1.2 Dubliners, the collection of short stories

    Dubliners, James Joyce's collection of fifteen short stories. Although Joyce wrote the stories between 1904 and 1906, they were not published until 1914. During these frustrating and impoverished years, Joyce heavily relied upon the emotional support of Nora Barnacle, his unmarried Irish lover, as well as the financial support of his younger brother, Stanislaus Joyce. Both Nora Barnacle and Stanislaus Joyce remained as protective, supporting figures for the duration of the writer’s life. Dubliners paints a portrait of life in Dublin, Ireland, at the turn of the 20th century. Its stories are arranged in an order reflecting the development of a child into a grown man. The first three stories are told from the point of view of a young boy, the next three from the point of view of an adolescent, and so on. 

1.3 “Araby”, the short story

    “Araby” is one of fifteen short stories that together make up James Joyce's collection, Dubliners. "Araby" is the last story of the first set, and is told from the perspective of a boy just on the verge of adolescence. The story takes its title from a real festival which came to Dublin in 1894 when Joyce was twelve years old. Joyce is one of the most famous writers of the Modernist period of literature, which runs roughly from 1900 to the end of World War II. Modernist works often include characters who are spiritually lost and themes that reflect a cynicism toward institutions the writer had been taught to respect, such as government and religion.