McIndoe 1

Is Joyces The Dead a postcolonial work?

Due to the way in which Joyce revised modernist writing, the scope for postcolonial criticism was narrowed by the heavier emphasis on other aspects of his work. However, in general postcolonial critics share a common conviction that The full measure of Joyces achievements cannot be understood without relating it to the Irish struggle for independence with a history still alive in Irish political memory, a constantly changing course in Joyces lifetime, and an unforeseeable future1 Therefore, when reading the text in a postcolonial context, many of the personal situations described within it can be seen to be applicable to the bigger political picture. All of the short stories within Dubliners appear to be very deeply rooted there they describe certain streets in Dublin and place all of the characters on top of each other, living all together in the crowded city. It is as if the city is a character it is not merely that these stories happen to take place in Dublin. It is possible to read the stories without knowledge of Dublin, but they appear to make much more sense when read with a clear idea of where everyone is travelling and living, thus preference is already placed upon the Irish reader. In the earlier stories, Joyce was much more critical in his treatment of Dublin and the inhabitants, but by the time he writes The Dead, the last of the stories in Dubliners, he has taken on a much more sympathetic tone of voice. In the same way Gabriel Conroy appears to soften his attitude towards the country, so Joyces distance from his homeland makes him reflect again on his previous notions. The character Gabriel Conroy seems to be loosely based upon Joyce; they have the same profession, both wrote for the same newspaper etc. However, Gabriel appears to be very hostile towards Ireland. As far as he possibly can, he distances himself from anything that appears too primative, and backwards, which is essentially how he appears to view the west of Ireland. He is ashamed of the fact that his wife is from Connacht, and when asked about this by Miss Ivors he replies her people are, as if by extension trying to distance Gretta from Galway too. One of the ways in which Miss Ivors challenges Gabriel is to draw attention to the fact that he writes for
1

Attridge & Howe, Semicolonial Joyce, p16

McIndoe 2 the Daily Express, a pro-British newspaper, and thus calls him a West Briton. He also takes his holidays abroad, rather than visiting the Irish-speaking Aran Islands, for which he retorts its not my language. Gabriel appears to be associating more closely with the culture imposed upon him i.e. English then his own, and becomes agitated when Miss Ivors challenges him upon this. His use of pretentious language and his assumed superiority very much characterise the colonial rulers, as he thinks what he has to say and what he believes is more important and more valid than those around him, who are more Irish than he is. Both Miss Ivors and Gretta appear to be symbols of Ireland, although in less obvious ways. Gretta just happens to be from Galway she expresses an interest in going back, and later in the story it transpires that her heart has always stayed there, but she is not nearly as vocal as Miss Ivors. Miss Ivors is incredibly nationalistic, she did not wear a low-cut bodice2, as deplored by the Gaelic League, and she wears a badge in the middle of her chest. It is almost as if the badge were over her larynx, and thus all that she said is spoken through the slogans and ideals of the nationalists. She talks to Gabriel of the Aran Islands, long believed to be the Irish ideal, and the university question, which concerned whether or not there was Irish representation in the syllabus. Later on in the story, Gabriel cannot hear the same music that Gretta can in fact, he observes his wife as she listens to the music. Gabriel seems to have successfully divorced himself from his heritage, and it is only when he is contemplating his own mortality that he begins to accept it once more. There seems to be an ideal that Miss Ivors harks back to, represented by the Aran Islands and the west of Ireland in general. However, throughout Dubliners Joyce appears to challenge this romantic notion. Even within The Dead, his most sympathetically voiced, there is no real Ireland behind the faade. The closest we get to that is embodied in Furey, and dreamed about by Gabriel as a snow covered land, inhabited by shades. To be Irish in these stories is to be a contemporary product of colonial history. Frustration, materialism, obsession with legitimacy and respectability make up precisely the territory which is the legacy of colonialism 3

2 3

Jackson, Wyse, James Joyces Dubliners: An Annotated Edition, p168 Platt, Len, Joyce and the Anglo-Irish: A Study of Joyce and the Literary Revival, p36

McIndoe 3 Even Miss Ivors falls prey to this the obsession with the Gaelic League, which is in effect a false notion to try and counteract the English influence. Even though it is the original culture, it is as forced and at odds with modern society that the English culture was. The very fact that she has to try and persuade people like Gabriel to go visit his own country, and the badge placed so prominently on her chest betrays that she is in effect playing a part. Irish history is pervasive throughout the text, most notably with the concept of the dead who are in the story. With Gabriel Conroy as the protagonist, a name taken from the Bret Harte novel, allusions can be drawn between the two characters. Gabriel Conroy in the Harte novel is leading a group of emigrants when they get trapped in a snowstorm, and thus must resort to cannibalism. This actually draws upon a true story of the Donner party travelling in the winter of 1847-48, which was the worst period during the Famine.4 Thus, a great deal of importance is placed on food during the story. This was a period when the colonised country was completely ignored by its colonisers, echoed later in the song The Lass of Aughrim, which tells of the story of a peasant woman, seduced and abandoned by Lord Gregory, with her child in her arms begging to be allowed into his house.5 The peasant woman, long considered an emblem of Ireland, and the seducer with his aristocratic claims as England, shows the complete allusion; the country was abused and then betrayed by its colonisers during the Famine. Joyces employment of the song within The Dead emphasises the rejected Ireland nation, and the dead within the text are the many Irish peasants who died during the Famine. Gabriel is haunted by their presence, the fact that he has rejected the nation that he owes so much to. His guilt seems apparent when he wishes to brush over the subject, Our path through life is strewn with many such sad memories: and were we to brood upon them always we could not find the heart to go on bravely with our work among the living6 The re-occurrence of death imagery throughout the story show the haunting of the dead of Ireland, and precursor the more personal haunting of Gabriel by Michael Furey. Three mortal hours, perished alive, and of course Mr Browne, who is
4 5

Thompson, Spurgeon, Recovering Dubliners for Postcolonial Theory, p195 Ellman, Richard, The Background of The Dead, p178 6 Jackson, Wyse, James Joyces Dubliners: An Annotated Edition, p181

McIndoe 4 constantly there and could be read as an allegory of death itself. As Gabriel ponders upon his own mortality, his mind goes westwards. The reason for this is twofold; on one hand, he could be accepting his own nationality and embracing Miss Ivors suggestion of visiting the west. Also, in a Christian context, souls were believed to travel westwards to ascend to heaven, and in an Irish context, to the Isles of the Blest. Gabriel appears to finally believe that there may be something of some worth in his homeland. The two men within Grettas life are polar opposites of each other, and considering Michael Furey appears to embody the Irish romanticism and heroism, this would appear a pro-nationalist standpoint for Joyce to have written in. Gabriel and Michael are opposites in every manner; Gabriel has a well filled shirt, Michael is thin and lithe, Gabriel thinks he knows what love is, whereas Michael has died for love of Gretta. Gabriel has literary pretensions, and Michael laboured in the gasworks. Michaels eyes are also wide and dark, compared to Gabriels delicate ones, which require glasses. This would appear to symbolise that Michael can see clearly and Gabriel cannot; Michael is single minded in his ambition and appears to evoke one of the great heroic figures of Ireland of a bygone era. The western Irish counteracts the West Briton, as Gabriel begins to betray possessive, colonial tendencies towards his western Irish wife, and is haunted by Furey. One reading of this could possibly be that Furey represents the Irish spirit, sickly and young though it is, rising up once more to haunt its colonial oppressors.7 Grettas words would seem to enforce this, as she says I think he died for me, which clearly echoes Yeatss drama Cathleen Ni Houlihan, in which men die for Ireland, portrayed by a woman. The use of language within the text is a method induced to show the difference between the pretentious Gabriel to the western Gretta. Early on, Gabriel smiled at the three syllables she had given his surname, which mocks her country accent.8 Lots of other idioms are employed by the characters two steps up the quay, youre the comical girl etc. Some phrases in Irish are used as well, such as when Miss Ivors bids them goodbye Beannacht libh. Also, other phrases are translated oddly into English due to the Irish roots, so get his death is due to the translation of bs dfhaghil.9

7 8

Valente, Joseph, James Joyce and the Cosmopolitan Sublime, p69 Jackson, Wyse, James Joyces Dubliners: An Annotated Edition, p159 9 Wall, Richard, An Anglo-Irish Dialect Glossary for Joyces Works. Beannacht libh is to bestow a blessing upon someone, and someone does not die in Irish but get death - bs dfhaghil.

McIndoe 5 It is a postcolonial tradition is to leave phrases and words within the text in the original language, i.e. not the language of the colonisers. Joyce did not translate the phrases used above it was only subsequent editors. Gibbons, a postcolonial critic, notes that one of the features of literature of this type is the refusal to fix reference points, and the refusal to name is allegorical to the silence induced by traumatic loss. Though Gretta is captivated by the ballad sung, she cannot remember its name.10 This can also be read as a general allegory to the British conquering the Irish this experience caused the Irish to lose their language and essentially be silenced. The refusal to have a transparency to writing, by using words from their original language, can be read as a form of rebellion against the ruling majority. This inability to name divides Gretta and Gabriel she just listens to the song, whilst Gabriel watches her, and at the end Gretta falls into a deep sleep whilst Gabriel muses upon mortality and has a stream of consciousness.11 Essentially, The Dead can be very much read as a postcolonial product. The usage of Irish phrases and words rather than just English, the portrayal of Furey as the passionate, western Ireland spirit and Gabriels realisation that actually, his homeland is not as backward as he once thought would all attest to this. The nationalism portrayed by Miss Ivors may be too strong, and if Gabriel is supposed to be representative of Joyce, perhaps this is his way in which he portrays his own feelings in the face of such strong patriotism. However, the fact that he comes around to her way of thinking by the end of the story, and is haunted by not only Grettas past, but Irelands past in general as represented by the shades shows that the Irish history is deeply engrained within him. He wishes to be more like Furey, to know true love as he did, and as he gives into the dead all around him, and the history they represent, he appears to be gaining a new appreciation of his country, over the culture imposed upon him, which he pandered to with his literary pretension.

Word Count: 1,998 BIBLIOGRAPHY

10 11

Thompson, Spurgeon, Recovering Dubliners for Postcolonial Theory, p188 Thompson, Spurgeon, Recovering Dubliners for Postcolonial Theory, p189

McIndoe 6 Attridge, Derek and Marjorie Howe (eds), Semicolonial Joyce, Cambridge University Press, UK, (2000) Ellman, Richard, The Backgrounds of The Dead, essay within anthology James Joyce: Dubliners and A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, ed. Morris Beja, general editor A. E. Dyson, Macmillan Education Ltd, London (1990) Jackson, Wyse, James Joyces Dubliners: An Annotated Edition, Sinclair Stevenson, Great Britain (1993) Platt, Len, Joyce and the Anglo-Irish: A Study of Joyce and the Literary Revival (Rodopi, Netherlands, 1998) Thompson, Spurgeon, Recovering Dubliners for Postcolonial Theory, essay within anthology, A New & Complex Sensation: Essays on Joyces Dubliners, ed. Oona Frawley (The Lilliput Press, Ireland, 2004) Valente, Joseph, James Joyce and the Cosmopolitan Sublime, essay in anthology, Joyce and the Subject of History, ed. Mark A. Wollaeger, Victor Luftig and Robert Spoo (University of Michigan Press 1996) Wall, Richard, An Anglo-Irish Dialect Glossary for Joyces Works (Colin Smythe, Great Britain, 1986)