James Joyce's "The Dead"

Discussion Question 1: Consider all the references to death, the dead, and dying throughout the text, what is their significance?  How does they influence/inform Joyce's title selection?

Jame's Joyce's constant reference to death throughout the text, starting with its title "The dead" implies that mortality is a key part of the story. "The dead" is set during the winter time, around Christmas.  Despite the many festivities that are going on, at which people should be enjoying themselves at this wonderful party and dance, the mood is bleak and gloomy.

The darkness that seems to fill the house, the corridors and the staircases, the shadows that are cast over the characters, as well as the cold winter night and the silent blanket of snow that is falling outside, give the reader the uncomfortable sensation that these characters are living life without really living. Their almost ghostly characteristics enhance the idea that they are really dead. For example, Aunt Julia's "hair, drawn low over the tops of her ears, was grey; and grey also, with darker shadows, was her large flaccid face." (p.1948) Her colorlous face reminds the reader the one of a corpse. Gretta, Gabriel's wife, also takes ghostly characteristics as she seems distant from the other characters, like she is in a different world: "Gabriel watched his wife who did not join the conversation (...) She was in the same attitude and seemed unaware of the talk about her." (p.1967) Also, when in the room together, he does not hear her come to him from the window, as if she moves around like a spirit.

The lingering memory of those who died also enhances the feeling that these characters are almost dead themselves. Gabirel's speech constantly refers to them: "we still cherish in our hearts the memory of those dead and gone great ones whose fame the world will not willingly let die." (p.1962) and again "but yet 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."

The memory of dead Michael Furey, Gretta's long lost lover who died for her, at the age of 17, is also an important reference to death in the text. His last name reminds the reader of the fire of passion that he felt for this woman, a passion so strong that his memory is still very much alive after all those years. A little part of Gretta died with Michael, and the only time she seems to fire up with a little bit of life is when Michael's memory surfaces. After hearing Bartell D'Arcy sing "The Lass of Aughrim," Gretta remembers her long lost love. She turns to Gabriel and he sees that "there was a sudden color on her cheeks and that her eyes were shining." (p.1967) Michael Fuery's death serves as an epiphamy for Gabriel as he sees himself as a shadow, in a world where life and death meet: "A shameful conscieusness of his own person assailed him. He saw himself as a ludicrous figure, acting as a pennyboy for his aunts, a nervous, well-meaning sentimentalist, orating to vulgarians and idealising his own clownish lusts, the pitiable fatuous fellow he had caught a glimpse of in the mirror." (p.1972) While during his dinner speech, Gabriel focuses on the separation between the past dead and those that are still alive, he realizes how false this separation is after seeing how alive Michael Furey's is through his mere memory. Despite his death so long ago, he is the most alive character of the story. Joyce voluntarily creates a confusion the living and the dead by creating a world where the dead are alive and the living are dead.

The snow is a final touch to the confusion between the dead and the living throughout the text, and this idea can be clearly perceived in the last paragraph: "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 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. (...) His soul swooned slowly 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." (p.1974) The last sentence captures Joyce's world where life and death meet and intertwine. 

Discussion Question 2: Consider the names of the characters, specifically Gabriel and Michael--what is their origin/meaning generally and then consider their use in the text.

In Christianism, Gabriel and Michael are the names of two of God's angels. Michael is an Archeangel, which means he is of higher rank, and Gabriel is God's special messanger. While Gabriel announces the birth of Jesus, he is also considered the angel of death. Gabriel's subservience to Michael in the bible is also true in "The dead". Gabriel feels inferior to dead Michael. He will never receive his wife's love like Michael did, and he will never cause her emotions to surge, like they did with the memory of Michael.