Daedalus Myth And Portrait Of The Artist Essay, Research Paper

James Joyce?s A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man is a novel of complex

themes developed through frequent allusions to classical mythology. The myth of

Daedalus and Icarus serves as a structuring element in the novel, uniting the

central themes of individual rebellion and discovery, producing a work of

literature that illuminates the motivations of an artist, and the development of

his individual philosophy. James Joyce chose the name Stephen Dedalus to link

his hero with the mythical Greek hero, Daedalus. In Greek myth, Daedalus was an

architect, inventor, and artisan. By request of King Minos, Daedalus built a

labyrinth on Crete to contain a monster called the Minotaur, half bull and half

man. Later, for displeasing the king, Daedalus and his son Icarus were both

confined in this labyrinth, which was so complex that even its creator could not

find his way out. Instead, Daedalus fashioned wings of wax and feathers so that

he and his son could escape. When Icarus flew too high — too near the sun — in

spite of his father?s warnings, his wings melted, and he fell into the sea and

drowned. His more cautious father flew to safety (World Book 3). By using this

myth in A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man (Portrait of the Artist), Joyce

succeeds in giving definitive treatment to an archetype that was well

established long before the twentieth century (Beebe 163). The Daedalus myth

gives a basic structure to Portrait of the Artist. From the beginning, Stephen,

like most young people, is caught in a maze, just as his namesake Daedalus was.

The schools are a maze of corridors; Dublin is a maze of streets. Stephen?s

mind itself is a convoluted maze filled with dead ends and circular reasoning

(Hackett 203): Met her today point blank in Grafton Street. The crowd brought us

together. We both stopped. She asked me why I never came, said she had heard all

sorts of stories about me. This was only to gain time. Asked me, was I writing

poems? About whom? I asked her. This confused her more and I felt sorry and

mean. Turned off that valve at once and opened the spiritual-heroic

refrigerating apparatus, invented and patented in all countries by Dante

Alighieri. (Joyce 246) Life poses riddles at every turn. Stephen roams the

labyrinth searching his mind for answers (Gorman 204). The only way out seems to

be to soar above the narrow confines of the prison, as did Daedalus and his son.

In Portrait of the Artist, the world presses on Stephen. His own thoughts are

melancholy, his proud spirit cannot tolerate the painful burden of reality. In

the end, he must rise above it (Farrell 206). At first, Stephen does not

understand the significance of his unusual name. He comes to realize, by the

fourth chapter, that like Daedalus he is caught in a maze: Every part of his

day, divided by what he regarded now as the duties of his station in life,

circled about its own centre of spiritual energy. His life seemed to have drawn

near to eternity; every thought, word and deed, every instance of consciousness

could be made to revibrate radiantly in heaven… (Joyce 142) Throughout the

novel, Joyce freely exploits the symbolism of the name (Kenner 231). If he wants

to be free, Daedalus must fly high above the obstacles in his path. Like the

father Daedalus and the son Icarus, Stephen seeks a way out of his restraints.

In Stephen?s case, these are family, country and religion. In a sense,

Portrait of the Artist is a search for identity; Stephen searches for the

meaning of his strange name (Litz 70). Like Daedalus, he will fashion his own

wings — of poetry, not of wax — as a creative artist. But at times Stephen

feels like Icarus, the son who, if he does not heed his father?s advice, may

die for his stubborn pride (Litz 71). At the end of Portrait of the Artist, he

seems to be calling on a substitute, spiritual parent for support, when he

refers to Daedalus as "old father, old artificer."(Joyce 247),(Ellman

16). Even at Stephen?s moment of highest decision, he thinks of himself as a

direct descendant of his namesake Daedalus (Litz 71). Stephen?s past is

important only because it serves as the fuel of the present. Everything that

Stephen does in his present life feeds off the myth of Daedalus and Icarus,

making him what he is (Peake 82). When he wins social acceptance by his

schoolmates at Clongowes, he does so by acting deliberately in isolation — much

as Daedalus in his many endeavors: "They made a cradle of their locked

hands and hoisted him up among them and carried him along till he struggled to

get free" (Joyce 52). When he reports Father Dolan to the Rector, he

defends his name, the symbol of his identity (Peake 71): It was wrong; it was

unfair and cruel: and, as he sat in the refectory, he suffered time after time

in memory the same humiliation until he began to wonder whether it might not

really be that there was something in his face which made him look like a

schemer and he wished he had a little mirror to see. But there could not be; and

it was unjust and cruel and unfair. (Joyce 47) The myth?s pattern of flight

and fall also gives shape to the novel. Each chapter ends with an attempted

flight, leading into a partial failure or fall at the beginning of the next

chapter. The last chapter ends with the most ambitious attempt, to fly away from

home, religion, and nation to a self-imposed artistic exile (Wells 252):

"Welcome, O life! I go to encounter for the millionth time the reality of

experience and to forge in the smithy of my soul the uncreated conscience of my

race."(Joyce 247). By keeping his audience in doubt as to whether Stephen

is Icarus or Daedalus, Joyce attains a control that is sustained through the

rhythm of the novel?s action, the movements of its language, and the presiding

myth of Daedalus and Icarus (Litz 72).

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