyce has used the Stream of Consciousness
technique throughout the novel to portray the life of Stephen from age five to
twenty and the various change of ideas he gets into on the course of his
growth.
No comments:
Post a Comment