Irving Howe, a literary and social critic, once noted that “the knowledge that makes us cherish innocence makes innocence inaccessible” (Lifehack Quotes). Often depicted during the transition from childhood to adulthood, this loss of innocence is both painful and eminent. A functioning society requires that individuals move at some point from a world of illusion to a world of reality; a transition that is a catalyst is a loss of innocence. James Joyce, Irish novelist and poet, highlights this loss of innocence in his short story “Araby”. In his work, Joyce contrasts the innocent, childlike nature of his narrator with the strident realities of the world, forcing the narrator to reconcile his perception of reality. By questioning and reversing the practicality of romance and faith, Joyce accelerates his narrator's loss of innocence. Furthermore, Joyce suggests that optimistic ideals are limited to the world of illusion, thwarted in the real world by the selfish, materialistic, and corrupt nature of society. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get an original essay By incorporating autobiography into “Araby,” Joyce conveys the universal nature of the loss of innocence. For example, the narrator and Joyce grew up on North Richmond Street and attended the Christian Brother's School. Additionally, Joyce critic Harry Stone has suggested that historical records confirm that the Araby Bazaar arrived in Dublin at the same time that Joyce's family lived on North Richmond Street (346). However, Joyce also made strategic and focused autobiographical changes. Literary critic JS Atherton has suggested that Joyce's father is actually described as the uncle in "Araby" in order to make the narrator appear "alone in order to stand out from his surroundings" (41). Although there is "reason to consider that 'Araby' is based on an actual event that occurred in Joyce's childhood," the incorporation of autobiographical elements gives merit to Joyce's work (Atherton 40). By interweaving autobiographical strands into his literary thread, Joyce ultimately produces a supreme work filled with true relevance and universal applicability rather than condescension and condescension. Joyce uses personification and connotation-laden diction in the first paragraph to contrast the narrator's initially innocent nature with the lifeless world around him. In the first line of the text, Joyce describes North Richmond Street as being “blind” and having a “blind end” (15). Although the phrase "dead end" denotes a dead end, the connotation of the phrase illustrates the nature of the narrator: blind, unaware, and ignorant of the problems that permeate the real world. The boy has an "idyllic ignorance of the world at large", as journalist Chris Power describes it, which reinforces his initial state of innocence. Furthermore, Joyce notes that at the end of the school day, “the school release(s) the boys,” insinuating that children are imprisoned by their education (15). This imprisonment is to some extent responsible for keeping the boys captive in a bubble of innocence; this prohibits them from exploring other realms of the world, possibly dangerous or enlightening. Joyce then contrasts the narrator's innocent nature with the seemingly lifeless state of the rest of the world which has lost its innocence. The houses, for example, are described as “uninhabited,” “isolated,” “brown,” and “undisturbed,” adjectives that evoke an atmosphere of hopelessness and hopelessness (Joyce 15). By contrasting the narrator's innocent nature with the corrupt nature of his world, Joyce suggeststhat the innocent narrator is oppressed by the outside world. Ultimately, Joyce reveals that the gulf between the narrator and the world is too great to bear; Ultimately, the gap, Joyce foreshadows, will be bridged through the narrator's conformity, achieved through his loss of innocence. By analyzing the practicality and possibility of romance in the real world, Joyce catalyzes the narrator's loss of innocence. Joyce examines the role of romance through his depiction of the narrator's relationship with Mangan's sister. At first, the narrator seems to have nothing more than an innocent crush on an older girl. As the narrator finds himself with “her brown figure always in my eyes,” he does not have the courage to speak to her because he “always quickened his pace” to pass her when they met (Joyce 16). This depiction, of a harmless and childish crush, changes dramatically as an undercurrent of sexual symbolism inhabits the latter part of the text. The first instance of this transition occurred in the evening when the narrator was home alone and entered the back room. At that moment, the narrator described how all his "senses seemed to want to cloud themselves" and that he felt like he was "on the verge of escape" as he "joined the palms of his hands” and whispered: “O love. ! O Love! » (Joyce 16). As literary critic Edward Brandabur notes, this scene is clearly one of “autoerotic displacement” and the realization of the narrator's sexual desire, more dominant than ever (53). The passage of the narrator's physical nature from boyhood to manhood permeates the rest of the text through "symbolic suggestion" such as the symbolically erotic objects for sale in the final scene at the bazaar (Brandabur 53). As a result of this transition, the reader is no longer able to view the boy's intentions in his romantic quest as purely innocent. Instead, his actions should be seen at least in part as sexual conquest, thus emphasizing his loss of physical innocence. As the narrator loses his physical innocence, he also experiences a loss of spiritual and emotional innocence. Through religious allusions and nuances, Joyce suggests that even religion is corrupt and will fail as a cornerstone of his narrator's strength. Joyce immediately established a connection between religion and his narrator by stating that the latter attended the "Christian Brother's School" and resided in a house formerly occupied by a priest (15). However, these images are juxtaposed by their description, for example with the specification that the priest was “dead in the back parlor” (Joyce 15). By aligning the spiritual with a negative description, Joyce describes his utter disgust at the "decay of the Church", also suggesting the eminent loss of Church, faith, and spirituality within the boy (Atherton 44 ). This loss of spiritual innocence is foreshadowed early on, with Joyce's inclusion of the narrator's own Garden of Eden residing in his backyard: a "wild garden" containing a "central apple tree" (15). On the day of the bazaar, which fell on "Our Lord's night," the narrator ignored his religious duties and instead engaged in the secular world (Joyce 18). This decision is what ultimately led to the “falling coins,” the fall of man, and the narrator’s fall from spiritual innocence (Joyce 19). By incorporating the religious construct of the Garden of Eden and original sin, Joyce was able to both symbolically depict his narrator's loss of spiritual innocence while also depicting his revulsion for the Church. Although the narrator initially appears unaware of his own journey of revelation, Joyce usesVivid images and details intentionally included to convey the narrator's original awareness of enlightenment. After receiving his duty of service to his lady—bringing her a gift from the Arabian bazaar—the narrator returns home “up the stairs” to watch his “companions play in the street below” (Joyce 17). By including this vivid description of the narrator's literal ascendancy over his young friends and his separation from them, the narrator is no longer portrayed as a child, with the same childlike innocence as his playmates in the film. Street. Additionally, Joyce has the narrator press his “forehead against the cold glass” as he “looked at the dark house where she lived” (18). This is one of the first moments of distinct revelation for the narrator who realizes that to realize his quest, he "must escape the loud noises and heat of life" and instead inhabit a state "where passion is frozen by the functioning of the intellect” ( Brandabour 54). In this precisely described moment, the narrator reveals his new understanding: to succeed in his romantic conquest, he will have to renounce his previous state of innocence and passion embodied by his friends below, and instead be present in the real world. The narrator, at this point, is aware that he is neither who he was nor who he will be. Instead, he is captivated in a realm of enlightenment where ignorance is dissolved and understanding gained. The narrator's epiphany in Araby finalizes his fall from innocence while describing the inhibiting characteristics of the real world. The boy enters the bazaar to hear “the falling of coins” in a dark room and “remembers with difficulty” why he had come (Joyce 19). The combination of these phrases highlights the futility and insignificance of boys who fall from innocence; he embarked on a romantic quest only to arrive at a symbolic, dark church and realize that neither romance nor faith gave him true meaning. He looks around the bazaar and describes the flirtatious and knowing conversation between a saleswoman and two Englishmen. At that moment, the narrator appears to the English as a second-rate character, even if his journey has left him much more enlightened and wise than the other men; a disparity that illustrates the unfair nature of the real world and its new “reality.” However, his final revelation occurs after the narrator speaks to the disdainful saleswoman when, “looking into the darkness, I saw myself as a creature driven and ridiculed by vanity; and my eyes burned with anguish and anger” (Joyce 19). At this point, the narrator is forced to look at both the literal darkness of the room and the “sad darkness of self-consciousness” (Brandabur 56). The narrator is finally able to “glimpse reality without embellishments” (Stone 362). He comes to understand that his new reality, grounded in the real world, is a place where "everyday religion...is based on an illusory and senseless materialism" and where romance is simply a mode of self -illusion (Stone 356). However, the narrator's mood regarding his revelation is twofold. This paradox of emotions is conveyed by Joyce's construction of the final sentence which is initially heavy, even heavy to express with the alliteration of the words "darkness", "pushed" and "ridiculed" (Joyce 19). The last part of the final sentence includes the alliteration of the words “anguish” and “anger,” which roll off the tongue and diffuse into a peaceful tone. This precise and distinctive sentence structure reflects the narrator's feeling: pitiful and depressed at the idea that "part of his lie, his innocent and illusory childhood, is now behind him" while also being relieved in the sense..