“Dubliners” is a collection of fifteen short stories written by James Joyce in which the author analyses the failure of self-realisation of inhabitants of Dublin in biographical and in psychological ways. The novel was originally turned down by publishers because they considered it immoral for its portrait of the Irish city. Joyce treats in “Dubliners” the paralysis of will in four stages: childhood, youth, maturity and public life. The paralysis of will is the courage and self-knowledge that leads ordinary men and women to accept the limitations imposed by the social context they live in. In “Dubliners” the style is both realistic - to the degree of perfectly recreating characters and idioms of contemporary Dublin - and symbolic – giving the common object unforeseen depth and a new meaning in order to show a new view of reality. Joyce defines this effect “epiphany” which indicates that moment when a simple fact suddenly explodes with meaning and makes a person realise his / her condi
The relationship between James Joyce and Trieste is an extreme element not only of his autobiography but also of its evolution as a writer. If Dublin was the city where Joyce’s personality was created and shaped, Trieste is the one where Joyce’s personality developed and matured.
Joyce worked here as English teacher at the Berlitz language school, journalist and reporter of local journal “Il Piccolo della Sera” and gave some literary presentations in conferences.
Despite the troubled period, Joyce completed some short stories which would later compose “Dubliners” and, then, he finished the second draft of “Chamber music”.
Joyce often gave private English lessons which were attended by the children belonging to the local nobility or local intellectuals like Italo Svevo. Joyce and Svevo made friends and the Irish novelist used Svevo as literary prototype for the main character of “Ulysses”, Leopold Bloom; in fact, many details of Judaism included in “Ulysses” were referred to him by Svevo himself.
In 1908 Joyce took singing lessons at the Conservatory of Music and he took part in Richard Wagner’s opera “I maestri cantori di Norimberga” in 1909.
Then, Joyce attended cultural circles of the city and became a regular guest at the Caffè San Marco, a meeting place for intellectuals of Trieste where Joyce worked on his novels.After the outbreak of the First World War some Joyce’s friends belonging to the bourgeoisie helped him to escape to Zurich, in Switzerland.
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