Irish People and Father Flynn
In order to answer the broad question, the term ‘possibility’ will be analysed in the context of the characters of the texts and in the ‘possibility’ for their personal growth and opportunity for change, be it spiritual, physical or emotional. The essay will focus thematically on four chosen texts: James Joyce’s The Sisters and Langston Hughes’ poems I, too, New Yorkers and Harlem. Firstly this essay will analyse how the city of Dublin represented in The Sisters is shown, through Joyce’s literary devices, to both offer and restrict possibility for each of its central characters. Key themes identified will then be used as a basis for further analysis of how these themes are more widely represented within the selected New York poems to either confirm or refute Lehan’s statement that ‘The city both offers and restricts possibility’.
Textual analysis of The Sisters reveals numerous literary devices that explicate the theme of the repression of possibility by the city of its people. Throughout, Joyce uses symbolism, metaphors, and ellipsis to emphasise his themes whilst allowing the reader to infer its meanings without the need to describe them explicitly. The italicised words ’paralysis’, ‘gnomon’ and ‘simony’ (page 1) is one such technique and immediately underscores the physical, spiritual and religious restrictions found within the story that Dubliners symbolises as a ‘paralysis’ (p1) of the city and its people.
The story’s young, intelligent, and sensitive (unnamed) protagonist comes to experience first-hand the reality of paralysis and death: he achieves his desire to ‘look upon’ (p1) both the physical paralysis and death of Father Flynn, with whom he was ‘great friends’ (p2) and the more subtle psychological ‘paralysis’ of those around him – his Aunt, Uncle Jack, Eliza and Nanny Flynn and Mr Cotter. The story shows that the Dublin adults are mentally immobilised – metaphorically paralysed, by their conformity to the conventions of their city lives,
Textual analysis of The Sisters reveals numerous literary devices that explicate the theme of the repression of possibility by the city of its people. Throughout, Joyce uses symbolism, metaphors, and ellipsis to emphasise his themes whilst allowing the reader to infer its meanings without the need to describe them explicitly. The italicised words ’paralysis’, ‘gnomon’ and ‘simony’ (page 1) is one such technique and immediately underscores the physical, spiritual and religious restrictions found within the story that Dubliners symbolises as a ‘paralysis’ (p1) of the city and its people.
The story’s young, intelligent, and sensitive (unnamed) protagonist comes to experience first-hand the reality of paralysis and death: he achieves his desire to ‘look upon’ (p1) both the physical paralysis and death of Father Flynn, with whom he was ‘great friends’ (p2) and the more subtle psychological ‘paralysis’ of those around him – his Aunt, Uncle Jack, Eliza and Nanny Flynn and Mr Cotter. The story shows that the Dublin adults are mentally immobilised – metaphorically paralysed, by their conformity to the conventions of their city lives,
Bibliography: • A230 Assignment Guide,( 2010) TMA 04, Open University press • Bremen, B (1984) “He Was Too Scrupulous Always": A Re-Examination of Joyce 's "The Sisters” James Joyce Quarterly , Vol. 22, No. 1 pp. 55-66 • Haslam, S & Asbee, S (2012) The Twentieth Century, Twentieth-Century Cities, Open University Press • Haslam, S & Asbee, S (2012) The Twentieth Century, ‘Readings for part 1’, Open University Press • James Joyce (2000 [1914]) Dubliners (with an introduction and notes by Terence Brown), Penguin Modern Classics, London, Penguin. • Walzl, F (1965) The life chronology of the Dubliners , James Joyce Quarterley Websites: • A230-11J, Study Guide: Week 26: Extra Resources, Milton Keynes, The Open University, http://learn.open.ac.uk/file.php/7066/ebook_a230_book3_pt1_chpt4_langston-hughes-poetry_l3.pdf (accessed 21st March 2012) • http://us.penguingroup.com/static/rguides/us/dubliners.html