The stories are often tragic but always worthwhile, eliciting new interpretations with every re-read.
Joyce’s early collection of short stories brings early twentieth-century Dublin to life in its depictions of religion, romance, politics and petty crime. Though the stories tackle topics as diverse as the death of an aged priest, the frustrations of an alcoholic stuck in a mind-numbingly dull job, and a lonely older man who cannot bear to let go of the habits which rule his life, they are linked by a common sense of Ireland’s stifling paralysis and a restless desire for change. The stories are often tragic but always worthwhile, eliciting new interpretations with every re-read.