Week 10

1.Araby

"Araby" is a short story by James Joyce published in his 1914 collection Dubliners.

Through first-person narration, the reader is immersed at the start of the story in the drab life that people live on North Richmond Street, which seems to be illuminated only by the verve and imagination of the children who, despite the growing darkness that comes during the winter months, insist on playing "until [their] bodies glowed." Even though the conditions of this neighbourhood leave much to be desired, the children’s play is infused with their almost magical way of perceiving the world, which the narrator dutifully conveys to the reader:

“ Our shouts echoed in the silent street. The career of our play brought us through the dark muddy lanes behind the houses where we ran the gauntlet of the rough tribes from the cottages, to the back doors of the dark dripping gardens where odours arose from the ashpits, to the dark odorous stables where a coachman smoothed and combed the horse or shook music from the buckled harness.[1] ”
But though these boys "career" around the neighbourhood in a very childlike way, they are also aware of and interested in the adult world, as represented by their spying on the narrator’s uncle as he comes home from work and, more importantly, on Mangan’s sister, whose dress “swung as she moved” and whose “soft rope of hair tossed from side to side.” These boys are on the brink of sexual awareness and, awed by the mystery of the opposite sex, are hungry for knowledge.

On one rainy evening, the boy secludes himself in a soundless, dark drawing-room and gives his feelings for her full release: "I pressed the palms of my hands together until they trembled, murmuring: O love! O love! many times." This scene is the culmination of the narrator’s increasingly romantic idealization of Mangan’s sister. By the time he actually speaks to her, he has built up such an unrealistic idea of her that he can barely put sentences together: “When she addressed the first words to me I was so confused that I did not know what to answer. She asked me if I was going to Araby. I forget whether I answered yes or no.” But the narrator recovers splendidly: when Mangan’s sister dolefully states that she will not be able to go to Araby, he gallantly offers to bring something back for her.

The narrator now cannot wait to go to the Araby bazaar and procure for his beloved some grand gift that will endear him to her. And though his aunt frets, hoping that it is not “some Freemason affair,” and though his uncle, perhaps intoxicated, perhaps stingy, arrives so late from work and equivocates so much that he almost keeps the narrator from being able to go, the intrepid narrator heads out of the house, tightly clenching a florin, in spite of the late hour, toward the bazaar.

But the Araby market turns out not to be the most fantastic place he had hoped it would be. It is late; most of the stalls are closed. The only sound is "the fall of the coins" as men count their money. Worst of all, however, is the vision of sexuality—of his future—that he receives when he stops at one of the few remaining open stalls. The young woman minding the stall is engaged in a conversation with two young men. Though he is potentially a customer, she only grudgingly and briefly waits on him before returning to her frivolous conversation. His idealized vision of Araby is destroyed, along with his idealized vision of Mangan’s sister—and of love. With shame and anger rising within him, he is alone in Araby.

2.Dubliners

Dubliners is a collection of fifteen short stories by James Joyce, first published in 1914. They form a naturalistic depiction of Irish middle class life in and around Dublin in the early years of the 20th century.

The stories were written when Irish nationalism was at its peak, and a search for a national identity and purpose was raging; at a crossroads of history and culture, Ireland was jolted by various converging ideas and influences. They centre on Joyce's idea of an epiphany: a moment where a character experiences a life-changing self-understanding or illumination. Many of the characters in Dubliners later appear in minor roles in Joyce's novel Ulysses. The initial stories in the collection are narrated by child protagonists, and as the stories continue, they deal with the lives and concerns of progressively older people. This is in line with Joyce's tripartite division of the collection into childhood, adolescence and maturity.

3.Pyre

A pyre (Ancient Greek: πυρά; pyrá, from πῦρ, pyr, "fire"), also known as a funeral pyre, is a structure, usually made of wood, for burning a body as part of a funeral rite or execution. As a form of cremation, a body is placed upon or under the pyre, which is then set on fire.

Matirials
Pyres are crafted using wood. The composition of a pyre may be determined through use of charcoal analysis. Charcoal analysis helps to predict composition of the fuel and local forestry of the charcoal being studied.

Ireland
Specifically in the Bronze Age, pyre materials were gathered based on local abundance and ease of access to the wood although materials were also selected due to the specific properties, potential traditional purpose, or due to economical reasons. In Templenoe, pyres typically consisted of oak and fruit wood compositions.

Poland
From analyzing three necropolises from Kokotów, Pawłowice, Korytnica it seems Polish pyres consisted of primarily Scots pine, birch, and oak trees, as pines, birch, and oak were dense in local woodlands. All parts of the tree were used including the trunk, branches, twigs, and even pine cones. Pyres were used in WWII death camps such as Treblinka.

Pyre remains in Britain
Worked antler and bone objects, along with flint and flake tools, and copper-alloys are most commonly found in pyre cremation remains. The copper-alloys leave a blue-green stain and are typically fused to the ribs, arms, and other areas where jewelry is commonly worn.

Analysis of bone fragment size
A study was done on the bone fragments of cremations to show that not only will movement of the bone fragments cause breakage but also environmental factors play a part. After studying cremation remains in urns that had been tightly sealed and had no evidence of environmental disturbance it was found that on average bigger bone fragment sizes were observed meaning less bone breakage had occurred. It was concluded that if cremated bone is placed in an urn before burial the original bone fragment size will be preserved. This study was intended to explain that more cautionary measures should be taken during and after any cremation occurs and to educate those who are studying cremated bone that the size of the fragments will be smaller than there were right after cremation.

4.Ulysses

Ulysses is a modernist novel by Irish writer James Joyce. It was first serialised in parts in the American journal The Little Review from March 1918 to December 1920, and then published in its entirety in Paris by Sylvia Beach on 2 February 1922, Joyce's 40th birthday. It is considered to be one of the most important works of modernist literature, and has been called "a demonstration and summation of the entire movement". According to Declan Kiberd, "Before Joyce, no writer of fiction had so foregrounded the process of thinking."

Ulysses chronicles the peripatetic appointments and encounters of Leopold Bloom in Dublin in the course of an ordinary day, 16 June 1904. Ulysses is the Latinised name of Odysseus, the hero of Homer's epic poem Odyssey, and the novel establishes a series of parallels between the poem and the novel, with structural correspondences between the characters and experiences of Leopold Bloom and Odysseus, Molly Bloom and Penelope, and Stephen Dedalus and Telemachus, in addition to events and themes of the early twentieth century context of modernism, Dublin, and Ireland's relationship to Britain. The novel imitates registers of centuries of English literature and is highly allusive.

Ulysses is approximately 265,000 words in length and is divided into eighteen episodes. Since publication, the book has attracted controversy and scrutiny, ranging from early obscenity trials to protracted textual "Joyce Wars". Ulysses' stream-of-consciousness technique, careful structuring, and experimental prose — full of puns, parodies, and allusions — as well as its rich characterisation and broad humour, have led it to be regarded as one of the greatest literary works ever written. Joyce fans worldwide now celebrate 16 June as Bloomsday.

5.Orpheus

Orpheus (/ˈɔːrfiəs, ˈɔːrfjuːs/; Greek: Ὀρφεύς) was a legendary musician, poet, and prophet in ancient Greek religion and myth. The major stories about him are centered on his ability to charm all living things and even stones with his music, his attempt to retrieve his wife, Eurydice, from the underworld, and his death at the hands of those who could not hear his divine music. As an archetype of the inspired singer, Orpheus is one of the most significant figures in the reception of classical mythology in Western culture, portrayed or alluded to in countless forms of art and popular culture including poetry, film, opera, music, and painting.

For the Greeks, Orpheus was a founder and prophet of the so-called "Orphic" mysteries. He was credited with the composition of the Orphic Hymns, a collection of which only two have survived. Shrines containing purported relics of Orpheus were regarded as oracles. Some ancient Greek sources note Orpheus' Thracian origins.

6.Eucharist

The Eucharist /ˈjuːkərɪst/ (also called Holy Communion, the Lord's Supper, among other names) is a Christian rite that is considered a sacrament in most churches and an ordinance in others. According to the New Testament, the rite was instituted by Jesus Christ during his Last Supper; giving his disciples bread and wine during the Passover meal, Jesus commanded his followers to "do this in memory of me" while referring to the bread as "my body" and the wine as "my blood". Through the Eucharistic celebration Christians remember Christ's sacrifice of himself on the cross.

The elements of the Eucharist, bread (leavened or unleavened) and wine (or grape juice), are consecrated on an altar (or table) and consumed thereafter. Communicants (that is, those who consume the elements) may speak of "receiving the Eucharist", as well as "celebrating the Eucharist". Christians generally recognize a special presence of Christ in this rite, though they differ about exactly how, where, and when Christ is present. While all agree that there is no perceptible change in the elements, Catholics believe that they actually become the body and blood of Christ (transubstantiation). Lutherans believe the true body and blood of Christ are really present "in, with, and under" the forms of the bread and wine (sacramental union). Reformed Christians believe in a real but purely spiritual presence of Christ in the Eucharist. Others, such as the Plymouth Brethren, take the act to be only a symbolic reenactment of the Last Supper.

In spite of differences between Christians about various aspects of the Eucharist, there is, according to the Encyclopædia Britannica, "more of a consensus among Christians about the meaning of the Eucharist than would appear from the confessional debates over the sacramental presence, the effects of the Eucharist, and the proper auspices under which it may be celebrated."