Essay on "The Boarding Hous", by James Joyce: A well-orchestrated "human comedy"

« the boarding house »: Study the most interesting aspects of joyce's narrative technique in this short story.

joyce(1882-1941)'s short story « the boarding house » was published in the Dubliners, a collection of stories set in the 'paralyzed' town of Dublin. the tale, in which Polly Mooney, the housekeeper's daughter, is involved with one of the boarders, a clerk in his mid-thirties named Mr. Doran, belongs to the stories that deal about adolescence.
the technical innovations -especially an extensive use of interior monologue- of joyce, noted for his experimental use of language in such works as Ulysses (1922), appear in « the boarding house ». the main interest of this short-story- the first story in Dubliners told from more than one perspective-lies in the apparently simple narrative technique.
In first instance, let us examine the polyphony of the narrative, that-is-to say the way in which the narrator ironically juxtaposes the viewpoints of/about the protagonists through the streams of consciousness and the reported speech. Then, we will try to show how the narrative technique serves a social satire that aims at underlining the social, financial, oral obstacles that paralyze the characters. Finally, we will study joyce's hybrid style, between naturalism and symbolism.