Gary M. Leonard states in Reading Dubliners Again A Lacanian Perspective(1):

How does Joyce remove these distinctions while denying himself and the reader the comfort of imposing new ones? He does so by allowing concepts such as authority, paternity, maternity, femininity, and masculinity to plead their cases as long as they want. The very defense that these distinctions are innate always reveals the gaps, ellipses and misrecognitions that show these natural forces and categories to be elaborate cultural constructs that are designed to protect the subject from the spurious nature of his or her “self”.

It is my wish to put forward a thesis statement today that encompasses the above position of Leonard but also to suggest that Joyce’s writing achieves the possibility of an interpretation that the self while erratic and fictional is in an evolutionary state. While imperfect and capable of becoming static and regressive in some characters the self can become in others stronger as Dubliners characters develop to a point where we can say that the self while weak is open to improvement. However this progress is at a snail’s pace...a Darwinian pace. A pace so slow it is a form of paralysis. I will demonstrate such an etching forward in the self of Polly of “A Boarding House” as she learns to survive, manipulate and ensnare through her mother Mrs. Mooney, taking such a development of self to the next level.

Polly’s evolution of a self can be seen as negative as she is cunning and manipulative. However it must be seen as a collective fighting response by Mrs Mooney and her daughter to a patriarchal society trying to shape her into an Eveline or worse the life of Eveline’s mother; a house bound life with a slow descent into madness. I shall map the usage of the word Frank within Dubliners as a name and word. Frank also ironically connotes dishonesty and thus represents the paradigms of patriarchy which can be seen as holding back both genders in their evolution of self. This Frank association and word play will allow me to make the case for the narrative of Dubliners as nascent of the narrative technique we come to witness in Finnegans Wake.

The dangers to the text in plurative interpretative endeavours whilst numerous and alarming must be risked for the high gains of new knowledge, the reinvention of a storyline, author or criticism itself depends upon this. Jacques Derrida in his concept of hauntology using the example of Marxism illustrates this:

Without disappearing, use-value becomes, then, a sort of limit... To haunt does not mean to be present, and it is necessary to introduce haunting into the very construction of a concept. Of every concept, beginning with the concepts of being and time. That is what we would be calling here a hauntology.(2)

A concept constantly shifts in and out of different subjective selves gathering meaning and alienating itself from its initial stages and not just between individuals but between generations. The concept of Marxism is different now, constantly evolving from its initial stages from the minds of Marx and Engels, from where they were influenced onto the Neo-Marxists and the practicing governments of so-called Marxism today. However these new concepts are haunted by their old conceptions and thus any new possible reinventions. The self evolves in large part through the paradigms existent in society be they through religious, political or ideological frameworks. These paradigms have a set number in a society especially in specific sectors of the social order and thus the people have a set limit of ways in which they can be influenced. In terms of a self in the Dublin of Joyce growing up in a deeply Catholic society, fervently Nationalistic and of very little variety in terms of entertainment, it is alcohol oriented. Each self in the vast majority of cases will be born of and influenced within the standardised nuclear family. In turn this means that a set number of selves can only be produced even if it is of an apparent vast and diverse quality. This is the case in Joyce’s Dubliners. It is possible for society to produce selves that are largely the same in action and thought. Joyce’s form of hauntology in his ellipses and allusions skilfully lures the reader into several thematic realms through allusive sentences or words.

This mirrors the plight of the self within Dubliners as there is no totalising grasp on the character’s experience of the events of their personal lives within the book. The self of the character within Dubliners struggles to encompass what is happening all around them, the different perspectives and interpretations of various character selves not to mention the unknowable alluded to. However there are collective beliefs which a self must adhere and be seen to practice in order to be accepted. In this way selves portrayed within Dubliners resemble what I will label a ‘Prismatic self’. A prism is usually a solid object with bases or ends possessing the same form and volume. These are parallel to one another. The prism is a transparent solid separating white light passing through usually glass into the colours of the rainbow. The selfhood of the Joycean Dubliner possesses a self akin to the action of the prism, although a transparent unsolid prism, where the information (the white light) passing through consciousness/self (prism) is changed by the paradigms (parallel bases or ends) existent in their subjective world be they of Catholicism or societal street wisdom into different illusions which helps to perpetuate the diverse fantasies (rainbow colours) which the selves of the characters choose or choicelessly harbour. However the self is always an unfinished thing, existent only in its practice and completely dynamic, without final meaning this is resulting it would seem due to the limited powers of perception of the human sense apparatus.

In “Two Gallants” we witness a self paralysed and with no serious ambitions of changing in the shape of Lenehan:

Like illumined pearls the lamps shone from the summits of their tall poles upon the living texture below, which, changing shape and hue unceasingly, sent up into the warm grey evening air an unchanging, unceasing murmur. (Dubliners, 1914, 52)

The physical nature of living society changes form and colour however its spiritual product of the mind its language and reason is fixed and constant, it would seem the metaphor states. The character of Lenehan captures this wonderfully:

The other, who walked on the verge of the path and was at times obliged to step on to the road, owing to his companion's rudeness, wore an amused, listening face... A yachting cap was shoved far back from his forehead, and the narrative to which he listened made constant waves of expression break forth over his face from the corners of his nose and eyes and mouth... His eyes, twinkling with cunning enjoyment, glanced at every moment towards his companion's face... expressed youth. But his figure fell into rotundity at the waist, his hair was scant and grey, and his face, when the waves of expression had passed over it, had a ravaged look. (Dubliners, 1914, 52)

Joyce’s first reference to Lenehan is as other, outlining how he is defined by others to such an extent that he is “The” other. He possesses a shape shifting identity which shall seek to be defined by his company. It is he who steps on to the road to accommodate Corley who can afford to be rude to Lenehan and dictate the conversation therefore being dismissive of Lenehan. Just as the mass crowd changes physically so too does Lenehan in terms of aging however just like the crowd his reason and noise does not change, he is still trying to be a young hustler on the streets of Dublin. He has not managed to progress from his past: his self is still maintaining the same self. Corley his companion is cut from the same cloth as Lenehan in terms of petty life ambition and Joyce outlines how he manages to maintain such a self:

He spoke without listening to the speech of his companions. His conversation was mainly about himself: what he had said to such a person and what such a person had said to him, and what he had said to settle the matter. (Dubliners, 1914, 55)

He represses all speech in his direction therefore repressing the ability of anyone to directly impact upon his self and his sense of self. His perception of his self is then removed from the influence of possible self-altering statements. As his conversation dictates he is self-obsessed, he outlines his perceptions regarding himself, his perception of what another had said to him and then his perception of how he had ended the conversation or won the argument. His self-belief and assurance is maintained through these methods despite the fact that: “Whenever any job was vacant a friend was always ready to give him the hard word.” (Dubliners, 1914, 54)

On the other hand even when Lenehan is not in the presence of another directly his sense of self is still dominated by the external:

Now that he was alone his face looked older. His gaiety seemed to forsake him, and as he came by the railings of the Duke's Lawn he allowed his hand to run along them. The air the harpist had played began to control his movements. His softly padded feet played the melody while his fingers swept a scale of variations idly along the railings after each group of notes. (Dubliners, 1914, 60)

Devoid of the presence of the youth of Corley, Lenehan’s face begins to look older and he cannot muster the expressions of youth without another to reflect his idealized self. However despite his physical elderness “his face looked older” the air of music which he meets begins to control his movements and reinvent his self to childlike movements as his hands scale the railings and his feet dance to the melody. His sense of self is coming not from his manner of expression and ideas but from his actions now as he allows his self to be taken by the music. The railings denote that he is imprisoned in his society and his self of other, calling to mind the conclusion of “Eveline” as she grips the railing in her eventual desire not to leave. On his entry to a Refreshment Bar he believes he has been perceived to possess a look of refinement and thus must shape his self to a manner more acceptable and akin to those present:

He spoke roughly in order to belie his air of gentility, for his entry had been followed by a pause of talk. His face was heated. To appear natural he pushed his cap back on his head and planted his elbows on the table. (Dubliners, 1914, 61)

Lenehan “A yachting cap was shoved far back from his forehead…” (Joyce, 1914, 52) shares a characteristic of Frank in “Eveline” “He was standing at the gate, his peaked cap pushed back on his head…” (Dubliners, 1914, 40). Is this the same person? Or is this a generic Frank, a product self of society? A society whose rigid structures produce those of similar paralysed ilk however there is further evidence than just the cap and the style of wearing it:

He had walked the streets long enough with friends and girls. He knew what those friends were worth: he knew the girls too. Experience had embittered his heart against the world…He might yet be able to settle down in some snug corner and live happily if he could only come across some good simple-minded girl with a little of the ready. (Dubliners, 1914, 62)

Once again we can see how his self has been battered and changed by those around him. Is this the Frank who had suffered the rejection of Eveline and has adjusted his self accordingly? It would certainly be true to Lenehan’s character to play a game with her, weave a web of lies in the hope of procuring what he wanted. A further allusion is made to this being the same Frank character: “Frank rude health glowed in her face, on her fat red cheeks and in her unabashed blue eyes.” (Dubliners, 1914, 59) Is this the revelation of Lenehan’s first name as he is reflected in her eyes as he makes eye contact with Corley’s “…fine decent tart”. This mirror of another character could possibly be read to reveal a Frank Lenehan of both “Eveline” and “Two Gallants”. The only other explanation is that society runs along such rigid lines of the paradigms at work that it produces characters of the same ilk. I will delve into further usages of Frank below in outlining how there is a link throughout various stories in the way different usages of Frank as name and word inform different readings of various stories. I feel this kind of narrative device is embryonic of the narrative we come to see in not just Ulysses but in Finnegans Wake. Finn Fordham states in Lots Of Fun At Finnegans Wake:

How is it possible for a book of 628 pages to inspire so many different visions? Because it consists of so many distinct but interrelated objects – that is to say words, of course, but they denote and evoke things – more things than there are words. Many of the words or formations appear nowhere else, and it is difficult to describe something so much of which you’re seeing for the first time. Its neologisms make it unencompassable, endlessly redefinable. The textual matter of Finnegans Wake developed over seventeen years, just as the meaning for its readers has developed over the seventy-eight years since its first publication.(3)

Dubliners possesses nowhere near the narrative achievement, depth or word play of Finnegans Wake. However it is in Dubliners that the first burgeoning of such a narrative technique takes shape. The reader is challenged not through ellipses but through word play and linkage to see associations and information informing other stories in the text.

In “A Boarding House” Mrs. Mooney is the mother and woman of her house however she does not clean the house unlike Eveline and her mother before her, she runs and dominates the house, she has someone to clean for her as opposed to the sisters, Eveline, Mrs. Chandler and Maria:

Mrs. Mooney sat in the straw arm-chair and watched the servant Mary remove the breakfast things... she began to reconstruct the interview which she had had the night before with Polly. Things were as she had suspected: she had been frank in her questions and Polly had been frank in her answers. (Dubliners, 1914, 69)

Akin to the two ungallant heroes of the previous story Mrs. Mooney, who can be seen as a mirror of sorts for Lenehan, and Polly, a mirror for Corley, aiming to trick Bob Doran into marriage. In many ways each couple mirrors, through opposition, the other couple rather than the individuals. Mrs. Mooney pervades over all the happenings of the house and is right in her assessment of the affair of Mr. Doran and Polly but holds her counsel until the time is right:

Things went on so for a long time, and Mrs. Mooney began to think of sending Polly back to typewriting, when she noticed that something was going on between Polly and one of the young men. She watched the pair and kept her own counsel. (Dubliners, 1914, 68)

Unlike Eveline’s father she is in complete control of the situation engineering and manipulating the coupling of Polly with a man. She is the exceptionally dominant person of the book, this is including both genders, as she does not just possess control over her own life and self but of others to a greater degree than others can achieve in the other stories. She is hatching a plan to rid herself of the financial burden of Polly and to gain Polly a husband even before Polly latches onto Bob Doran:

As Polly was very lively, the intention was to give her the run of the young men. Besides, young men like to feel that there is a young woman not very far away. Polly, of course, flirted with the young men, but Mrs. Mooney, who was a shrewd judge, knew that the young men were only passing the time away: none of them meant business. (Dubliners, 1914, 68)

Mrs. Mooney is like a fisherman with bait (Polly) waiting for someone to bite on the hook. She is a self in control of herself and outside of the impact of others to a large extent only keeping to convention when it is good for her public self and thus the profit of herself. She does not bend to convention and the other. Polly is introduced thusly:

Polly was a slim girl of nineteen; she had light soft hair and a small full mouth. Her eyes, which were grey with a shade of green through them, had a habit of glancing upwards when she spoke with anyone, which made her look like a little perverse Madonna. (Dubliners, 1914, 67)

The description of Polly as possessing a pair of grey eyes with a shade of green and the use of the word “perverse” links her with the past concept of the pervert of “An Encounter” whom also had green eyes and was perverse.

This serves Joyce to point to her fermenting instincts and her unusual nature of being a young girl but with the power to seduce and enthral those the object of her mission just as the pervert of “An Encounter” would attempt to entrance or James Flynn would impress with his knowledge of matters religious. However it is Polly who is successful. She is active like these men and not passive like Eveline. However she is far more cunning and unrepressed than these men she is linked to possessing the freedom and wherewithal to seduce, hide her real self skilfully and manipulate the selves of others into what actions she desires for her benefit.

Polly, like the young narrator of “The Sisters” also knows she is being watched however her sense of self unlike the young narrator is not impacted upon negatively in terms of will by any elder of society:

Polly knew that she was being watched, but still her mother’s persistent silence could not be misunderstood. There had been no open complicity between mother and daughter, no open understanding…when she judged it to be the right moment, Mrs. Mooney intervened. She dealt with moral problems as a cleaver deals with meat: and in this case she had made up her mind.” (Dubliners, 1914, 68)

Polly too can read into the actions of her mother and knows how to relate her self to such a perceptive person whilst not revealing too much of her own self and motivations. She recognizes the authority of her mother but also identifies that she has the power to manipulate it to a degree. These women are of decisive and authoritative action unlike Lenehan of the previous story who cannot make significant decisions regarding his life and his desires but clings to the illusion of a youth, its immature and petty actions, that is lost. The tidying up of the dining area reveals the extent to which Mrs. Mooney is prepared and controlling for every eventuality down to butter under lock and key. Before her questioning of Polly she did not want to reveal that she knew what was happening or was hoping for what had happened. As this is not the public self she wants to portray even to herself at times. The sentence “Things were as she had suspected: she had been frank in her questions and Polly had been frank in her answers.” (Dubliners, 1914, 69) is not accurate as it is soon revealed to us what exactly was not exposed. Both act as if undiscerning, disclosing a self they wish to expose without revealing what they wish to not divulge. Mrs. Mooney assumes she is undetected whereas Polly is alive to the perceptions of Mrs. Mooney. Lenehan agonises over such matters whereas Corley ignores the selves of other through repressing their input in order to protect his feeble self-identity. Once again we see the reintroduction of Frank from “Eveline” to connote dishonesty “frank in her questions and Polly had been frank in her answers.” as the reader knows they had not been frank but had been withholding from each other their true selves and knowledge of the situation. Mrs. Mooney is the complete opposite of Lenehan as she is very much in control of her own self portrayal and it is very manipulative on her part, as she is not easily influenced, as to how she should behave or express herself. Unlike Corley Mrs. Mooney is skilfully manipulative in that she manages to be on the right side of societal opinion as they will not be able to see through her actions to her well-hidden motivations to offload her daughter on Mr. Doran just like her upgraded version, her daughter Polly who is clued into her mother:

She had been made awkward by her not wishing to receive the news in too cavalier a fashion or to seem to have connived, and Polly had been made awkward not merely because allusions of that kind always made her awkward, but also because she did not wish it to be thought that in her wise innocence she had divined the intention behind her mother's tolerance. (Dubliners, 1914, 69)

Both are aware of each other’s plans and desires however Mrs. Mooney is not totally wise to Polly’s understanding and perception of her and how she has manipulated her to an extent. There is an unspoken conspiracy to trap a young relatively moneyed man into marriage with Polly, not a mere “small gold coin” which our ungallant Lenehan and Corley seek:

She felt sure she would win. He was a serious young man, not rakish or loud-voiced like the others... She did not think he would face publicity. All the lodgers in the house knew something of the affair; details had been invented by some... publicity would mean for him, perhaps, the loss of his job. Whereas if he agreed all might be well. She knew he had a good screw for one thing... (Dubliners, 1914, 70)

What other course of action was available to the women of The Boarding House? They must learn to manipulate societal convention as it is heavily patriarchal and thus against them it would seem is their motivation. As we have seen from the other stories women must fight for their right to escape and manipulate a way out of house bound life that we have seen thrown upon the sisters and Eveline. Mrs. Mooney was trapped herself however managed to release herself from the situation, an alcoholic husband, and she has now managed to craft her daughter’s situation so as to have societal convention upon her side regarding the morality of the circumstances as she could be justly overwrought in such a storyline with indignation: “She was sure she would win. To begin with, she had all the weight of social opinion on her side: she was an outraged mother.” (Dubliners, 1914, 69/70)

She begins to construct her own illusion, which her public self will seek to sell to Bob Doran and the rest of society. She will dominate the other of Bob Doran forcing him into marriage with her daughter through pushing the weight of societal convention down upon his shoulders:

“...since he was a man who had seen something of the world. He had simply taken advantage of Polly's youth and inexperience: that was evident. The question was: What reparation would he make?...For her only one reparation could make up for the loss of her daughter's honour: marriage.” (Dubliners, 1914, 70)

It is the self of both these women that dictates the reality of their world; they are not to be crushed under the weight of males in a household or in society. Bob Doran shall give in under the psychological weight of this imposing woman, this time societal convention is on the side of the woman manipulated by woman in contrast to the other stories.

Memory much like the young narrator of “The Sisters”, Eveline and Lenehan dominates Mr. Doran’s line of thinking regarding his reason and morality. He is unable to repress unlike Corley, Mrs. Mooney and Polly the perceptions and feelings of others:

They used to kiss. He remembered well her eyes, the touch of her hand and his delirium…
But delirium passes. He echoed her phrase, applying it to himself: ‘What am I to do?’ The instinct of the celibate warned him to hold back. But the sin was there; even his sense of honour told him that reparation must be made for such a sin. (Dubliners, 1914, 73)

He is unable to separate himself from feeling and his reason is dictated by his morality, the morality of the collective:

He longed to ascend through the roof and fly away to another country... yet a force pushed him downstairs step by step. The implacable faces of his employer and of the Madam stared upon his discomfiture …but Jack kept shouting at him that if any fellow tried that sort of a game on with his sister he’d bloody well put his teeth down his throat: so he would. (Dubliners, 1914, 74)

This reminds one of the efforts of the young narrator of “The Sisters” who tries to remove the presence of James Flynn from his mind with thoughts of Christmas but is unable to achieve this. It is once again the other and the perception of what the perceptions and actions of others will be which dictates to Mr. Doran how he too will act despite his own desires and wishes. Eveline-like fear backbones his acquiesce into marriage with Polly. Polly on the other hand is different; she is unEveline:

She waited on patiently, almost cheerfully, without alarm, her memories gradually giving place to hopes and visions of the future. Her hopes and visions were so intricate that she no longer saw the white pillows on which her gaze was fixed, or remembered that she was waiting for anything.
At last she heard her mother calling. She started to her feet and ran to the banisters.
‘Polly! Polly!’
‘Yes, mamma?’
‘Come down, dear. Mr. Doran wants to speak to you.’
Then she remembered what she had been waiting for. (Dubliners, 1914, 75)

Polly is not paralyzed by fear or her memories of her past. She can envision a future which is centred around her self happiness and unlike Eveline she is able to act it out till the end. Despite the apparent drama of the situation she is confident that she will attain the satisfaction of her desire without worrying of the outcome of the meeting between Mrs. Mooney and Bob Doran. She is so confident of the fulfilling of her ideal other’s vision that she allows the current drama to slip from her concentration. She has managed unlike Eveline and unlike so many other characters to create a self which is self-centred and capable of delivering the desires of her self. However one must venture to ask has she and Mrs. Mooney factored in the long term affects on Mr. Doran of being railroaded into a marriage and what effect this will have upon them? Will Bob Doran become an alcoholic like Mrs. Mooney’s husband and repeat the cycle? This is evident from the Bob Doran we meet in Ulysses. Polly and Mrs. Mooney have acted but have they foreseen the consequences of these actions which the previous stories have outlined for the reader to assume. However Polly despite the paralysis at work throughout Dubliners is an upgraded version of her mother’s strong and manipulative self.