A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man (referred to as Portrait from here on) is the story of a young man named Stephen Dedalus. In the novel, we follow him from his earliest of childhood memories up to the point where he leaves for France to pursue a career as a literary theorist. There are many different theoretical approaches that have been taken to discuss Portrait. It has been discussed from a Marxist perspective, looking at Stephen’s class origin and his opportunities throughout the book. It has been discussed from a psychoanalytic perspective, looking at his actions and motivations throughout. It has been discussed from a feminist perspective, looking at the roles of women in Stephen’s development. The perspective that is perhaps the most interesting to look at is the mythological perspective. At first glance the connection to Greek mythology seems to be entirely superficial, limited only to Stephen’s last name, Dedalus. In reality the connection goes much deeper then that, especially when you consider the fact that Joyce made such effective use of the Homeric epic, The Odyssey, in the sequel to Portrait, Ulysses (the English translation of Odysseus). (Di Giuseppe Trivellato 59) We will find upon close examination of the story of Daedelus the Artificer (Stephen Dedalus’s namesake) and his son Icarus, that the use of the myth in Portrait is not merely superficial, as it first appears to be, but rather a guiding thread throughout the entire story.
The story of Daedelus the artificer is an expansive and sordid tale. His story begins in Athens where he is already a famous artisan and craftsman. He is exiled after his attempted murder of his nephew Perdix, who he feared would surpass his ability. He flees to Crete were he becomes the architect, artist, and craftsman for King Minos. He is the one responsible for creating the wooden bull for the Queen Pasiphae so she can slake her lust for the divine white bull who was a gift from the god Poseidon to King Minos. It is he who builds the Labyrinth to imprison the unholy offspring of that union, the Minotaur. It is he who finally overcomes the labyrinth by creating wings of wax for his son Icarus and himself. After he escapes, he lives a long and fruitful life in the land of Sicily. (Cotterell 36)
The first proof of the Daedelus myth in Portrait is on the very first page. The story of Stephen Dedalus starts with a fairy tale that his father told him when he was a child, with a clean mind ready for teaching. The fist line of Portrait is:
Once upon a time and a very good time it was there was a moocow coming down along the road and this moocow coming down along the road met a nicens little boy named baby tuckoo…. (Joyce 20)
Already, in the first line of the book we are introduced to three images that tell us that we are dealing with a story that draws explicitly from the Daedelus myth. The first is an indication that we are in the realm of myth; the phrase “Once upon a time,” the stereotypical opening line for fairy tales and myth. This is a deliberate choice on the part of Joyce (or the older Stephen who is presumed to be the author/narrator) to get us into the general mindset of a fairy tale.
The second indication found in the first line is the reference to a “moocow.” As the moocow walked down the road he “met” a little boy. The use of this word “met” is significant. It personifies the bull, giving him the ability to “meet” someone, as opposed to recognizing them or deferring to them. This personification of the bull brings out the idea of a humanized bull, like the Minotaur.
The third point in the first line that points to the Daedelus myth is the name of the little boy, “tuckoo.” This name is possibly nonsensical, but it is possible that it is a reference to the sound a bird might make (think of a cuckoo clock). This is purely extrapolation, but a plausible extrapolation since there is another bird reference not a page later talking about the eagle (Joyce 21), and since bird imagery is certainly not in short supply throughout the novel.
However, the most important guiding aspect of the Daedelus myth in Portrait actually lies, not in the story line (which is quite important), but in the intimate similarities between the character of Stephen Dedalus and Daedelus the Artificer. In The Hero with a Thousand Faces, Joseph Campbell says:
For centuries Daedelus has represented the type of the artist-scientist: that curiously disinterested, almost diabolic human phenomenon, beyond the normal bounds of social judgment, dedicated to the morals not of his time but of his art. He is the hero of the way of thought—singlehearted, courageous, and full of faith that the truth, as he finds it, shall make us free. (Campbell 18)
The repercussions of his actions were never of great importance to Daedelus. He created for himself a world and life theory where morality was relative, not to social acceptability, but to art and science, and that was all that ever mattered. In the quote above, if we were to change the word “centuries” to “decades” and change the spelling of “Daedelus” to “Dedalus” the rest of the quote would fit Stephen Dedalus just as well as Daedelus the artificer. Stephen, like the original Daedelus, is only interested in what he finds to be important; his own search for truth. The individualism and moral ambiguity that they share is what drives Stephen’s character development and what drives the progression of the story. A very important difference in these stories is that Daedelus the artificer is already morally ambiguous when we encounter him, as is evidenced by the fact that he would attempt to murder his own nephew just to maintain his status as the best. The story of Stephen Dedalus, is the story of how the two of them came to be the same.
These events often take on the figurative shape of a labyrinth in Portrait. The novel is nothing more or less than a series of events that lead to Stephen’s eventual moral ambiguity through his continual imprisonment in, and extraction from these labyrinths. In the original myth, the labyrinth is a massive stone maze made to contain and imprison the Minotaur and his victims. It was so effective, that only three people ever made it out: Theseus, a brave warrior and prince from Athens, Daedelus, and his son Icarus (and he only made it with the help of his father). In Portrait the labyrinth is represented by anything that keeps Stephen restrained, confined, or lost. There are passages throughout the story that make the world around Stephen seem very much like the labyrinth in which Daedelus becomes trapped. These passages are often accompanied by major turning points or decisions that Stephen faces. For example, the first time Stephen walks down the street lined with prostitutes, the surroundings are described as “a maze of narrow and dirty streets.” (Joyce 98). The same type of description (though a bit more subtle) can be found in the description of the streets of Cork (Joyce 87), the description of Stephens school as a child (Joyce 64), and the streets that he walks through with his friend Lynch while explaining his aesthetic theory (Joyce 183). Though the literal labyrinths found throughout the novel are important, their primary role is to underscore and offer support to the idea of the figurative labyrinth from which Stephen is trying to escape.
The most important labyrinths in Portrait are the ones that find Stephen trapped within his own mind. These images are found throughout the novel and are always related to one of the three organizations that rule (or attempt to rule) Stephens life: the church, the family, and the nation. Shortly after his visit to the prostitutes, Stephen finds himself trapped in a labyrinth of sin related to the church:
He had sinned mortally not once but many times and he knew that, while he stood in danger of eternal damnation for the first sin alone, by every succeeding sin he multiplied his guilt and his punishment. His days and works and thoughts could make not atonement for him, the fountains of sanctifying grace have ceased to refresh his soul. (Joyce 100)
In this passage, Stephen recognizes the nature of sin, as defined by the church, is a degrading principle; sin leads to more sin, more sin leads to more damnation. It is a self-defeating cycle, unless you make a concerted effort to remove yourself from it, which Stephen eventually does. This type of mental labyrinth also appear along side the physical labyrinth during Stephen’s trip to Cork immediately after his father tries to give him advice to live by. His mind is paralyzed by the idea of taking his fathers advice and submitting to the labyrinth of family life: “He could scarcely interpret the letters of the signboards of the shops… He could respond to no earthly or human appeal, dumb and insensible to the call of summer and gladness and companionship, wearied and dejected by this father’s voice” (Joyce 92).
The Minotaur that terrorizes the occupants of these various labyrinths represents the authority figures that try to suck Stephen into their world; in the case the last example the Minotaur is Stephen’s father. In chapter four Stephen is asked to join the Jesuit order by the director of his school (Joyce 143). In chapter five, Stephen’s friend Davin asks him to become more actively involved in his Irish heritage and nation (Joyce 181). If Stephen were to take his father’s advice, or take an active role in his heritage, or join the Jesuit order, he would in effect become a permanent resident of the labyrinth, but Stephen’s particular skill is his ability to break out of the labyrinths that would hold him hostage.
This ability is another trait that binds him to Daedelus the Artificer. “The mythical [Daedelus] was imprisoned in a labyrinth… and escaped by inventing wings. He is a symbol therefore, not only of the rebel who breaks out of his prison, but of the inventor who creates the instrument of his escape. He is both man and artist.” (Drew 62) Throughout the novel Stephen removes himself from a number of labyrinths, but often just moves from the frying pan into the fire. In order to escape the labyrinth of religion and structure at school, he turned to the secular pursuit of sexual gratification and found himself instead in the labyrinth of sin. In order to remove himself from the labyrinth of sin, he retuned once again to the labyrinth of religion and in the end found himself confronted by the Minotaur himself, the director of his school, asking Stephen to become a Jesuit. Like Daedelus the artist, Stephen removes himself expertly from the labyrinths he is confronted with: he simply rebels against the principals they uphold, whatever they may be. In the end of the novel however Stephen, like his namesake, “creates the instrument of his escape”, his aesthetic theory.
Stephen’s aesthetic theory is his own creation, and the tool that he hopes will remove him once and for all from the labyrinths that pursue him. It has an effect on the story in two ways: physical and mental (just like the labyrinths that he is presented with). The physical effect of his removal from the labyrinth by his theory is brought about at the end of the novel when he leaves for France. This literally removes him from his family, his church (at least that specific sect), and his nation. Mentally he is removed from the labyrinths by the nature of the theory itself. Stephens intent upon creating his aesthetic theory was to create a universal principal to guide the analysis and creation of fiction. What he did actually accomplished was to create a morally ambiguous frame work that he could use to judge the world and his decisions. By applying Aquinas’s quote “Three things are needed for beauty, wholeness, harmony, and radiance,” Stephen takes the judgment of what is of worth away from society and puts it in the hands of the individual. Wholeness, harmony, and radiance are relative terms that can change from person to person. Hence, if Stephen does not view family, the church, or the nation as whole, in harmony, and radiant, he has no responsibility to them.
The final aspect of Portrait that I would like to look at is the escape itself. When Daedelus and his son Icarus escape from the labyrinth they use wings made of wax. Daedelus warned his son not to fly too close to the sun because it would melt his wings and he would fall. These wings are represented throughout the novel by the bird imagery. The final question that must be considered is “Is Stephen really Daedelus, who escaped the Labyrinth and found peace, or is Stephen Icarus, who flew too close to the sun and plunged to his death in the sea?” If you read Portrait with no consideration for its sequel Ulysses, there is a case to be made both ways. On the one hand Stephen did make it to Paris and as far as we know (without Ulysses as a source) made it in the literary world. On the other hand we have the pattern set up throughout the novel of Stephen escaping one labyrinth only to find himself in another. At the end of Portrait, Joyce really does leave it for the reader to decide whether Stephen is Daedelus or Icarus.
Works Cited
Campbell, Joseph. “Myth and Dream.”The Hero with a Thousand Faces. 3rd ed. Novato, California: New World Library, 2008. 1-19.
Cotterell, Arthur and Rachel Storm. The Encyclopedia of World Mythology. London: Lorenz Books, 2007.
Di Giuseppe Trivellato, Rita. “James Joyce's Portrait: A Case of Applied Mythology.” Quaderni di Lingue e Letterature 2. Verona, Italy: L'Università degli Studi di Verona, 1977. 59-67.
Drew, Elizabeth. “The Interrelationship of Theme, Symbolism, and Structure.” Ed. Clarice Swisher. San Diego: Greenhaven, 2000. 60-72.
Joyce, James. A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. Ed. R.B. Kershner. Boston: Bedford St. Martins, 2006.