“The Dead” by James Joyce

This past week in my Twentieth Century Literature class, we discussed “The Dead,” a short story by James Joyce that is part of his larger work, Dubliners. I remember borrowing this book from the library one summer in high school, to read for fun, and being thrown by Joyce’s use of dashes instead of quotation marks for dialogue. But now, reading it as a college student, I am able to enjoy it much more, and get so much more out of it; particularly, the meaningful symbolism and its message about death.

At one point, when the main character, Gabriel Conroy, is giving a speech at dinner, he states:

“‘Listening tonight to the names of all those great singers of the past it seemed to me, I must confess, that we are living in a less spacious age. Those days might, without exaggeration, be called spacious days: and if they are gone beyond recall let us hope, at least, that in gatherings such as this we shall still speak of them with pride and affection, still cherish in our hearts the memory of those dead and gone great ones whose fame the world will not willingly let die.’”

“Spacious” here means having broader or more comprehensive views. And therefore, though Conroy believes that in their modern era there is less room for varying opinions, he still believes that people should be able to look back on the old times happily, not bitterly. Though perhaps the most talented of people are gone, “the world will not willingly let [them] die,” because they are able to cherish their memories of them.

And though Gabriel advocates fondly reminiscing over the people and times that are lost to us, he advises that we remember that we must continue to move forward with our lives:

“‘But yet,’ continued Gabriel, his voice falling into a softer inflection, ‘there are always in gatherings such as this sadder thoughts that will recur to our minds: thoughts of the past, of youth, of changes, of absent faces that we miss here tonight. Our path through life is strewn with many such sad memories: and were we to brood upon them always we could not find the heart to go on bravely with our work among the living. We have all of us living duties and living affections which claim, and rightly claim, our strenuous endeavours.’”

Looking back on the past can sadden us and make it hard to go on with our lives, but it is important that we remember that we must go on. If we were to spend all of our time thinking of our heartrending memories, we wouldn’t be able to continue on, to have the strength to keep living. But as Gabriel says, our “living duties” and “affections” “rightly claim,” our time: life is meant for living, for looking forward in addition to looking back. We must find the right balance between the two.

Conroy continues:

“‘Therefore, I will not linger on the past. I will not let any gloomy moralising intrude upon us here tonight. Here we are gathered together for a brief moment from the bustle and rush of our everyday routine. We are met here as friends, in the spirit of good-fellowship, as colleagues, also to a certain extent, in the true spirit of camaraderie…’”

We should not “linger” on what is behind us- reflecting on it now and then is appropriate, but to let it consume our lives is wrong. As Gabriel says, it is “gloomy.” He reminds us that we must enjoy the present moment, our present circumstances, and the people we have in our lives at present. We can’t forget all of this in the midst of remembering our pasts.

Later in the story, after Gabriel’s wife Gretta tells him she has been thinking about a past love who has died, Michael Furey, Gabriel begins to realize that he himself is heading toward death; that it is inevitable, even if he cannot fully comprehend it. While before he could only think about it, now he fully grasps that it will happen to him one day, and he starts to accept it. Joyce uses snow as a symbol for the universality of death, and Gabriel’s epiphany is fully realized as he watches it falling:

“Yes, the newspapers were right: snow was general all over Ireland. It was falling on every part of the dark central plain, on the treeless hills, falling softly upon the Bog of Allen and, farther westward, softly falling into the dark mutinous Shannon waves. It was falling, too, upon every part of the lonely churchyard on the hill where Michael Furey lay buried. It lay thickly drifted on the crooked crosses and headstones, on the spears of the little gate, on the barren thorns. His soul swooned softly as he heard the snow falling faintly through the universe and faintly falling, like the descent of their last end, upon all the living and the dead.”

The fact that the snow falls “all over Ireland” and, more broadly, “through the universe,” illustrates Gabriel’s recognition that death happens to everyone. While before he was only thinking about it in terms of other people, now he is aware that he too will die. It happens everywhere- no one is excluded. And it is what links us to those that are gone. Finally, Gabriel comes to terms with this, and just as the snow brings closure to Gabriel’s musing, it brings closure to the story too.