Irish Postcolonialism and James Joyce's Araby--Bradley and Annalisa

We are presenting this week on Irish Postcolonialism. Brenda Murray defines Post-colonialism as "Post-colonialism – essentially a critique of colonialism, is characterised by a

process of disengagement from the colonial epoch and has taken many forms" in her essay Ireland – a test case of Post-colonialism / Post colonialism.

Here's a timeline that outlines some key events in Ireland's history including its struggle for independence.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/country_profiles/1038669.stm

Araby, published in Joyce's collection, Dubliners (1914) was originally written in 1905, during the height of Irish nationalism. Sinn Féin, a left-wing Irish Nationalist group was founded in 1905, and most of the members partook in the Easter Rising of 1916.

Here is a summary of Araby, along with character descriptions, and plot themes:

http://www.cummingsstudyguides.net/Guides5/Araby.html

The website states: "Joyce presents a bleak city struggling against oppressive forces."

In Joyce's description of the city, hints of eager nationalism are elicited, in passages such as:

“We walked through the flaring streets, jostled by drunken men and bargaining women, amid the curses of labourers, the shrill litanies of shop boys who stood on guard by the barrels of pigs’ cheeks, the nasal chanting of street singers who sang a come-all-you about O’Donovan Rossa or a ballad about the troubles in our native land” (Joyce, 1225).

O' Donovan Rossa is a reference to Jeremiah Donovan, and Irish Nationalist, who was sentenced to a lifetime of penal servitude but was granted amnesty and departed for America (Broadview).

Although short, the protagonist's arrival to a vacant Araby is even further disillusioned by his encounter with an English attendant.

"I remarked their English accents and listened vaguely to their conversation...Observing me, the young lady came over and asked me did I wish to buy anything. The tone of her voice was not encouraging: she seemed to have spoken to me out of a sense of duty" (Joyce, 1227).

This brief but acerbic encounter marks the struggle between the Irish and the English, and serves as a microcosm for the hostility between Irish nationalists and the British government.

References:

Joyce, James. The Broadview Anthology of British Literature Concise Edition Vol. B. Ed. Don LePan.

Peterborough: Broadview Press, 2008.