Narrator and point of view

The short story “Araby” by James Joyce is a first-person narration with the storyteller being a young Irish boy. The narrative is very subjective, and is rendered entirely from the boy’s perspective who has limited knowledge of the events: “I did not know whether I would ever speak to her or not or, if I spoke to her, how I could tell her of my confused adoration.”

His account is very subjective and even lyrical occasionally, as he personifies elements of the setting and describes the girl he likes in metaphorical terms: “The other houses of the street, conscious of decent lives within them, gazed at one another with brown imperturbable faces.”; “I imagined that I bore my chalice safely through a throng of foes. Her name sprang to my lips at...