June 7 2007 Professor Bruce Bassoff ENG 4224-100 Study Questions #3 The first paragraph of Two Gallants is beautifully constructed with vivid imagery, alliteration, and repetition. Joyce emphasizes the warm evening filled with warm air providing the reader with a feeling of the Sunday afternoon in August. The streets, shuttered for the repose of Sunday and the unchanging unceasing murmur of the living texture of the streets (p.43) all are examples of the alliteration Joyce employs in the paragraph. The paragraph is so beautifully written, it seems like it is a piece of prose fiction or almost like an introduction to a paragraph in a romance novel. Lenehans desired to learn about Corleys mission with the slavey because he could have possibly been privy to the fact that Corleys meeting would be lucrative as well as sexual. Although it is also apparent that Lenehan lives somewhat through Corleys relations with women and assumes the role of the disciple(p.55). Corleys life consisted of bad jobs and relationships and he wondered to himself, Would he never get a good job? Would he never have a home of his own? (p.52). Corley provides Lenehan with hope that he can meet a girl himself and he wishes to see Corley successful with his endeavors with women. Lenehans lack of confidence is expressed in this statement, He knew that he would have to speak a great deal, to invent and to amuse, and his brain and throat were too dry for such a task (p.50). Thus, Lenehan continues his life roaming idly the streets and having simple, clichd conversations with other friends similar to him. Perhaps this is Joyces social commentary to the state of Ireland and the people within it
that we have been discussing. Mrs. Mooney believes she can get what she wants in 43 minutes because she says that she had all the weight of social opinion on her side: she was an outraged mother (p.59). She felt that Mr. Doran had simply taken advantage of Pollys youth and inexperience (p.59). The only reparation to be made for Mr. Dorans case is marriage to her daughter. She felt she could win because Mr. Doran was a serious young man, not rakish or loud-voiced like the others (p.60). He could not afford to have slanderous rumors about him at his job in a great Catholic wine-merchants office. Little Chandler is embarrassed to read poetry to his wife because he feels he has failed himself in becoming a successful writer. Little Chandler does not believe in himself partly because he cannot get into the mood (p.79). Poetry represents adventure and escape for Little Chandler and he is unable to attain such lofty adventures that he admires from his friend Igatius Gallahers accomplishments. He wishes to escape to another place like London and become successful in his own writing career, but he felt as if He was a prisoner for life (p.80). Little Chandlers circumstances are representative of the claustrophobic condition of Ireland that Joyce comments on but the characters cannot escape.