PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST AS A YOUNG MAN


How does the quality of our choices affect the quality of our lives? How does our view of the world change? What Creates Man's World View? 

How does the quality of our choices affect the quality of our lives? How does our view of the world change?

To say the least, Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by James Joyce has quickly become one of my favorite novels of the semester, and one of my favorite books of all time. Not only is there an incredible level of depth in Joyce’s work, but there is a power of description that flows through the entire novel. There are segments of this novel that have left images and impressions on my mind that will certainly stay with me for years to come.

Portrait, in many ways, is one of the best studies to answer my big question that we have read throughout the semester. As the novel progresses, the reader is given an intensely detailed look into the past of Stephen Daedalus, the novel’s protagonist. As a child, Stephen is highly influenced by those that surround him – the political views of his father, his interactions with his schoolmates, and in particular the religious views of his mother and Dante, his aunt.

Religion quickly becomes a central focus of Stephen’s worldview, and an aspect that becomes the litmus test on his path towards adulthood. As a young boy enrolled in Clongowes, a Catholic boy’s preparatory school, Stephen has a simplistic yet conflicted view of the Catholic Church. On one hand, Stephen is enamored with the church – comparing Eileen, a young Protestant friend, to the Virgin Mary, and fearing the “terrible sin” of stealing the monstrance from the Church. Yet this characterization is coupled with the harsh practices of his Jesuit teachers, and on one occasion when Stephen is reprimanded and caned without cause, Stephen speaks out against the injustice, earning the respect of his peers and the smirks of his instructors.

This occasion appears to drive Stephen away from the Church for a time, in which Stephen begins a hedonistic journey into the world of prostitutes and sex. During this period, Stephen falls away from everything; he forgets his friends, his family, and almost entirely forgets the Church. Stephen continues pursuing the desires of his flesh until he attends a scathing sermon on the nature of Death, Judgment, Hell, and Heaven.   This sermon brings about a fearful change in Stephen, and “weep[ing] for the innocence he had lost” he turns from his ways, confesses to a priest, and begins a life of pious prayer and introspection. This life, however, leaves Stephen even further isolated from those he cares about, giving his soul with a sense of “spiritual dryness together with the growth of doubts and scruples.”

This doubt provides the grounds for the intense change in Stephen in the final chapters of Joyce’s novel. As Stephen nears the end of his school years, he is asked by the head of his school to consider joining the priesthood. Although he contemplates this path, in the end, Stephen recalls his days as a child at Clongowes, as well as his years of hedonism and years of piety, and chooses a middle path. Stephen rejects a direct role in the Church, and instead pursues life as an artist. His past – in particular his past relations with the Church – gives way to a new life, and is described as “ the cerements shaken from the body of death...the linens of the grave.” Stephen breaks with his past and the church and continues in a new direction entirely.

This direction leads Stephen into the final stage of his manhood. After attending the university, Stephen has progressed immensely from the simple schoolboy Joyce relates at the beginning of the novel. This new Stephen, empowered by his art and his freedom from the world, issues one of the most powerful (and one of my personal favorite) statements of the novel:

I will tell you what I will do and what I will not do. I will not serve that in which I no longer believe, whether it call itself my home, my fatherland, or my church: and I will try to express myself in some mode of life or art as freely as I can and as wholly as I can, using for my defense the only arms I allow myself to use, silence, exile, and cunning.

Stephen, in a sense, creates his own religion by the end of the novel. No longer bound by the stigma of society, nor the judgment or support of his family and peers, Stephen pursues that which gives him meaning and purpose. Stephen’s rejection of organized religion and the Catholic Church marks the beginning of his adulthood, a young man on a mission to change the world and the way we live in it.

To some extent, I think that Joyce has done exactly this. Although I don’t necessarily agree with his stance on Christianity or other major topics of the novel, I am inspired by Stephen’s dedication to that which gives him meaning. In spite of all difficulties, Stephen remains true to his art, a determination and drive that we all must have in our lives, whether we are a young man striving towards the artistic ideal, or a young man writing a blog post for his Literature class. And, as one who has some experience in both, it appears to me that determination and perseverance are the most important step on this path to purpose and meaning. 

BELOVED

How does the quality of our choices affect the quality of our lives? How does our view of the world change?

To say the least, Toni Morrison’s novel Beloved is anything but beloved in my mind. I think that the magical realism Morrison utilizes goes too far, leaving me (particularly as a male reader) unsettled and uncomfortable. Although Morrison’s description and style are powerful, there is just too much in this book – it, like the love of its main character, is “too thick”.

However, despite my personal distaste for the novel, it is certainly a work of literary merit, and one that fits quite well with my big question. I think that the novel exists as a study of the past – of the choices Morrison’s characters have made – and how these characters cope with the harsh reality of their former lives as slaves. Each character has a different approach to dealing with the past – some that are healthier than others, and some that are certainly detrimental.

One character’s past that is particularly painful is that of Sethe. Forced to choose between life as a slave and death, Sethe attempts to murder her children in order to save them, killing one of her daughters, and managing only to maim her other three children. Sethe’s choice to kill her daughter, known only as ‘Beloved’, haunts her throughout the novel, both in her emotional and social state, but also in physical form, when Beloved returns in the form of an adult woman. Although Sethe is consistently advised to “lay down her sword and shield” and the pain of the past, Sethe clings to it, searching for forgiveness and peace, yet only finding pain and suffering.

Like Sethe, her daughter – and only remaining child – Denver, is a victim of her mother’s past. Early in the novel, Denver is totally dependent on her mother, childlike to a level that distracts from the fact that she is indeed a young woman. To Denver, Beloved is her only friend; however, as Beloved grows more and more powerful in the household, Denver begins to come to terms with herself. She must venture out into the world in order to save herself and her mother, and she does so, moving forward from the decisions and fear of the past, and taking control of her future.

It is this same path that Paul D takes. Paul D has a history almost as painful as Sethe’s – a story of dehumanization, escape, and drifting that leads him to question not only people, but his own manhood, another struggle integral to the novel. Paul D arrives at 124 with his story locked up in “the rusty tobacco tin of his heart”, yet as he spends time with Sethe, Paul D begins to come to grips with his past. Although he leaves when he learns of Sethe’s past crimes, Paul D returns to 124, and in the very end of the novel, Paul D is a changed man, one with friends, family, and a future.

Although I am not a fan of Morrison’s novel, I do agree to some extent with her characterization of the past. We cannot let the past control us, and if necessary, we must “beat back the past” in order to earn the future – as Morrison writes, “The future was sunset; the past something to leave behind. And if it didn’t stay behind, well, you might have to stomp it out. Slave life; freed life – every day was a test and a trial.” If we let the past control our lives, then we become nothing but ghosts in the present. Life in fear is no life at all, and our challenge is to move past this fear into bigger and better pursuits. 

THE STRANGER

WHAT CREATES MAN'S WORLDVIEW?

The worldview held by Meursault in Albert Caumus’ The Stranger is aptly one of the strangest ways of life that I have read all semester – quite the feat when one of my novels, The Road, describes the lives of a father and son traveling through a post-apocalyptic wasteland.

Early in the novel, Meursault appears to view and react to life apathetically, making no real decisions and having no real emotions, even over the death of his own mother. This path defines Meursault for nearly the first half of the novel, and even the climax of the story, Meursault’s murder of the Arab, appears an empty and meaningless act, undertaken almost nonchalantly – and certainly without remorse.

But as Meursault is tried for his crimes in the second half of the novel, Camus begins to reveal an entirely different side of Meursault.  To say a change comes over Meursault I think would be false; instead, the second half of the novel provides some insight into the motivations and the inner workings. No longer does Meursault appear the careless perpetrator of a murderer, but a helpless man – controlled by a social machine and pushed to his destruction by a harsh universe. Meursault does nothing because he has no power to do anything else; he is a spectator to an absurd game that determines his fate. This change in depiction, at least for me, although far from making me like Meursault or his actions, led me to feel a sense of pity for his condition, and somewhat distraught over the apparent injustice of the situation.

Despite this change of opinion, Meursault’s fate is sealed; Meursault’s acceptance of this fact in the final chapter provides some of the most powerful moments of the novel. One line that particularly stuck out to me was when, remarking on his imminent execution, Meursault states, “Deep down, I knew perfectly well that it doesn’t matter whether you die at thirty or seventy – whether it was now or twenty years from now, I would still be the one dying.”  Although there are doctrines of existentialism and thoughts that Camus relates that I strongly disagree with, this quote resonates with me. A sense of carpe diem gives this dismal section a somewhat hopeful air, and Meursault’s acceptance of this grim reality gives him a freedom that cannot be conquered even in death.

I think that this is where the power of The Stranger lies. Although I don’t necessarily agree with existentialism, this book is interesting and compelling, and makes a fascinating argument for the existentialist world view.