Structure

The short story “The Boarding House” by James Joyce is structured around a single main event, the prospective marriage of the daughter of a boarding house owner with one of the tenants. As the author is more concerned with rendering different perspectives on marriage as a social convention, less attention is given to the traditional elements of the plot. The plot initially develops in a classical way, having and exposition and a rising action. However, the story has no explicit climax or falling action, but only an open, yet predictable resolution.

Title

The title of the short story pinpoints the setting of the events, a boarding house. As the story is part of the “Dubliners” collection readers will also assume, correctly, that the events take place in Dublin.

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Beginning

The short story begins with a rather long exposition in which a backstory on one of the main characters is provided; we find out how Mrs Mooney came to own a boarding house after a failed marriage with a drunkard:

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Middle

The middle of the short story continues in a descriptive mode, introducing readers to Mrs Mooney’s son and daughter, Jack and Polly. The rising action begins to build once the intrigue of Polly seeing one of the tenants is introduced:

Things went on so for a long time and Mrs Mooney began to think of sending Polly back to typewriting when she noticed that something was going on between Polly and one of the young men. She watched the pair and kept her own counsel.

What hooks readers’ attention is that the mother, Mrs Mooney, knows about the affair but does nothing to stop it and Polly herself know about her mother watching her steps.

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Ending

The story ends without presenting the conversation between Mrs Mooney and Mr Doran, which might have functioned as a climactic moment. By omitting this part from the narrative, the author suggests...

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