A Portrait of The Deluded Artist Essay - 1644 Words

Few novels capture the peculiarity of the human mind as well as James Joyce’s, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. Frustrating and awe-inspiring at the same time, the fleeting ambiguity with which Joyce depicts Stephen’s character leave the reader often puzzled and asking the natural question, â€Å"What is this supposed to mean?† We can then remain in this state of perplexity or try to interpret the subtle clues, dispersed throughout the book, in hope of arriving closer to the hidden meaning of what the author’s intention was for his readers to comprehend. Perhaps the most unsatisfying obscurity of this novel is its ending—is Stephen successful in becoming the liberated artist he aspires to be? Is he truly released from the bounds of†¦show more content†¦Growing up in a Catholic family and attending Jesuit school, Stephen recognizes his sexual desires as wrong and feels guilty as a result. Due to this clash between sexual morality an d his desires, Stephen develops the belief, even if unconsciously, that according to God it is wrong to feel any desire at all. As a result, when he becomes radically religious, his feelings of guilt follow him everywhere he goes. In response, he persuades himself that by stripping his mind of any concept of beauty, pleasure, or desire whatsoever, he can purify himself. He goes to great lengths to mortify his senses by subjecting himself to noises which cause him â€Å"painful nervous irritation† and to odors â€Å"against which his sense of smell revolted† (Joyce 127). This type masochistic tendency of making himself uncomfortable, in belief that it is somehow pleasing to God, fails to acknowledge that his highly developed aesthetic appreciation is part of his identity. Instead of embracing this gift, perhaps given to him by God who after all would be the creator of anything beautiful, Stephen sets himself up for failure for one cannot deny himself to such extent for ever. When he then experiences a feeling of overwhelming beauty as he sees the girl on the beach, he inevitably feels bound by his religion to be free to enjoy it. Stephen’s transformation into an artist free from the restrains of religion, or anything for that matter, is, however, only superficial. Even though he shunsShow MoreRelatedArtemisia Gentileschi1979 Words   |  8 Pageswas fifteen years old and her rapist, Agistino Tassi, was about 32. At the beginning of the year Artemisia declared that the previous year, at his home in via della Croce, her perspective teacher had raped her. Agostino Tassi, after the rape, had deluded to marry her - causing the girl to behave more uxorio - but when she discovered the deception, she informed his father that made an appealed to the justice. 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