Abstract
“Clay” is the tenth story of Dubliners by James Joyce and the heroine is an old spinster, Maria. She is a Catholic and works among inmates of a home, the Dublin by Lamplight laundry established for the reformation and rehabilitation of prostitutes under Protestant direction. The story takes place on Halloween. On the evening of that day, Maria plans to visit the Donnelly family to attend the party. Maria had worked for the Donnelly family and had brought up Joe and his brother Alphy as their nurse. It seems that nothing signals a change in the merry mood of the party, but the melancholy hidden in the mood sometimes appears in the story. Maria plays a game of divination of the future and tou ches “clay” which symbolizes death. Everyone except Maria with the bandage over her eyes realizes that death is coming to her soon. For “clay” which Maria touches with her finger, Joyce uses the expression, “ a soft wet substance. ” He uses neither the word, “soil” as in Genesis nor “Clay” which is the title of the story. “Cl ay” symbolizes death. However, “a soft wet substance” as Joyce expresses it seems to symbolize not only death but also rebirth. Maria seems to reflect Joyce's image of Ireland. Also, her image overlaps with the image of a woman which the Irish have held in the depth of their consciousness as the ideal of their motherland. By her touching “ a soft wet substance, ” it comes to symbolize the spiritual death and rebirth of the Irish. These symbolic meanings, especially Maria symbolizing Ireland, I try to show in this paper.
