Comparing Alcoholism in Grace and Dubliners :: Comparison Compare Contrast Essays

Alcoholism in Grace and capital of Irelanders What does it mean to be in a state of drunkenness? A person who is exhilarate views his surroundings in a surreal fashion reality exists on the periphery. The drunk is by default interacting with the world on an inferior take as opposed to those who are sober. Alcoholism is also a continuing debilitating disease. It resonates outward from the individual to all those that he has contact inside his life. Joyce utilizes the character of the drunk in many of the stories in Dubliners, hardly a story skips a mention of drink. Among despair, isolation and dependence, alcoholism is a mind that runs through all the stories. Alcoholism is the focus in Grace where Joyce takes the symbolical alcoholic and shows us what Joyce believes is a part of the problem plaguing Dublin. When we first spiel Tom Kernan, we are non even told his name. Kernan is an anonymous being-a drunk that is not differentiated from any other drunk. In his alcohol-induced state he is save human. He lay curled up at the foot of the steps down which he had fallen...his clothes were smeared with the filth and ooze of the floor on which he had lain...a thin stream of blood trickled from the corner of his mouth (Joyce 150). Kernan has kinda literally fallen but also has fallen morally and spiritually. The pack that surrounds him fairs better only in comparison to him. Instead of seeking flying help, they all query as to what is his name. Who he is, is obvious, he is a drunk. even so there is an unwillingness to address this by the crowd. The reason why he is lying on the floor is present but not acknowledged. Is this scheme part of the essence that makes up the people of Dublin? Surely it is for repeatedly the reader is shown or referenced alcohol but direct computer address does not come. Thats deplorable (Joyce 153) we are told by Mr. Powers who has just been shown Kernans bitten tongue. What exactly though is ugly? Solely the bitten tongue or the defeated man or the inhabitants of Dublin? Perhaps it is all of them. Kernans physical maladies are demonstrative of his mental affliction. At first he has fallen, then his anonymousness persists because he cannot speak. He cannot speak at first because of the level of intoxication but also as we analyze because of his bitten tongue.