The Dead

In the short story “The Dead,” James Joyce’s use of the events leading up to the epiphany and Gabriel’s epiphany aid the reader greatly in understanding the story as a whole. At first, the entire party and the dialogues seem like chaos rather than trying to build the backbone of the story. As the reader, we go through many dialogues and get introduced to an array of characters. We don’t make sense of any of this information until Gabriel’s epiphany in the end. The song the man is singing shortly towards the end of the story holds great significance to Gretta, Gabriel’s wife. He finds out that she once had a lover that died for her. He feels that throughout their relationship, there is a missing connection between the two and that this lover that died for her is the missing piece. Gabriel sits back and realizes many of life’s greatest mysteries. Everything he talked about in his speech comes to life and makes sense. One of these realizations is that death of tradition and hospitality, something he said that his aunts were known for. The newer generation lacks this and much more. In his epiphany, he realizes that the death of this tradition and hospitality is inevitable. The snow that falls in the end, in particular to both the living and the dead, symbolize the connection between life and death. In this sense, the end of one life brings about the life of another. All the events prior to the epiphany now turn into significant facts that bring about Gabriel’s realization. The unorganized thoughts in the beginning connect to the ending, and this aids the reader in understanding the author’s focus and reasoning.