A Flow of Life or a Stasis of Oblivion - Research Paper Example

"Eveline" by James Joyce Introduction What kind of feeling haunts you in the process of Joyce's "Eveline" reading? To my mind, this is a feeling of decay and the atmosphere of stasis. There is an evident opposition between passive and active way of being. For example, when Eveline looks at the army marching right into her neighborhood, she stays indifferent as she does not understand that it is the end of stability and the beginning of ruin. She has been always playing a role of a passive viewer. She did not have any wish to turn into the active participant of life, but she rather preferred staying aside and stays calm. Dust is everywhere in her room in spite of the fact that she has been mopping and dusting for years. She is a part of this dusty atmosphere, just another object in her room. Thesis: a psychological development of this woman is intensely influenced by the external subjection to her self-restraint and her obsession with her father. A Flow of Life or a Stasis of Oblivion When love rushes in her life, she does not have any choice but to follow this external acclaim. She follows her lover, and it is difficult to imagine, but this calm woman has managed to board a ship about to set sail across the ocean. There is a high speed animated development of her life. Nevertheless, she gives up and is occupied by her vivid imagination, when she is dreaming about her lover, who is grasping her head and she is experiencing her inner passion and desire. In her real world, she lets these dreams be only in her mind, but she is resistant to the wind of change for sure. A gentle and a passive female nature, she turns into a subjective animal, and it looks like she has no choice but only continue her passive life. “Eveline” in Dubliners reminds us about the importance of small pieces and images in our lives. It is possible to claim that the whole life is a big puzzle and different episodes in our lives are merely puzzle elements. Joyce saturates his manner of narration in this piece from Dubliners with vivid descriptions and luxurious emotions, rich impressions and endless feelings and perceptions. Even readers can experience his bright idealistic world through the small segments and episodes of his stories. It is possible to consider "Eveline" from different perspectives. On the one hand, in "Eveline" domesticity is clearly associated with details, with metonymy and synecdoche. The detail that will become Eveline's signature is the "odour of dusty cretonne" (Mosher 408). In this article the author clearly underlines that housewives and their housekeeping is associated with special smells and episodes of their lives. This woman always cleans up, and the curtains of crettone are her Everest. She always tries to put up with difficulties and deal with inevitable dust in those curtains. Her home is a museum of memories for her and nothing more. There are many different objects connected with her life, but it is better for her to get rid of them, like Italians get rid of old furniture on the New Year. Her female nature and her role of a housewife are developed in accordance with commonly accepted social templates, but in the real world she plays a very pitiful role because she has to count her meager funds. We can see that the "purse" is a metonymy of her role as housekeeper for her family. She is imprisoned in her home and her housekeeping obligations bear her down. She counts every nickel in her purse, and visiting market is really depressing and intriguing for her. Frank suggests getting rid of her imprisonment and offers a trip to Buenos Aires with him. He says that his home is there. "Home" is a metaphor about her another life. It is a direct juxtaposition to her daily life and she hesitates whether to try on a new role or not. Joyce introduces and apt euphemism for "sexually aroused" – "pleasantly confused" (Joyce 45). He shows that feelings are common for her and her love is just another background for her possible development. Moreover, it looks like this woman discards everything she wants in her life. It is a kind of a psychological deviance. For example, she does not do what she wants; she will not attain what one expects; she loses what she has; and she will not be what she could be (Ingersoll 506). She experiences numerous hesitations. When she wants to travel with her lover, she does not know whether to do it or no. We can refer to psychological analysis too. It is evident that Eveline is able to watch in the night sky and think about something. Supposedly, the readers should follow her observations. James Joyce fills our reading with emotions and feelings. There is a clear representation of a vacant gaze of Eveline, but at the same time Joyce shifts the accents and focus readers' attention on smells of housekeeping. There is an interesting representation of two different worlds: the one is the world of illusions and another is the world of a real life. Eveline is a tired woman, which is absorbed into an invading evening and the dusty smell. When we pay attention for her audio perceptions, we are also intrigued by the unusual nature of her observations: “Few people passed. The man out of the last house passed on his way home; she heard his footsteps clacking along the concrete pavement and afterwards crunching on the cinder path before the new red houses” (Mosher 411). Under any circumstances this woman is tired. She is weary and tired of everything which happens around her. We look beyond the window, like Eveline does, but we can see nothing weird there. We can see that objects in the room are very much important for Eveline. She is much focused on the subjects in her room, and she does not want to look at the objects beyond the window. She is an observer of her own life. She does not want to reach anything beyond her own life experience. She is satisfied with her reminiscences, and her emotions are joyful for her. It seems to me, that this woman likes self-torturing for sure. She suffers from staying at home, but at the same time, she is subjected to a passive observation of events happening in the street (Chaudhry-Fryer 320). He is not a fool woman because she is interested in finding an answer to one of the eternal questions: "where the dust comes from." The story is more about her daily life, about her daily experiences and daily changes. It is not about her possible future life. She is focused on her current days. Eveline is a lonely woman, and she wants nothing more but living in calmness. Odors of city, many different impressions outside the street are intriguing her, but she prefers staying by herself in her own life. It is possible to analyze this complex psychological character of Eveline in terms of Freudian theory. One of the world's greatest books on psychology The Interpretation of Dreams in 1900 makes a great contribution to a scrutinized consideration about intellectual movements in the literature. Though Joyce's "Eveline" has been often considered in terms of Marxist theory, which made a great emphasis on economical aspect of the story - to my mind, it is more effective to take into account psychological aspects of the main character's development and concentrate on Freudian theory. From the Modernist perspective, it is difficult to find out whether ideas of Eveline are conscious or subconscious. In “Eveline” the main heroine of the story exposes her stream-of-consciousness, and this moment turns into epiphany. This moment is another proof of the fact that subconscious very often exceeds the limits of conscious and exert influence on our lives and actions for sure. Joyce claims that unconscious cannot be totally understood, and it is very difficult to transform Eveline's ideas into a commonplace language. Manifestations of unconscious underline the importance of psychological aspect of the main character described in the story. Freud has acknowledged the importance of differentiation between conscious and unconscious thoughts four years before "Eveline" was published. A theory of subconscious has much to do with “Eveline,” and James Joyce did not deny his focus and concentration on Freudian theory (Kelly 368). The first critic who took into account various aspects of psychological issues in “Eveline” was Gary Leonard, who interpreted Eveline’s psychological development through a prism of Freudian interpretations. Therefore, it can be claimed that Eveline has been never released from her attraction to her father. She has been always looking for a man, who looks like her father. Eveline cannot overcome her childish attraction to her father. Her father is a tyrant; he takes too much control about Eveline. She cannot even reach an orgasm and remains frigid. She is paralyzed both physically and emotionally. Eveline cannot trust her lover, and we can see some hints of allegory in the passage, which describes orgasm. It is a climax of the story. Here we can see a blending of religious and physical pleasure experienced by Eveline. Conclusion We can see that this woman is at the cross roads. She does not know what to do in a right or in a wrong way. It is unclear for her how to remain a silent father's daughter but at the same time to feel an orgasm. It is a clear disharmonious development of a person. Religion is a right path for self-development. There is no option to take another way. Eveline’s mind is filled with controversial ideas about a strange nature of relations between her father and Frank. Her lover is just a clone of her father for her. It is the evidence of a disharmonized female nature. This story is rather challenging and to comprehend this story it is relevant to focus on different aspects of the main heroine's development. On the one hand, it is necessary to take into account her inner and subconscious development, but on the other hand, it is relevant to refer to the context of her personality's development. There is no doubt that Eveline is a self-reserved woman, who is easily subjected to external pressures and influences. It is much better for her to concentrate her attention on a life's flow, but not on a life's stasis. It would be better for her to change her life of a passive observer into a role of an active life participant. Beware, a weak female creature of your inability to focus on life pitfalls, – this is a hidden appeal of James Joyce for the readers of coming generations. Get rid of worn-out things and dust, free your mind and act! Works Cited Chaudhry-Fryer, Mamta. "Power Play: Games in Joyce's "Dubliners."(Special "Dubliners" Number)." Studies in Short Fiction 32.3 (1995): 319+. Questia. Web. 11 Dec. 2012. Ingersoll, Earl G. "The Stigma of Femininity in James Joyce's "Eveline" and "The Boarding House."" Studies in Short Fiction 30.4 (1993): 501+. Questia. Web. 11 Dec. 2012. Joyce, James. Work in Progress: Joyce Centenary Essays. Ed. Richard F. Peterson, Alan M. Cohn, and Edmund L. Epstein. Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois UP, 1983. Questia. Web. 11 Dec. 2012. Kelly, Joseph. "Joyce's Marriage Cycle." Studies in Short Fiction 32.3 (1995): 367+. Questia. Web. 11 Dec. 2012. Mosher, Harold F., Jr. "The Narrated and Its Negatives: The Nonnarrated and the Disnarrated in Joyce's Dubliners." Style 27.3 (1993): 407+. Questia. Web. 11 Dec. 2012. Read More