In A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, Stephen struggles with friendship. In his years at Clongowes, he doesn’t fit in very well with his peers. Even when he becomes the hero of his school for telling on Father Dolan, his peers “broke away in all directions” after they had carried him in celebration. He then states, “The cheers died away in the soft grey air. He was alone” (60). Stephen never mentions a best friend, and although he is not hated among his peers, he just doesn’t seem to fit in with them. The same thing happened in his teenage years. The only companionship he had were the prostitutes he visited. After he confesses his sins, he turns to God. Even God could not give him the love found in friendship.
However, Stephen needed this isolation to discover who he was as an individual. Stephen recognizes that there is a part of him that is on a different level than others around him. He needed to work out the problems and questions he had with himself before he could create relationships with others. That is why his time at the university is the first time he has true friends. Davin calls him “Stevie” and confides in him. He talks about the meaning of beauty with Lynch. Simple things such as this demonstrate that he has finally made friendships. This could only happen after he discovered who he was. He is not impacted by their opinions, but he can still have intelligent conversations with them and express his ideas.
The novel discusses Stephen’s growth as an individual and as an artist. All of the separate sections connect in the last part to demonstrate how all of his experiences have created the individual he has become. When Cranly asks Stephen about his point of view at the very end of Part 5, he says to him:
You have asked me what I would do and what I would not do. I will tell you what I will do and what I will not do. I will not serve that in which I no longer believe whether it call itself my home, my fatherland or my church: and I will try to express myself in the same mode of life or art as freely as I can and as wholly as I can, using for my defense the only arms I allow myself to use—silence, exile, and cunning. (268)
This quotation perfectly explains Stephen’s newfound self understanding. It is the description of a poet, and an artist, in a nutshell. He will “no longer believe” in something because others do. He wants to believe in it himself, from his own mind, using his own ideas. Just because his parents or his peers want him to love his home country or express his religion, he will not. Instead, he chooses to express himself by creative expression. The tone in this quotation is confident, which demonstrates a complete understanding of what he is stating. Stephen would never have said something so outspoken in the earlier parts of the novel. He has discovered his independent voice and is now using it in conversations with his friends (friends being something that are new in his life as well). Expression is the most important aspect of his life now, and he knows exactly how to go about it.
A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man was certainly not easy to get through, but I enjoyed the overall meaning of the work. It was interesting to see how changes in voice and language can so effectively trace the growth of an individual. The focus on the growth of a single character made it more interesting to follow and connect to. I don’t think I will be reading James Joyce again anytime soon, nor will I obtain an obsessive crush over him, but I’m glad to have had the experience of reading his work.
