The document provides context on several key themes in James Joyce's short story "Araby". It begins by discussing how the story explores issues of growing up and coming of age through the first person narration of an adult reflecting on his youth. It also touches on themes of religion, sexuality, and unfulfilled desires represented by the boy's infatuation with his friend's sister. Literary devices used in the story are examined like imagery, symbolism, and the contrast between light and dark. The climax of the story involves the boy's disappointment at the bazaar when he is unable to buy a gift for the girl.

2. Coming of Age
• One of the central issues in Araby is growing up. The narrator, who uses
mature language to describe his youthful experience, reflects back on his
experience providing small insights from an adult experience.
The fact that the story is told from an adult perspective
indicates that the story is about growing up.
Religion and Catholicism
• The narrator of Araby is surrounded by religion. He attends a Roman Catholic school
and people around him, just like he himself, are steeped in the Catholic religion that
held sway in Ireland at the time when the story was set.
Love and Sexuality
• Another issue in Araby is that the narrator develops romantic feeling on Mangan’s
sister (and he discovers his sexuality). The narrator lives in a ‘blind’ street, where
it is secluded and not frequented by outsiders. Plus, he attends an all-boy school,
which suggests he does not know many girls.

3. Vanity
• The boy felt completely vain as he arrives late at the bazaar. Most of the stalls
had closed and he ended up couldn’t find any gifts for Mangan’s sister, his crush.
As the stalls closed, the lights off, he is in the darkness of night and he felt that
everything is worthless. Thus so the narrator says,
“gazing up into the darkness I saw myself as a creature driven and
derided by vanity; and my eyes burned with anguish and anger.”
Adoration
• A boy that keeps thinking about his friend’s sister and her name always pass
through his lips in his prayers. The girl has been crossing his mind a lot until
he can’t explain why and he keeps thinking on how he would react and say if
he ever happen to meet and talk to that girl. Plus, the boy seems to like the girl
so much and he sees it as the opportunity for him to get the girl something from
the bazaar as the girl can’t go due to she has to attend a retreat with her school.

4. WinterTime :
Places :
• North Richmond Street - A quiet street .
• Christian Brothers' School -
All boys school.
• The wild garden behind the house -
Containing a central apple-tree and
a few straggling bushes.
• An uninhabited house of two storeys.
• The bazaar.
• The drawing-room -
In which the priest had died.
• Café Chantant - At the bazaar.
• In the bedroom, classroom.
• Buckingham Street.
• Westland Row Station.

5. • The unnamed adolescent .
• Youthful hopes that are reminiscent.
• The girl through the eyes of the boy.
• Irony presented through the boy.
It is told in the first person point of view of an unnamed
adolescent that is infatuated with his friend’s sister
First person viewpoint, the author is giving the readers the impression that
the story is not told by the boy but it is actually a mature man reminiscing
about his youthful hopes, desires and frustrations.
The character of the girl by the third person narrator with the “I” viewpoint,
meaning the reader can only see her character through the eyes of the boy.
The reader can plainly see the irony presented through the boy.

6. Exposition
The setting was during winter by the end of North Richmond Street, Dublin, Ireland.
The main character is the narrator, the boy who was smitten by a girl he saw, which was his
friend’s sister. The boy lived with his uncle and aunt, as tenant in a house where a priest died.
"North Richmond Street, being blind, was a quiet street except at the hour when the Christian
Brothers' School set the boys free. An uninhabited house of two storeys stood at the blind end,
detached from its neighbors in a square ground. "
The boy was at his house and he imagined a conversation with the girl he had a crush on,
Mangan's sister. He found out that the girl could not go to the bazaar. He asked his uncle
to take him to the Araby bazaar so he could buy a gift for his crush.
"I did not know whether I would ever speak to her or not or, if I spoke to her, how I could
tell her of my confused adoration. But my body was like a harp and her words and
gestures were like fingers running upon the wires."
Rising Action

7. Climax
The boy finally arrived at the Araby bazaar. He tried to buy something for the girl but
the lady in the shop won't give him any help and won't pay attention to him.
"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.”
The boy leaves the bazaar in South Dublin after not buying anything for the girl. He
realized that everything he imagined was merely an illusion.
"I lingered before her stall, though I knew my stay was useless, to make my interest in
her wares seem the more real. Then I turned away slowly and walked
down the middle of the bazaar. "
Falling Action

8. Conclusion
The boy was mad and crushed because he was not able to buy the girl a gift.
He then decides not to do anything about his love and gave up on it.
"Gazing up into the darkness I saw myself as a creature driven and derided by vanity;
and my eyes burned with anguish and anger."

9. Literary Devices
• “The other houses of the street, conscious of decent lives within them,
gazed at one another with brown imperturbable faces.”
Irony
• Appearance: “The syllables of the word Araby were called to me through
the silence in which my soul luxuriated and
cast an Eastern enchantment over me.”
• Reality: “Observing me the young lady came over and asked me
if I wished to buy anything. The tone of her voice was not encouraging;
she seemed to have spoken out of a sense of duty.
I looked humbly at the great jars that stood like eastern guards
at the either side of the dark entrance to the stall
and murmered: No, thank you.”
Personification

10. • “I imagined I bore my chalice safely through a throng of foes.”
Imagery & Juxtaposition
• There is constant contrast between the story’s setting and Mangan’s sister.
Most of the contrast is achieved through light and dark imagery.
This contrast emphasizes the difference between the real world
and the dream he wants to be fulfilled.
Metaphor
Light Dark
• “She was waiting for us,
her figure defined by the
light from the half-opened
door.”
• “Nearly all the stalls were
closed and the greater part
of the hall was in
darkness.”

11. Light Dark
• “She was waiting for us,
her figure defined by the
light from the half-opened
door.”
• “Nearly all the stalls were closed and the
greater part of the hall was in darkness.”
• “The light from the lamp
opposite our door caught
the white curve of her neck
lit up her hair that rested
there and falling, lit up the
hand upon the railing.”
• “The career of our play brought us through the
dark muddy lanes behind the houses where we
ran the gauntlet of the rough tribes from the
cottage, to the back doors of the dark dripping
gardens where the odours arouse from the
ashpits, to the dark odorous stables where the
coachman smoothed and combed the horse or
hook music from the bucked harness.”
• “Some distant lamp or
lighted window gleamed
below me.”

12. Symbols
Similes
Epiphany
• “While she spoke she turned a silver bracelet round and round her wrist.
She could not go, she said, because there would be a retreat that week in
her convent.”
• “My body was like harp and her words and gestures were like fingers
running upon the wires.”
• “I had never spoken to her, except for a few casual words, and yet
her name was like summons to all my foolish blood.”
• “Gazing up into the darkness I saw myself as a creature driven
and derided by vanity; and my eyes burned with anguish and anger.”