Young adult fiction note week 8: James Joyce’s "Araby" (short story)

James Joyce was an Irish novelist and poet. He contributed to the modernist avant-garde, and is regarded as one of the most influential and important authors of the twentieth century.

 (The Love of Zero, a 1927 film by Robert Florey)

• The avant-garde are people or works that are experimental or innovative, particularly with respect to art, culture, and politics.

• "Araby" is a short story by James Joyce published in his 1914 collection Dubliners.
• Dubliners is a collection of fifteen short stories by James Joyce, first published in 1914. They form a naturalistic depiction of Irish middle class life in and around Dublin in the early years of the 20th century.

    I watched my master’s face pass from amiability to sternness; he hoped I was not beginning to idle. I could not call my wandering thoughts together. I had hardly any patience with the serious work of life which, now that it stood between me and my desire, seemed to me child’s play, ugly monotonous child’s play. 
    —“Araby”

    In this quote, the young boy of “Araby” has just spoken with Mangan’s sister, and now finds himself entirely uninterested and bored by the demands of the classroom. Instead, he thinks of Mangan’s sister, of the upcoming bazaar, and of anything but what rests before him. This scene forecasts the boy’s future frustration with the tedious details that foil his desires, and it also illustrates the boy’s struggle to define himself as an adult, even in the space of the classroom structured as a hierarchy between master and student. Just as mundane lessons obstruct the boy’s thoughts, by the end of the story everyday delays undermine his hopes to purchase something for Mangan’s sister at the bazaar. In both cases, monotony prevents the boy from fulfilling his desires.
From SparkNotes