Exile: A Road To Salvation

A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man,which is commonly considered as an autobiography for Joyce's growth,recounts a story of young man's choice of exile.Though it is generally agreed that Joyce is a master of myth and Bible which attracts many critical to focus on an archetypal study to this novel,exile is still a seldom touched from this perspective.Based on this perspective and detailed analysis of the novel,the thesis holds the point that Stephen's exile follows the oldest motif in literature as well as tradition in human history.And it could also be an archetype that is clearly reflected in Joyce's writings.Exile,then,is not only Stephen way of salvation,but also the artist's redemption from a gloomy existence in early twentieth century world that is full of famine,war,poverty,political chaos and injustice.This thesis consists of five parts:Chapter one gives a brief introduction to James Joyce's literary achievements,and A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man with its critical reception and notes that the study of exile in an archetypal interpretation is a seldom touched subject in Joycean study.Chapter two introduces the archetype of exile,which includes a brief summary of critical theory on archetype;then the prototypes of exile in Biblical tradition as well as that among western literature practitioners.Chapter three deals with the archetype of exile in the novel.Like Joyce's exile,it associates with the writer's life experiences.Like Jesus Christ's earthly mission,Stephen's exile is interpreted as both sacrifice and salvation.He,at the cost of family,friends,religious belief and Irish conventions,was reborn from a new serve to art,which awakens people from long years of spiritual death.Like Deadalus's flying away,to which Stephen parallels himself,exile is a liberation from spiritual imprisonment as well as a pursuit of art.And latter it studies Stephen's exilic path.Like Joyce and other exiles,Stephen experiences the same path of exile which oppression goes first,and then arouses the exile strong imperative of rebellion,which tortures him a lot,after a failure from confrontation,the artist could only choose to go to departure for a spiritual freedom.Oppression makes Stephen realize the unsuitability that the life he used to live,and it brings loneliness intensifying his desire of departure; rebellion shows Stephen's responses to those betrayal while it also clears him that the contradiction of freedom to his artistic pursuit is irreversible;finally he alienated himself from the culture and community that he once consented,they are inescapable emotions that the exile must undergo,to some extent,in rest of his life,thus departure becomes the only solution to balance his sentimentalitiesFollowing the archetypal reading above,Chapter Four tries to interpret Stephen's salvation that achieved in exile into three ways the abandonment of religion,pursuit of art and most important, spiritual redemption.Because exile means to abandon his religion which he once believed and is the fundamental of his existence,now only brings him hopelessness and frustration.To give up his catholic identity is undoubtedly excluded Stephen from his community but opens his pilgrimage of salvation. However,the pursuit of art saves the young man of losing his identity by allowing him freedom and inspiration to reconstruct his faith.Thus,to learn the wisdom from beauty,and to touch immortality from artistic creation finally lead Stephen's spiritual sublimation above the earthly misery around the world.Chapter five draws a conclusion that Stephen's deportation on the one hand models from tradition of exile,on the other hand,it indicates itself as an archetype in Joyce's craftsmanship.Therefore,it opens a way for both Stephen and Joyce's redemption from the snares of the world.