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"A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man" is a coming-of-age story. A story in which Stephen Dedalus moves from the insecurities of childhood to the confidence and determination of adulthood. Stephen always wanted the same basic thing the freedom to live as he pleased free from the rule of others. Stephen's name, Dedalus, is a reference to flight in Greek mythology. Like his martyred namesake, Stephen suffers because of his unique perception of the world. He works his way through the labyrinth of school, Dublin, and the church before he transcends this maze. Stephen reflects on life in Ireland saying "When the soul of a man is born in this country there are nets flung at it to hold it back from flight" (0). Throughout the novel, Joyce relates flight and the beings of flight to the experiences that move Stephen in the direction of attending his goal. Stephens ultimate desire to live for himself and to have the ability to realize his own dreams without the limitations of others is represented by the concept of flight.
One of the earliest examples of the connection of freedom with flight can be found at the end of the first chapter as Stephen's classmates are cheering him as a hero. In a literal and physical sense Stephen is essentially flying above his classmates as they made a cradle of their locked hands and hoisted him among them and carried him along (60). Stephens flight cannot be contained to this simple physical experience. Stephen, a socially challenged child who referred to himself as small and weak, is now being cheered as the champion of the College. His euphoria and sense of flight goes beyond the gratification of being accepted by his schoolmates. It represents the beginning of Stephens independence of thought and freedom from the rules of others. He has taken a stand against Father Dolan's unjust punishment at the hands of the Catholic Church. Stephen goes through life trying to escape those who control him, in particular, the Church. At this point in his life, he is still very much a child. Stephen is not yet ready to throw away his allegiance the church, and says that he must remain, very quite and obedient and he wished that he could do something kind for [Father Dolan] to show him that he was not proud (60-61). At this stage in his life, Stephen is still comfortable pledging allegiance to others around him, but he is at his happiest when he can act as he chooses.
Stephen again encounters the imagery of flight after his family has been forced to move from their home in Bray and Stephen begins his studies at Belvedere College in Dublin. There he meets Vincent Heron, a boy whom he describes as having, a birds face as well as a birds name and a shock of pale hair like a ruffled crest (80). Heron represents everything that Stephen secretly yearns for. While the rest of the student body is obediently inside the assembly hall waiting for the play to begin, Heron and his friend are outside enjoying a cigarette. Heron is independent and refuses to fall in line with the demands of the faculty at Belvedere College. He has not allowed anyone to get in the way of his thoughts and desires, and as a result he is portrayed by Joyce as having birdlike characteristics. Heron is free to fly away to the world he desires, a quality Stephen admires.
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Stephen's fear of being unable to fly leads him to momentarily return to the Catholic Church of his childhood. The sermon given to Stephen and his classmates during their Saint Xavier retreat at Belvedere College entails the reasons one may be sentenced to eternity in Hell and the suffering of its inhabitance. The preacher tells Stephen, who has recently taken to a life of debauchery and visiting prostitutes on a regular basis, that in Hell both the flesh and the soul suffer always. The image of Lucifer, the fallen angel, is the central image of the sermon. This is where Stephens desire to take flight is captured. Lucifer was an angel who had the ability to fly and was unbound by the rules of others. Through his sin, however, all of that was lost. Stephen fears that he too has been sentenced to lose his wings and will be forever Hell bound. It is this fear that causes Stephen to repent.
Flight is again the theme when Stephen realizes that for his entire life he has been stopping short of living a life that is truly free. He has lived a life so meticulous in its adherence to the practices of the Catholic Church that he is approached by the director of Belvedere and asked if he has ever considered a vocation in the priesthood. The priest tells Stephen that he is marked off from his companions by his piety (170). Although much of the imagery associated with the Catholic Church seems to imply flight flying towards heaven on the wings of angels, being born up on eagles wing by the Hand of God, the idea of Christs Ascension into the sky, these are nowhere to be found in Stephens mind. Instead Joyce tells the reader how Stephen is not destined to be a member of the priesthood because being a member of any order would prevent him from learning the wisdom of others among the snares of the world (175). Stephen believes that freedom in life must not be restricted.
Stephen begins to comprehend his need for freedom and desire for flight as he is making his decision to reject the priesthood. As Stephen walks around the streets of Dublin thoroughly convinced that he must turn away from the priesthood, he looks skyward and focuses on the slowdrifting clouds, dappled and seaborn. They were voyaging across the deserts of the sky (181). The vision that Stephen sees, a hawk-like man flying sunward above the sea (18), is a foretelling of his final decision to leave the land that he calls home in search of freedom and artistic identity. Joyce connects the sky with the concept of journeying and freedom. It is at this moment that Stephen begins to realize the desire that has been within him all along. He has been trying to find freedom within a system which is founded upon strict rules and regulations. The only answer to his problem is, like the clouds, to journey away from that which controls him.
Stephens change in thinking is best represented when he wades out into the water and a beautiful girl suddenly appears before him. Much as Stephen describes Heron earlier, the features of this girl are bird-like in nature. He refers to her as being
. . . like one whom magic had changed into the likeness of a strange and beautiful seabird. Her long slender bare legs were delicate as a cranes and pure save where an emerald trail of seaweed had fashioned itself as a sign upon the flesh. Her thighs, fuller and softhued as ivory, were bared almost to the hips where the white fringes of her drawers we like featherings of soft white down. Her slateblue skirts were kilted boldly about her waist and dovetailed behind her. Her bosom was as a birds soft and slight, slight and soft as the breast of some darkplumaged dove. (185-186).
This girl, like Heron, represents the freedom that Stephen can have if he makes the choice to fly over the nets that are holding him back. The girl differs from Heron because she is there for Stephen to accept as his own. When Stephen was following Heron, he was on the outside looking into a life of freedom. In this instance, the opportunity is set before him, and he is given the ability to choose for himself.
As Stephen is standing on the steps of the library, he comes to a realization while watching a flock of birds fly overhead. He feels the need to depart from the world he has established for himself and start again fresh just as birds are "ever leaving the homes they had built to wander" (45). He feels that "the augury he had sought in the wheeling darting birds and in the pale space of sky above him had come forth from his heart like a bird from a turret quietly and swiftly" (45). As he takes off into the unknown, he calls on his old father, Daedelus, the old artificer, to stand [him] now and ever in good stead (76). He has created for himself, just as his legendary namesake, wings to fly from his oppression into a world where he will be free to exercise his own desires.
Works Cited
Joyce, James. The Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man Text, Criticism, and Notes. Ed. Seamus
Deane. University of Minnesota Penguin Books, 164.
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