James Joyce’s most famous short story, ”The Dead,” works in layers. “The Dead” brilliantly illustrates the potential of literary engagement to produce changes in conceptions of ourselves and others through metaphorical extension into, and identification with, the emotions and thoughts of a character about whom we read.
Q. What James Joyce the Dead says about memories?
He lauds the “new generation” with its “new ideas and new principles” yet speaks with “pride and affection” about “the memory of those dead and gone great ones whose fame the world will not willingly let die.” This statement becomes ironic when later Gabriel argues that the living must not “linger on the past” or brood …
Table of Contents
- Q. What James Joyce the Dead says about memories?
- Q. What is the role of memory or the past in Joyce’s The Dead?
- Q. What is the epiphany of the dead?
- Q. What was falling on all the living and the dead?
- Q. What does Gabriel learn in the dead?
- Q. Why does Miss Ivors criticize Gabriel Conroy?
- Q. When was the dead written?
- Q. Who is Michael Furey?
- Q. Why might Joyce have chosen this particular feast day on which to set the dead?
Q. What is the role of memory or the past in Joyce’s The Dead?
Memory clearly played a crucial role in writing “The Dead.” Joyce not only drew upon his own memories, but upon the memories of his wife. The narrator only ever dips into the consciousness of Gabriel, creating a significant distance between those memories and the narrative.
Q. What is the epiphany of the dead?
In James Joyce’s “The Dead,” through an epiphany the main character, Gabriel, realizes the true relationship between him and his wife, Gretta. The epiphany Gabriel experiences is the direct effect of his wife’s confession to having a love before she met him.
Q. What was falling on all the living and the dead?
“Snow was general all over Ireland…” The last paragraph of Joyce’s The Dead. Yes, the newspapers were right: snow was general all over Ireland. His soul swooned slowly as he heard the snow falling faintly through the universe and faintly falling, like the descent of their last end, upon all the living and the dead.
Q. What does Gabriel learn in the dead?
At the end of the story Gabriel comes to the realization that he has failed to find true love or passion in his life, and that he is on track to live a meaningless life and die a meaningless death.
Q. Why does Miss Ivors criticize Gabriel Conroy?
Miss Ivors, an Irish patriot, has been criticizing him for being insufficiently interested in his own country. Gabriel doesn’t feel very patriotic; in fact, he feels “sick of” Ireland. He does not disrespect his aunts, but he knows that both he and Miss Ivors are far better educated and that she should know better.
Q. When was the dead written?
1907
Q. Who is Michael Furey?
Michael Furey may refer to: Sax Rohmer, who wrote his occult novel Wulfheim under this name. A character in The Dead, the last short story in Dubliners by James Joyce.
Q. Why might Joyce have chosen this particular feast day on which to set the dead?
Events of The Dead, his masterful bookend story in Dubliners, takes place on January 6th. Joyce probably chose the date deliberately. Given his contempt for the Catholicism of his time, it is likely Joyce was referring to his own extrapolation of the word as much as the Christian feast day.
