Discuss Joyces Treatment Of The Theme Of

?We had to be home before four o?clock

lest our adventure should be discovered.? Reality strikes them, as they

realise they cannot always escape, as they are prisoners of time.In Araby another inhibiting factor affects the boy, this is adolescent

love, of a kind, which he will never succeed in but he cannot help himself. ?Every morning I lay on the floor in the

front parlour watching her door?I kept her brown figure always in my eye? I

imagined that I bore my chalice safely through a throng of foes.? The boy

is clearly obsessed with Mangan?s sister, and even worships her. ?All my senses seemed to veil themselves and,

feeling that I was about to slip from them, I pressed the palms of my hands together

until they trembled, murmuring: ?O love! O love!? many times.? He knows

that his love is unlikely to be unrequited, but he still is obsessed with her

and thinks of her the whole time: ?Her

image accompanied me even in places the most hostile to romance.? It is

this fixation that causes him to go to the bazaar and eventually to realise

that what he has been doing in his life has been stupid, as there is no way

that she would ever respond to his passion in a good way.An especially significant source of

paralysis, especially in the childhood stories is through the older generation.

All of the childhood stories include accounts of where the older generation

have restrained the younger in their progress through life.?He began to puff at his pipe,

no doubt arranging his opinion in his mind. Tiresome old fool! When we knew him

first he used to be rather interesting, talking of faints and worms; but I soon

grew tired of him and his endless stories about the distillery.? As described in The Sisters, the boy feels alienated because of the generation

gap, and Old Cotter is a typical member of the older generation, which are

characteristic of Dublin?s paralysis. ?Why, when I was a nipper every

morning of my life I had a cold bath, winter and summer.? The older generation always want the children to

live in the past, as they do and not look to the future. ?The old chap

taught him a great deal, mind you; and they say he had a great wish for him.? The boy has to do as he is told and follow what he

is instructed for him, this is a restriction on him and therefore a source of

paralysis through the older generation. ?Tiresome old red-nosed

imbecile!? The boy wants to live his life the

way he wants, and not have Old Cotter wittering on to his aunt and uncle, as to

how he should really be living his life. The boy?s uncle is also a source of

paralysis, as he wanted him to enter the priesthood, as did the priest, as it

was a great honour then, however, the aunt was more genial and genuine: ? ?God

have mercy on his soul,? said my aunt piously.?In

An Encounter, the paralysis through the

older generation is through the schoolmaster and the paedophile, who they come

across on their day out. The boys try to escape the tedium of school through

literature, but the schoolmaster catches them and tries to stop them, and so

they try to escape by going truant for a day. However, the meeting with the

paedophile ruins this: ?There was nothing he liked, he said, so much as

looking at a nice young girl, at her nice white hands and her beautiful soft

hair?He said that when boys were that kind they ought to be whipped and well

whipped?A slap on the hand or a box on the air was no good: what he wanted was

to get a nice warm whipping?He described to me how he would whip such a boy as

if he were unfolding some elaborate mystery. He would love that he said, better

than anything in this world; and his voice, as he led me monotonously through

the mystery, grew almost affectionate and seemed to plead with me that I should

understand him.? The meeting up with this man,

destroys the day, as it is not a pleasant thought for him, and he is understand

himself more, but in a bad way. The responsibility is placed on the boy, which

causes an inappropriate seriousness on him, which he should not need to encounter

at his age.The

uncle is the key source of paralysis from the older generation in Araby, as he prevents the boy from getting to the bazaar

in time, to see it in all its glory, which would probably mean that he would

still be a happy boy, and yet obsessed with Mangan?s sister. ?At nine

o?clock I heard my uncle?s latchkey in the halldoor. I heard him talking to

himself and heard the hallstand rocking when it had received the weight of his

overcoat. I could interpret these signs. When he was midway through his dinner

I asked him to give me the money to go to the bazaar. He had forgotten.? The uncle is drunk and has had his pleasure, but he

has no interest in the boy, and has forgotten all about him. The Aunt feels a

bit sorry for him, and in this way, is more caring and like the aunt in The

Sisters: ?Can?t you give him the money

and let him go? You?ve kept him late enough as it is.? However, the uncle is a main source of the paralysis, as it is his

entire fault that the day has become such a disaster.Literal

paralysis can be seen in some people through illness, for example the

paedophile is mentally ill, as is shown by his sick and perverted pleasures.

The priest in The Sisters, is also

mentally, and also physically, ill and therefore ?paralysed?: ?Even as

he raised his large trembling hand to his nose little clouds of smoke dribbled

through his fingers over the front of his coat?When he smiled he used to

uncover his big discoloured teeth and let his tongue lie upon his lower lip – a

habit which had made me feel uneasy in the beginning of our acquaintance before

I knew him well??That affected his mind? she said. ?After that he began to mope

by himself, talking to no-one and wandering about by himself.?? The priest is not quite in total control of himself,

as with the paedophile, who also needs a walking stick. Both these characters

are both physically and mentally handicapped and so are ?paralysed.?Paralysis

is something that certain characters do not like unsurprisingly and so the need

to escape is another major theme in Dubliners. In The Sisters, the boy tries

to escape the tedium of life at home with his Aunt and Uncle, by dreaming of

foreign and exotic lands, such as Persia: ?As I walked along in the sun

I remembered old Cotter?s words and tried to remember what had happened

afterwards in the dream. I remembered that I had noticed long velvet curtains

and a swinging lamp of antique fashion. I felt that I had been very far away,

in some land where the customs were strange.??Araby? the title of one of the short stories, represents

Arabia, which is another exotic land and is a form of escape for the boy, where

he can connect with his ?love.? The Wild West is the land of escapism for the

boys at the school in An Encounter,

where they can live off heroes in another world. Dublin is also a place of

escapism in An Encounter, where they try

to escape the restrictions of school. The

priest, in The Sisters, tries to escape

in a different way, as he tries to escape the limitations of the church, by

living his life through the boy. However, all these characters try to escape

the paralysis through life and literature, but it always ends in frustration.Every

one of the stories in Dubliners has many

forms of paralysis, which have a crippling effect on life. In The Sisters, paralysis affects both the boy and the priest, who

is not only affected by literal mental and physical paralysis, but also by the

paralysis from the limitations of the church. The priest, who in a way also

thrust him forward with education, held the boy back, but he also suffers

paralysis through the older generation, from Old Cotter, his father and the

priest, who impose expectations on him.The

boys in An Encounter, suffer from many

forms of paralysis. The school imposes limitations on them, and it is this that

they are mainly trying to escape from. The older generation, linked to the

school through the master, but also through the paedophile are a major source

of paralysis, as in all the stories. The paedophile, is also a victim of

paralysis, through, as with the priest in The Sisters, both literal physical and mental paralysis. Time is

also a force holding the boys back, as shown when they realise that they must

get back home before four o?clock. Their escape from the tedium and paralysis

of school is a serious failure as they encounter many other forms of paralysis,

which are just as depressing, especially Dublin, which deteriorates the

atmosphere dramatically.The

citizens of Dublin depend solely in the eye for comprehension and understanding

of the real world. However, they do not see clearly but rather in a blurred

way, upon the connection of two senses, usually the sight and hearing, the

characters are able to fully comprehend the reality. As is shown clearly in Araby: ?My eyes were often full of tears (I could

not tell why) and at times a flood from my heart seemed to pour itself out into

my bosom.? The tears are a literal showing of

the fact that he cannot see clearly, until the boy hears the conversation

between the people at the bazaar: ?Gazing up into the darkness I saw

myself as a creature driven and derided by vanity; and my eyes burned with

anguish and anger.? Hearing this conversation,

brings forth his moment of discovery and awareness and realises that the

aimlessness of his hopes. As the lights go out his sight is replaced by insight

and inner vision and he finally realises that his previous world was an

innocent vision and illusory.Paralysis

in Dubliners is a metaphor for the

doomed and self-defeating life in Dublin and it is a very affective force upon

the lives of the children in the first three stories. Some stories focus on

some forms of paralysis rather than others, but the recurring main source of

paralysis is from Dublin, the city itself. All three stories end with a greater

self-awareness within the boys involved, who learn to take on the guilt of the

world. James Joyce intended to write a chapter displaying Dublin, as a centre

of paralysis and he did this by using a number of sources of paralysis and

showing them in different contexts.