The Boarding House
By
James Joyce
After a
difficult marriage with a drunken husband that ends in separation, Mrs. Mooney
opens a boarding house to make a living. Her son, Jack, and daughter, Polly,
live with her in the house, which is filled with clerks from the city, as well
as occasional tourists and musicians. Mrs. Mooney runs a strict and tight
business and is known by the lodgers as “The Madam.” Polly, who used to work in
an office, now stays at home at her mother’s request, to amuse the lodgers and
help with the cleaning. Surrounded by so many young men, Polly inevitably
develops a relationship with one of them, Mr. Doran. Mrs. Mooney knows about
the relationship, but instead of sending Polly back to work in the city, she
monitors its developments. Polly becomes increasingly uncomfortable with her
mother’s lack of intervention, but Mrs. Mooney waits until “the right moment”
to intercede. First she speaks awkwardly with Polly, then arranges to speak
with Mr. Doran on a Sunday morning.
Mrs. Mooney
looks forward to her confrontation, which she intends to “win” by defending her
daughter’s honor and convincing Mr. Doran to offer his hand in marriage.
Waiting for the time to pass, Mrs. Mooney figures the odds are in her favor,
considering that Mr. Doran, who has worked for a wine merchant for thirteen
years and garnered much respect, will choose the option that least harms his
career.
Meanwhile, Mr.
Doran anguishes over the impending meeting with Mrs. Mooney. As he clumsily
grooms himself for the appointment, he reviews the difficult confession to his
priest that he made on Saturday evening, in which he was harshly reproved for
his romantic affair. He knows he can either marry Polly or run away, the latter
an option that would ruin his sound reputation. Convincing himself that he has
been duped, Mr. Doran bemoans Polly’s unimpressive family, her ill manners, and
her poor grammar, and wonders how he can remain free and unmarried. In this
vexed moment Polly enters the room and threatens to end her life out of
unhappiness. In her presence, Mr. Doran begins to remember how he was bewitched
by Polly’s beauty and kindness, but he still wavers about his decision.
Uneasy, Mr.
Doran comforts Polly and departs for the meeting, leaving her to wait in the
room. She rests on the bed crying for a while, neatens her appearance, and then
nestles back in the bed, dreaming of her possible future with Mr. Doran.
Finally, Mrs. Mooney interrupts the reverie by calling to her daughter. Mr.
Doran, according to Mrs. Mooney, wants to speak with Polly.
Analysis
In “The Boarding
House,” marriage offers promise and profit on the one hand, and entrapment and
loss on the other. What begins as a simple affair becomes a tactical game of
obligation and reparation. Mrs. Mooney’s and Mr. Doran’s propositions and
hesitations suggest that marriage is more about social standards, public
perception, and formal sanctions than about mere feelings. The character of
Mrs. Mooney illustrates the challenges that a single mother of a daughter
faces, but her scheme to marry Polly into a higher class mitigates any
sympathetic response from the reader. Mrs. Mooney may have endured a difficult
marriage and separation, but she now carries the dubious title of “The Madam,”
a term suggestive of her scrupulous managing of the house, but also of the head
of whorehouse. Mrs. Mooney does, in fact, prostitute her daughter to some
degree. She insists that Polly leave her office job and stay at home at the
boarding house, in part so she might entertain, however innocently, the male
lodgers. When a relationship blossoms, Mrs. Mooney tracks it until the most
profitable moment—until she is sure Mr. Doran, a successful clerk, must propose
to Polly out of social propriety. Mrs. Mooney justly insists that men should
carry the same responsibility as women in these casual love affairs, but at the
same time prides herself on her ability to rid herself of a dependent daughter
so easily.
Mr. Doran
agonizes about the limitations and loss of respect that marrying beneath him
will bring, but he ultimately relents out of fear of social critique from his
priest, his employer, Mrs. Mooney, and Polly’s violent brother. When Polly
visits him in distress he feels as helpless as she does, even though he tells
her not to worry. He goes through the motions of what society expects of him,
not according to what he intuitively feels. When he descends the stairs to meet
with Mrs. Mooney, he yearns to escape but knows no one is on his side. The
“force” that pushes him down the stairs is a force of anxiety about what others
will think of him. While Mr. Doran’s victimization by Mrs. Mooney evokes pity,
his self-concern and harsh complaints about Polly’s unpolished background and
manner of speaking make him an equal counterpart to Mrs. Mooney. He worries
little about Polly’s integrity or feelings, and instead considers his years of
hard work and good reputation now verging on destruction.
D.N. Aloysius
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