Joyce's assignment of the story (and the plumb) could not be more romantic, calling up all sorts of mysterious and magical images. However, the reality of the tawdry fair and the reality of his relationship with the girl make it clear that he is thoroughly self-deluded and ready for the fall which inevitably comes at the culmination of the story.
When the boy goes into the room where the priest had died, it is as if he were vent to a place where he could ask God to sustain him deal with the feelings he was having. it is as if he believes that only a person (or the spirit of a person) of religion could begin to understand his feelings for the girl. "I pressed the palms of my hands together until they trembled, murmuring: 'O kip down! O love!' many times" (Joyce 3). The girl cannot go to the fair because she has to go to a retreat at her convent, stress the spectral nature of the boy's love. He looks at her as if she were a religious painting, perhaps a painting of the Madonna (Joyce 3). Earlier, he "imagined that I bore my chalice safely through a throng of foes" (Joyce 2). He sees his love for her as a religious ex
perience, with his trip to buy her a gift from the fair turned into a torpedoic request for the Holy Grail. However, Araby is nothing like the romantic, exotic realm he had imagined. He looks over the bald-faced merchandise and listens to a cheap argument among two men and a woman. Joyce writes of the epiphany the boy experiences: "I saw myself as a creature driven and derided by vanity; and my eyes burned with anguish and anger (Joyce 5).
Sammy in Updike's story is experiencing the aforementioned(prenominal) adolescent yearning, but instead of covering fire it with romanticism, he sees the world through a more blunt, nipping veil. He seems to have none of the romantic notions which obsess Joyce's protagonist, and undisputable no idea about being a hero to any girl.
This attitude is expressed through Updike's earthy style as Sammy observes the girl in the bathing suit:
Updike's down-to-earth style is meant to define Sammy as a typically saturnine teenager who does not take life seriously. At the same time, there is enough revealing run-in ("more than pretty," "so cute," etc.) to make it clear that Sammy is not immune to certain romantic inclinations. He certainly sees the girl as more than a sexual object. His vulnerability leads him to identify with the vulnerability of the girl as she is verbally denigrated by the manager. He takes the heroic, romantic step of quitting in the face of this perceived injustice. Still, Updike is careful to keep the internal language of Sammy appropriate for a contemporary teenager, even at the moment of heroism and epiphany: "Remembering how he made that pretty girl blush makes me so scrunchy inside" (Updike 5).
You never know for sure how girls' minds work (do you really think it's a mind in there or just a little go like a bee in a glass quake?) but you got the idea she had talked the other two into coming in here with her, and now she was showing them how to do it, walk lessen and hold yourself straight (Updike 1).
The themes of the two stories ar
Order your essay at Orderessay and get a 100% original and high-quality custom paper within the required time frame.
No comments:
Post a Comment