James Joyce

JAMES JOYCE JAMES JOYCE Life: he was born in Dublin in 1882. The writers he admired more were Dante, considered his "spiritual food", D'Annunzio and Ibsen. The interest in Euripean literatures led him to begin to think himself as an European rather than an Irishman. His attitude contrasted with that of his literary contemporaries, like Yeats, who where supporting the struggle for Irish indipendence. In 1904, fearing of not being totally immmune from the "paralysis", he decided to leave Ireland and he moved to Italy, in particular Trieste. There he known Italo Svevo, whose "La coscienza di Zeno", shows Joyce's influence. Main features: he wrote in the XX century, so he was influenced by the french naturalism and the decadence. Thus he used in his works new tecniques such as the impersonality of the author, the symbolism, the psycological analysis and the epiphany. As regard impersonality, Joice abandons the omniscient narrator of the 19th century and the story is told through differents points of view, that are those of the characters and the language changes adapting to the protagonist. In particular in the "Dubliners" the language develops itself, becoming more complex in the later stories where the protagonists are adults. Moreover in a "Portrayt of an Artist as a Young Man" there are several differences between the language of the first chapter, in which the protagonist is a child, and the fourth chapter, where he had became an adult. Symbolism: it derives from Baudelaire, Verlaine and Mallarmè and consists in a double vision of reality. Poetry is now associated to the intuitive power of the artist and the poet is the one, which can find misterious associations. For example the final part of the "Dubliners", "The Dead", is a combination of realism and symbolism. Whereas Misses Morkan house, the people and the dinner are described through an accumulation of realistic details, the same details become symbols of a deeper reality (for example the roast goose served at the dinner becomes symbol of Gabriel need for escape; the same name Gabriel, which, according to the Hebrew mythology, is both the prince of fire and the angel of death, means that Gabriel is spiritually dead; instead Michael Furey, whose name means the highest angel, will live for ever in Gretta's memory). Moreover symbolism is present in a "Portrayt of an artist…"when the protagonist, Steven Dedalus, associates the girl appeared to a bird. This meant that the girl is a symbol of flight, escape, safety and freedom. The psycological analysis: in the XX century the writer's interests are no more directed to the relationship between the individual and society, but to the mind of the characters. For this new aim of literature was indispensable the influence of Freud, the founder of psychoanalysis. To analyze the character's interiority Joyce uses the stream of consciousness, that is the casual association of thoughts, impressions and emotions of a person who is not thinking inte