The Boarding House by James Joyce
"The Boarding House" by James Joyce is a short story that explores themes of social expectations and the dynamics of power within relationships. Set in a modest boarding house run by Mrs. Mooney, a determined and shrewd woman, the narrative centers on her attempts to secure a marriage for her daughter, Polly, with one of their lodgers, Bob Doran. Through a series of narrative flashbacks, the story reveals Mrs. Mooney’s manipulative tactics and the pressure Doran faces to conform to societal norms, including the expectations of marriage driven by economic and social factors.
As Doran grapples with his feelings for Polly—who he finds both alluring and vulgar—he becomes increasingly anxious about the implications of their affair and the looming confrontation with Mrs. Mooney. The story captures Doran's internal conflict as he navigates his reluctance to marry while feeling cornered by external pressures, including religious guilt and the threat of scandal. While the plot unfolds over a brief time period, the tension between personal desire and societal obligation is richly developed, culminating in a promise of marriage that reflects both compulsion and resignation. Joyce’s narrative provides a poignant reflection on the constraints of early 20th-century Dublin society, emphasizing the complexities of human relationships amid economic struggles and social conventions.
On this Page
The Boarding House by James Joyce
First published: 1914
Type of plot: Social realism
Time of work: 1904
Locale: Dublin
Principal Characters:
Bob Doran , an unmarried clerk, a lodger in Mrs. Mooney's boardinghousePolly Mooney , an attractive single girl, the daughter of the boardinghouse proprietressMrs. Mooney , the owner of a shabby Dublin boardinghouse and Polly's motherJack Mooney , Mrs. Mooney's son, a clerk and a carouser
The Story
Mrs. Mooney, a coarse, shrewd, and determined woman, connives to marry off her daughter to one of the more responsible lodgers in her shabby, questionably respectable boardinghouse. Having given her daughter the run of the young men, Mrs. Mooney watches in silent approval as Polly seduces a meek, middle-aged clerk. As the story opens, Mrs. Mooney, having ascertained the facts of the situation from her daughter, prepares to confront the lover, Bob Doran. She is determined to make him marry the girl, under the weight of social, religious, and economic pressure. The story, told almost entirely through narrative flashbacks, recounts the collusion between mother and daughter in the entrapment of Doran. Although Doran balks inwardly against this coercion, he finds himself surrendering to the admonitions of his priest, to the middle-class conventions of Dublin life, and to his fears of scandal, of losing his job, and of reprisals by Polly's rowdy and violent brother. Despite his affection for Polly, he is repelled by her vulgarity and fears that he will be lowering himself socially by marrying her. Indeed, the narrative substantiates Doran's "notion that he was being had," while it makes clear that his capitulation is a foregone conclusion.
Because most of the story is told through exposition and flashback, very little happens in the course of the narrative, which spans only about an hour on a Sunday morning. Doran, the reluctant lover and the even more reluctant husband-to-be, is very agitated after having confessed the affair to his priest on the previous day. His anxiety increases when Polly enters, cries on his shoulder, and tells him that she has "made a clean breast of it to her mother." Feebly reassuring Polly that everything will be all right, he is summoned to an interview with Mrs. Mooney. While Mrs. Mooney has the matter out with Doran, her daughter obediently awaits the outcome of the interview, her mind filled with pleasant reminiscences of her trysts with her lover and with still more pleasant "hopes and visions of the future." At the end of the story, Mrs. Mooney, whose name recalls "money," calls Polly downstairs to inform her of the "reparation," a promise of marriage, which she has extracted from Bob Doran.