The sisters by James Joyce

 The sisters-James Joyce(1914)

rating 6/10

Among the previous stories, I think this story is the hardest one to understand. It is said that the topic of the story is 'paralysis' that shows paralyzed Irish culture. Father Flynn reflected the paralyzed Catholic Church, which was one of the reasons why Irish culture was paralyzed. The story ends with the sentence"..that there was something gone wrong with him.", and it shows that the priest had a mental problem before he dies. Inappropriate relationship between the boy and the priest shows the paralyzation of the priest, church and culture. There are some other themes that reflects paralysis through Father Flynn such as his death or decayed teeth.

 I liked how Joyce reflected paralysis through the priest, but I don't like Joyce's writing method. He left the story too open-ended. It would've been better if he gave some clear hint about the ending so that we can at least predict one integrated conclusion. 

Overall, It was a hard, complicated story that I couldn't understand perfectly even though I read it 3 times. 

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