Eveline - James Joyce

James Joyce’s “Eveline,” focuses on a character of the same name amidst an emotional turmoil. This story could be deemed a love tale which involves Eveline who struggles to remove herself from the strong ties to her family and follow her love, Frank, to Buenos Aires. Joyce uses literary elements such as setting, symbols, and themes that help convey Eveline’s emotional struggle.

This story begins in a town in Ireland with the introduction of family characters. Family seems to be a strong theme in Joyce’s writing. This theme is evident when Eveline stays home and takes over the motherly duties in the household as a teen after a promise was made to her dying mother. Death plays a major role in this story as the author points out that many of Eveline’s friends and family are said to have died at some point. Symbolism such as dust collecting around the house and the aged yellow painting of Mary Margaret Alocoque, a French nun, enable the reader to get a sense of the death and loneliness surrounding Eveline. There are several issues presented by Joyce that give rise to Eveline’s internal conflict of breaking the promise to her mother and leaving with Frank. One major problem is that the family is very poor and money is a very precious resource in their lives. Eveline expresses the importance of money when she is walking to the market with her purse clasped close to her body almost as if to protect it as though it were her very own life. Her family’s poverty is apparent when Frank takes her to the theater and she expresses her delight with the seats Frank has purchased because she has been accustomed to sitting in the back row due to her inability to purchase better seats.

To Eveline, Frank represents a new and exciting lifestyle that she has not had the opportunity to experience after taking over the mother role. Her routine, mundane lifestyle that Eveline has led appears to be comforting to her because of its stability, whereas being with Frank is something new and spontaneous. Perhaps Eveline is not so much in love with Frank as she is with the opportunity to embark on a new lifestyle that contradicts everything she has known and become accustomed to. When the time comes for Eveline to make her life altering decision she falters. Frank is urging her to go as they are at the station and Eveline becomes frozen in a state of emotional paralysis, unable to make a decision. Again, Joyce uses symbolism when Eveline grips onto the handrails that lead down the steps to her new life. The handrails represent stability and control. They represent the life she has always known and the comfort that it provides. James Joyce tells us that Eveline lacks the strength to make her own decision. Therefore, she remains dysfunctional due to her fear of failure, promise to her mother, or guilt that she faces for leaving her family behind. Joyce is able to exaggerate all of these feelings inside Eveline primarily because of his writing style. The use of these literary elements gives a more intense understanding of the emotional quarrel that Eveline is forced to deal with.