Candi's Reviews > The Dead

Can a story leave your heart aching like this after just a few short pages?! I’ve just learned that it can indeed. The beautiful, expressive prose delighted me. The nostalgic quality charmed me. The melancholic air indulged my current state of emotion while reading. I don’t know what I was expecting, but James Joyce exceeded whatever I could have possibly been looking for in this little novella.

"He was in a dark part of the hall gazing up the staircase. A woman was standing near the top of the first flight, in the shadow also. He could not see her face but he could see the terra-cotta and salmon-pink panels of her skirt which the shadow made appear black and white… He asked himself what is a woman standing on the stairs in the shadow, listening to distant music, a symbol of. If he were a painter he would paint her in that attitude. Her blue felt hat would show off the bronze of her hair against the darkness and the dark panels of her skirt would show off the light ones. Distant Music he would call the picture if he were a painter."

A holiday party hardly seems the place for a revelation, and I certainly didn’t anticipate what came next. A song, a painting, a word, anything can spark a memory. Are we living the life we should be – a life filled with beauty and passion? Or, are we wasting opportunities, and letting them slip through our fingers? I can’t say too much or I’ll spoil the perfection of the last few pages of this piece.

Why does my literary diet not include James Joyce? He’s Irish, for heaven’s sake! It’s no wonder his writing appealed to me so much.

"Like the tender fire of stars moments of their life together, that no one knew of or would ever know of, broke upon and illumined his memory. He longed to recall to her those moments, to make her forget the years of their dull existence together and remember only their moments of ecstasy."