The Boarding House

While Polly is the focus of the story, she and her thoughts appear surprisingly little in it. Although her mother demonstrates how women can work within the current social system to gain mobility, Polly is an example of how young women can be trapped in marriages due to lack of agency and accountability for their choices. Mr. Doran and Mrs. Mooney are deciding Polly’s future, and though she is seemingly compliant as she dreams of her future with Mr. Doran, the choice is not hers. Her character contrasts with her mother, demonstrating two of the only paths available to women in Dublin at the time.

Joyce paints Polly as a flat, one-dimensional character, centering her focus around love and young men, with no other thoughts, doubts, or ideas. She is very much a stereotype of the naive young girl. This depiction makes a statement about how Joyce saw the youth, particularly girls, of Dublin. The line revealing Polly’s thoughts of a life with Mr. Doran leads readers to question whether she is just a young girl in love, or if she intended to trap him. Polly’s thoughts do not provide evidence of a trap. Nevertheless, Mr. Doran’s proclamation that he has been duped makes the reader wonder if Polly is as shrewd as her mother when it comes to opportunities for further social mobility. The open-ended nature of the story’s conclusion does not offer closure as to whether Mrs. Mooney and Polly “won.”

Serving as both a romantic interest to Polly and an economic and social mobility interest for Mrs. Mooney, Mr. Doran’s character is not necessarily a protagonist or antagonist. In the context of Dublin’s culture, societal norms cast him as the antagonist by sleeping with Polly and not asking for her hand in marriage. However, the additional information readers are given about Mrs. Mooney’s intention to manipulate him into a proposal complicates a strict antagonist/protagonist binary. Joyce purposefully muddies how readers see Mr. Doran by implicating him in wrongdoing through his relationship with Polly while also making him a victim of Mrs. Mooney’s scheme. With this complication, Mr. Doran becomes a more multifaceted and rounded character, one that is harder to place into a strict character type.

That complexity is demonstrated in the glimpse Joyce provides into Mr. Doran’s thoughts as he dreads the meeting with Mrs. Mooney on Sunday. As he ruminates, he comes to believe he has been duped into proposing to Polly, which is corroborated by Mrs. Mooney’s own thoughts. His negative perception of the Mooney family shows that he believes they want to use him to gain higher social status. Here the reader encounters the complexity of his character, as he is technically right, but Polly does not overtly seem to be part of it. Her interest is mostly romantic, and his seems to be as well. When Polly enters the room threatening to take her life, he comforts her and becomes enamored with her once again. This does not solidify Mr. Doran’s decision, but very much complicates it, demonstrating Dublin’s constraints on choices for men as well. Mrs. Mooney’s focus on Mr. Doran’s job and the money she suspects he has made highlights how a man’s worth in Dublin is determined by his job and the status that comes with it.

Only appearing briefly in the story’s exposition, Mr. Mooney provides motivation for Mrs. Mooney’s success and her boarding house. Having spiraled into alcoholism, Mr. Mooney runs down the butcher business he and his wife ran together, forcing Mrs. Mooney to find another way for her and her children to survive. His utility as a motivating character also aids in demonstrating the character traits of Mrs. Mooney. Her tenacity and acumen are shown against the background of Mr. Mooney’s abuse, to the point where she obtains a separation from him. Without Mr. Mooney as both a catalyst and an expositional figure, readers would not have the background knowledge of Mrs. Mooney’s character, which is crucial to understanding why she tries to manipulate Mr. Doran and Polly.

Mr. Mooney serves as a background antagonist. The fact that he does not appear again in the story is important, due to his continued influence on Mrs. Mooney. Her experiences with him helped create her strong will and attitudes, and his character is felt though his absence. Mrs. Mooney’s marriage to him colors her interactions with Mr. Doran and Polly’s other suitors.

Mrs. Mooney’s father is also a background figure, mentioned briefly in the first few paragraphs of the story. However, he is still an important character and functions similarly to Mr. Mooney. His influence over Mrs. Mooney is substantial as her father, and the profession of “butcher” in Dublin during this time, carries certain connotations of status and skill in the community. Joyce therefore uses his profession to tell readers something about Mrs. Mooney’s own character: how she grew up and was raised, and what values she holds. These traits again work in the background of the story yet are crucial to Mrs. Mooney’s character and her actions concerning Polly and Mr. Doran.

Joyce provides very little detail about Mrs. Mooney’s father, other than the insinuations from his profession. The only other information readers are given is that, once he died, Mr. Mooney descended into a downward spiral. His father-in-law’s death appears to be the trigger for Mr. Mooney’s abuse and alcoholism and, therefore, Mrs. Mooney’s character development. The simultaneous nature of these events suggests that his presence, when alive, kept the behavior of Mrs. Mooney’s husband in check.