The Dead (short story)

Characters

Gabriel Conroy, Gretta Conroy, Kate and Julia Morkan, and Bartell d'Arcy are all alluded to in James Joyce's later work, Ulysses, though no character from "The Dead" makes a direct appearance in the novel.

Plot summary

The story centres on Gabriel Conroy, a teacher and part-time book reviewer, and explores the relationships he has with his family and friends. Gabriel arrives late to the party with his wife Gretta, where he is eagerly received. After a somewhat awkward encounter with Lily, the caretaker's daughter, Gabriel goes upstairs to where the party attendants are dancing. Gabriel worries about the speech he is to give, especially that it contains too many academic references for his audience, and Freddy Malins arrives drunk, as the hosts had feared.

As the party moves on, he is confronted by Miss Ivors, an Irish nationalist, about his publishing a weekly literary column in a newspaper with unionist sympathies, and she teases him as a "West Briton," that is, a supporter of English political control of Ireland. Gabriel thinks this charge is highly unfair, but fails to offer a satisfactory rejoinder, and the encounter ends awkwardly, which bothers him the rest of the night. He becomes more disaffected when he tells his wife of the encounter and she expresses an interest in returning to visit her childhood home of Galway. The music and party continues, but Gabriel retreats into himself, thinking of the snow outside and his impending speech.

Dinner begins, with Gabriel seated at the head of the table. The guests discuss music and the practices of certain monks. Once the dining has died down, Gabriel thinks once more about the snow and begins his speech, praising traditional Irish hospitality, observing that "we are living in a sceptical...thought-tormented age," and referring to Aunt Kate, Aunt Julia and Mary Jane as the Three Graces. The speech ends with a toast, and the guests sing "For they are jolly gay fellows."

The party is winding down, and as the guests filter out. Preparing to leave, he finds his wife standing, apparently lost in thought, at the top of the stairs. From another room, Bartell D'Arcy singing "The Lass of Aughrim" can be heard. The Conroys leave and Gabriel is excited, for it has been a long time since he and Gretta have had a night in a hotel to themselves. When they arrive at the hotel, Gabriel's aspirations of passionate lovemaking are conclusively dashed by Gretta's lack of interest. He presses her about what is bothering her, and she admits that she is "thinking about that song, The Lass of Aughrim." She admits that it reminds her of someone, a young man named Michael Furey, who had courted her in her youth in Galway. He used to sing The Lass of Aughrim for her. Furey died at seventeen, early in their relationship, and she had been very much in love with him. She believes that it was his insistence on coming to meet her in the winter and the rain, while already sick, that killed him. After telling these things to Gabriel, Gretta falls asleep. At first, Gabriel is shocked and dismayed that there was something of such significance in his wife's life that he never knew about. He ponders the role of the countless dead in living people's lives, and observes that everyone he knows, himself included, will one day only be a memory. He finds in this fact a profound affirmation of life. Gabriel stands at the window, watching the snow fall, and the narrative expands past him, edging into the surreal and encompassing the entirety of Ireland. As the story ends, we are told that "His soul swooned slowly as he heard the snow falling faintly through the universe and faintly falling, like the descent of their last end, upon all the living and the dead."

Reception

Dan Barry of The New York Times called "The Dead" "just about the finest short story in the English language" on the centennial of Dubliners. T. S. Eliot called it one of greatest short stories ever written. Joyce biographer and critic Richard Ellmann wrote "In its lyrical, melancholy acceptance of all that life and death offer, 'The Dead' is a linchpin in Joyce's work." Cornell University Joyce scholar Daniel R. Schwarz described it as "that magnificent short novel of tenderness and passion but also of disappointed love and frustrated personal and career expectations."

Adaptations

"The Dead" was adapted as a one-act play of the same name by Hugh Leonard in 1967.

In 1987, it was adapted into the 1987 film The Dead directed by John Huston, starring Anjelica Huston as Gretta Conroy and Donal McCann as Gabriel Conroy.

In 1999, it was adapted into Broadway musical by Richard Nelson and Shaun Davey, which won a Tony Award for Best Book of a Musical. The original production starred Christopher Walken as Gabriel Conroy.

Joyce Carol Oates's 1973 story "The Dead" makes many allusions to Joyce's story.