James Joyce's The Dead Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

James Joyces The Dead - Essay Examplen in the following lines A light fringe of s right away lay bid a cape on the shoulders of his overcoat and like toecaps on the toes of his goloshes and, as the buttons of his overcoat slipped with a squeaking noise through the snow- stiffened frieze, a cold odorous air from out-of-doors escaped from crevices and folds. There are other common allusions to the near freezing Dublin weather in which the story is set. The instance when Gretta Conroy, Gabriels wife caught cold infection is again a literal citing of the word cold. The sole occasion when cold was used in the metaphorical backbone is when Gabriel replies unenthusiastically to Gretta that You can go if you like, said Gabriel coldly.Talking of the dark aspects of the story, in the context of Gabriels address to the gathering, he mentions how our path through animateness is strewn with many sad memories and continues in a morbid tone, how were we to brood upon them always we could not fi nd the heart to go on bravely with our work among the breathing and further in the narrative he says His soul had approached that region where dwelt the vast hosts of the dead. This poignant remembrance of his own past had shaken up his composure. Gabriel had now been overwhelmed by a sense of losing his love and the pain associated with it. Joyce depicts the state he is in with the following dark imagery into a grey impalpable populace, all the living and the dead.As for the light in The Dead, there are again two interpretations one is light as in whim and frivolity the other is insight or revelation. There are plenty of instances of both cases. Phrases such as laughing very heartily, There was a great deal of confusion and laughter and noise, The table burst into applause and laughter at this sally, She laughed herself this time good-humouredly, etc represent the light-hearted elements in the narrative. blithesome as brightness can be seen in