In contrast to his most experimental Modernist work Ulysses (1922), James Joyce’s short story collection Dubliners (1914) initially appears to contain more linear narratives of ordinary people in their ordinary lives. Through an analysis of the epiphany motif which is a prominent feature in all of his short stories, it is evident that this is not the case. Joyce’s characters experience moments of realisation in each story which he himself referred to as ‘epiphanies’. Traditionally an epiphany connotes an enlightening religious revelation. However, Joyce’s Dubliners reverses the conventional definition of the epiphany; they are far more ambiguous than the term suggests. This leads Kevin J. H. Dettmar to suggest that each character actually experiences an ‘epiphony’ and he argues that the ‘false epiphany […] is always ultimately subjective, the validity – the efficacy – of a character’s epiphany is available to scrutiny’. Joyce’s characters cannot move beyond paralysis and the epiphanies demonstrate the moment of recognition in which they realise this.
A close reading of ‘Eveline’ reveals Joyce’s epiphany/epiphony and is exemplary of the characteristics of Joyce’s short story collection. The eponymous protagonist is stuck in a state of paralysis in this story, fixed in a circulatory routine within ordinary domestic life: ‘Home! She looked round the room reviewing all its familiar objects which she had dusted once a week for so many years’. Eveline is offered an escape from this familiarity in an alternative life in Buenos Ayres with an enigmatic sailor named Frank. Frank’s representation remains detached from the narrative so he does not gain the trust of either Eveline or the reader. The narrator’s description of her opportunity to escape paralysis appears predetermined by Frank: ‘She was to go away with him by the night boat to be his wife and to live with him in Buenos Ayres where he had a home waiting for her.’ It is clear that Eveline has little agency in her fate and it is suggested that Frank has constructed a similarly circulatory life for her in the ‘home’ which ‘he had waiting’. The ‘waiting’ home appears sinister similar to a predator waiting for its vulnerable prey.
Eveline’s epiphany results in her abruptly deciding to remain in Ireland, leaving Frank to sail off towards her abandoned future. Her decision is made on the dock when she feels that, ‘All the seas of the world tumbled about her heart. He was drawing her into them: he would drown her. She gripped with both hands at the iron railing.’ The image of the seas tumbling reveal the inaccessibility of a better future as if she would drown before reaching Argentina. The iron railing is an image which effectively demonstrates the ambivalence of Joyce’s epiphanies. The railings are fragmented: made up of both solid bars and empty spaces. These empty spaces represent the possibility to break free from routine but it is impossible due to the physical barriers which break up the empty space. The fragmentary characteristics of railings, in that the bars physically represent a barrier to freedom, but this freedom can be seen through the empty spaces beyond the bars, displays a future that can never be reached. Eveline’s potential to escape is equally ambiguous and fragmented as it is not necessarily going to result in her liberation from paralysis. Joyce’s epiphanies are neither freeing nor caging as characters are left in a liminal state between bars/barriers and empty spaces.
The closing sentences of the story maintain the tone of ambiguity: ‘She set her white face to him, passive, like a helpless animal. Her eyes gave him no sign of love or farewell or recognition.’ Just as animals are evolved to their habitats, Eveline is unable to adapt to leaving Dublin. Additionally the image of a ‘helpless animal’ alludes to a caged animal unable to break free from captivity. The predatory undertones of Frank’s character culminate in the direct comparison of Eveline to a ‘helpless animal’. The emptiness of Eveline’s final gaze at Frank portrays this inability to abandon her home/habitat as she is both emotionally and physically holding on to Dublin.
Joyce’s short stories demonstrate the physical railings of linear narratives but significantly the empty spaces in between which ultimately facilitate the reader’s epiphany that paralysis prevails.
By Sarah Lough and Niamh Hughes
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