john updike aandp and james joyc
JOHN UPDIKE'S A & P AND JAMES JOYCE'S ARABY John Updike's A & P and James Joyce's Araby share many of the same literary traits. The primary focus of the two stories revolves around a young man who is compelled to decipher the different between cruel reality and the fantasies of romance that play in his head. That the man does, indeed, discover the difference is what sets him off into emotional collapse. One of the main similarities between the two stories is the fact that the main character, who is also the protagonist, has built up incredible,yet unrealistic, expectations of women, having focused upon one in particular towards which he places all his unrequited affection. The expectation these men hold when finally "face to face with their object of worship" (Wells, 1993, p. 127) is what sends the final and crushing blow of reality: The rejection they suffer is far too great for them to bear. Updike is famous for taking other author's works and twisting them so that they reflect a more contemporary flavor. While the story remains the same, the climate is singular only to Updike. This is the reason why there are similarities as well as deviations from Joyce's original piece. Plot, theme and detail are three of the most resembl
What does not escape either story, however, is the manner in which the young men are transformed into "distracted, agitated, disoriented" (Wells, 1993, p. 127) versions of their former selves once they have become focused upon their respective objects of affection. Both have lost sight of what is important within their lives, "with the serious work of life" (Joyce 32), to see what havoc their passion is wreaking. It is not important that everyone around them notices the way they have withdrawn from reality; rather, they have both come under a spell of infatuation that pays no mind to anything but their fixations (Wells, 1993). Despite their best efforts, neither young man ultimately wins the heart -- or the attention -- of his respective love interest, which Updike's character asserts to be "the sad part of the story" (192). Their gallant rescue attempts aside, the two men are faced with the grim and shattering reality that the girls have no desire for their company. This particular attention to plot is critical within the two stories, because it demonstrates how despair can be both disheartening and uplifting at the same time. Updike's character has found himself holding a dollar bill that he obtained from his lady love, to which he inwardly acknowledges "it just having come from between the two smoothest scoops of vanilla I had ever known" (193-94). The gifts each young man offered his love interest are not well received; in fact, it is at this very moment in each story that the reader feels the depths of each character's despair. While different in origination, the intent was the same, since both young men come from such diverse backgrounds; where Joyce's Irish boy offers a material gesture, Updike's American character offers himself as a shield against any further antagonizing his lady has endured. What is even more telling of Updike's imitation of Joyce's Araby is the fact that the A & P title is hauntingly close in pronunciation to the original story's title. The theme of A & P and Araby are so close to each other
Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 1372
Approximate Pages = 5 (250 words per page double spaced)
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