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A wonderfully evocative collection from a master craftsman who redefined the nature of the English novel!
First published in
1914, Dubliners
is a wonderfully evocative collection of 15 short stories by James Joyce, a master craftsman who redefined the nature of the English novel! They form a naturalistic depiction of Irish middle class life in
and around Dublin in the early years of the 20th century. The stories
were written when Irish nationalism was at its peak and a search for a
national identity and purpose was raging; at a crossroads of history and
culture, Ireland was jolted by various converging ideas and influences.
They centre on Joyce's idea of an epiphany: a moment where a character
experiences self-understanding or illumination. Many of the characters
in Dubliners later appear in minor roles in Joyce's novel Ulysses.
The initial stories in the collection are narrated by child
protagonists, and as the stories continue, they deal with the lives and
concerns of progressively older people. This is in line with Joyce's
tripartite division of the collection into childhood, adolescence, and
maturity.
A young boy falls in love with his friend's much older sister and is desperate to get her the perfect gift from the Araby Fair.
After a party, a man discovers something he had never known about his wife, which has a devastating impact on their marriage.
An ambitious mother schemes to get her daughter a role in a series of concerts.
A drunken legal clerk takes out his frustrations on his helpless young son.
These and other brilliant stories are contained in the collection entitled Dubliners. Published in 1914 during the height of the Irish Nationalist Movement, the fifteen stories are an invaluable record of the life and times of the middle class in Dublin. The strangest aspect of this book, which we value so much today, is that it was serially rejected by fifteen publishers before a Dublin publisher agreed to do so. Many publishers wanted certain passages to be cut, while others did not agree with the ending of some of the stories and wanted them rewritten. One of them even burned the original manuscript when James Joyce the author refused to pay for publication. He managed to salvage parts of it and rewrote it with great difficulty. He continued to doggedly pursue his conviction and the result is available today for all of us to marvel at.
An ambitious mother schemes to get her daughter a role in a series of concerts.
A drunken legal clerk takes out his frustrations on his helpless young son.
These and other brilliant stories are contained in the collection entitled Dubliners. Published in 1914 during the height of the Irish Nationalist Movement, the fifteen stories are an invaluable record of the life and times of the middle class in Dublin. The strangest aspect of this book, which we value so much today, is that it was serially rejected by fifteen publishers before a Dublin publisher agreed to do so. Many publishers wanted certain passages to be cut, while others did not agree with the ending of some of the stories and wanted them rewritten. One of them even burned the original manuscript when James Joyce the author refused to pay for publication. He managed to salvage parts of it and rewrote it with great difficulty. He continued to doggedly pursue his conviction and the result is available today for all of us to marvel at.