1. “A PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST AS A YOUNG MAN”
CHAPTER 4
FEMINISM:
“His eyes showed every encounter with the eyes of women”
In this chapter, James Joyce portrayed the picture of Stephen by dictating ‘sense of light’ that
can be interpreted according to feminist perception. Women are considered as an object of sin.
They are only who seduce men and men just attach his sexual desire to her. Women are those
who become the reason of man’s committing sin, so he makes a rule for him that he will always
walk with downcast eyes. In the whole novel, women are presented as weak, fragile and
submissive.
When he read some pages from a book written by ‘Saint Alphonsus Liguori’, his sexual desires
arouse and he feels need for a sexual partner and these desires was dominant in his prayers.
This idea of surrender had a perilous attraction for his mind and he feels that his soul beset
once again by the voices of the flesh, which began to murmur to him again, even during his
prayers. (Chp: 4 episode: 2)
“Her long fair hair was girlish: and girlish and touched with the wonder of mortal beauty”
Stephen was alone and saw a girl on the stream whom was taken by him as “strange and
beautiful seabird”. Women are taken as object of pleasure and beauty as James Joyce mentions
“her long slender bare legs were delicate”.
Stephen also called is sexual desires as destruction of his personality that desires are evoked by
women as “he seemed to feel a flood slowly advancing his naked feet”.
RELIGIOUS VIEWS:
We find three main points about religious views in this chapter. 1) Strict religious observance to
throw out his physical desires. 2) He was offered vocation of priesthood, being called the
church, means retreats himself to religiosity or spirituality. 3) His universality life begins and
the realization of his true vocation in life (epiphany) happens. He fixed days for prayers:
“Sunday was dictated to the mystery of the Holy Trinity, Monday to Holy Ghost, Tuesday to
Guardian Angels, Wednesday to Saint Joseph, Thursday to Most blessed Sacrament of the Altar,
Friday to the Suffering Jesus and Saturday to the Blessed Virgin Marry”.

2. Next we see that Stephen offers prayers and thinks it will result the purgation of soul. He also
repents on his previous deeds and fears of them that they will become the cause of punishment
for him before God or in the life of Hereafter. So he seeks forgiveness to save himself and
returns to religion.
After seeking forgiveness he supposes that God has forgiven him and he will be rewarded by
God in lieu of his forgiveness and worship, he even imagines himself in heaven. As in the text
that: “to see the amount of his purchase start forth immediately in heaven, not as a number
but as a frail column of incense or as a slender flower”.
He adopts strong restrictions towards desires and limits himself in the circle of religion, for this
reason he also modifies all his five senses. He start expecting reward from God impatiently that
he even thinks why he cannot get the whole seven gifts of the Holy Ghost at a time or in a
single time instead of getting them one after another with a pace of time among them.
In the very paragraph of this chapter we can observe the dedication of Stephen to the church
even his every thought was dedicated: “every moment of thought or action for the intentions
of the sovereign pontiff and with an early mass”.
He prevents, to see the feminine figures as considered them seductive that invited towards evil,
to listen music, to eat savor foods and hence, keeps him in a torturous bond, uncomfortable
position by listening unpleasant sounds, by sleeping in only one position, keeping him away
from fire etc. “sat in the most uncomfortable positions, suffered patiently every itch and pain,
kept away from the fire”. But in spite of all this Stephen feels unhappy and dissatisfied, as in the
text that: “it was his constant failure to do his own satisfaction”.
LANGUAGE
Joyce's style, which is richly detailed and concretely sensual in earlier sections of the novel, now
becomes extremely dry, abstract, and academic. This style corresponds with Stephen's
psychological state: as Stephen becomes more ascetic and self-depriving, Joyce's language loses
its colorful adjectives and complex syntax. The very difficulty of reading such dry language
suggests the difficulty of the life that Stephen is leading. Stephen's question at the end of
Chapter 4, Section 1 "I have amended my life, have I not?" emphasizes the fact that Joyce
himself has amended his prose. Importantly, though Stephen explicitly acknowledges that his
life has changed, he does not say that it has necessarily improved. His heroic efforts to deprive
himself are impressive, but do not necessarily make him a better person.

3. Spiritual views
Stephen begins fervently to apply spiritual discipline to his own actions, in contrast to his
passive status as a member of the audience listening to Father Arnall's sermon and attempting
to understand it academically. Long passages during the sermon make no mention of Stephen
at all, as the focus is on hell itself. Here, however, we focus on Stephen's reaction, which is no
longer passive. His withdrawal into himself is not only described in psychological terms, but in
physical ones as well, as when he goes to his room "to be alone with his soul." In applying the
knowledge from the sermon, Stephen becomes the master of his spiritual fate. Even his dream
of hell indicates a more active relationship with the torments he undergoes, as the goat like
devils come from his own mind as his own creations. Since they are products of Stephen's own
mind, he can disown them if he wishes. Therefore, as scary as the goat nightmare is, it is
something of a release and a relief for Stephen, who runs to the window to be soothed by the
fresh air. His decision to confess his sins is the next step in his gradual process of taking control
of his spiritual state.
Stephen's rigorous program of spiritual self-discipline is impressive, and demonstrates his
extraordinary earnestness. The unbelievable asceticism that he willingly adopts demonstrates
his strength of will and suggests his heroism. Like some of the early ascetics and hermits of the
Christian Church, who lived in the desert and ate locusts, Stephen displays an astonishing ability
to overcome his bodily longings and to affirm the superiority of the soul. In doing so, he proves
his similarity to martyrs and saints.
Steam of conciseness
At first, Stephen is intrigue by the thought of the priesthood, and pictures himself in the
admired, respected role of the silent and serious priest carrying out his duties. As he
imagines the bland and ordered life awaiting him in the church, however, he begins to feel a
deep unrest burning inside him. He walks back home from school and passes a shrine to the
Virgin Mary, but feels surprisingly cold toward it.
When Stephen sees his disorderly house, he knows that his fate is to learn wisdom not in the
refuge of the church, but "among the snares of the world." Arriving home, he asks his brothers
and sisters where their parents are. He learns that his parents are looking for yet another house
because the family is about to be thrown out of its current one. Stephen reflects on how weary
his siblings seem even before they have started on life's journey.
"To merge his life in the common tide of other lives was harder for him than any fasting or
prayer, and it was his constant failure to do this to his own satisfaction which caused in his
soul at last a sensation of spiritual dryness together with a growth of doubts and scruples."
Images
The next paragraph is an interesting series of multi-sensory images; Stephen ponders the "colors" of
words and their "rhythmic rise and fall." Maybe he loves language because he doesn’t have great
eyesight and has to express the world through words rather than images?

4. Stephen thinks that he is a good boy and God gifted him. God has been obliged and merciful to him. he
has a figure of mythical figure as a saint type. That why the devil want to disguise him in the sexual
feelings that comes in the line
“When he had eluded the flood temptation many times in this way he grew troubled”
“A vague fear that his soul had really fallen”