During the moment of peak conflict in the story (when Mrs. Kearney demands that the Eire Abu Society leaders pay her the full eight guineas they promised Kathleen), Kathleen decides to perform against her mother’s wishes. Joyce captures the tension in this moment in the following passage, using a simile in the process:
Mr Fitzpatrick held a few banknotes in his hand. He counted out four into Mrs Kearney's hand and said she would get the other half at the interval. Mrs Kearney said:
– This is four shillings short.
But Kathleen gathered in her skirt and said: Now, Mr Bell, to the first item, who was shaking like an aspen. The singer and the accompanist went out together.
The simile here—in which the singer Mr. Bell (with whom Kathleen is performing) is described as “shaking like an aspen”—communicates the amount of tension in this scene. Aspen leaves, because of their especially long and flat shape, are known for shaking in the wind more than the leaves of other trees. That Mr. Bell quivers in such an extreme way helps readers understand the immensity of the conflict in this scene—Mr. Bell is not directly involved in the conflict and yet is terrified of taking the stage with Kathleen, as he doesn’t want to face Mrs. Kearney’s wrath for performing against her wishes.
This moment demonstrates how, despite being belittled by the sexist men in the Committee, Mrs. Kearney has a palpable power (enough to scare people not directly involved). It also shows Kathleen asserting herself for the first time in the story, doing what she wants rather than getting caught in the conflict amongst the older members of the Nationalist movement. This is possibly Joyce’s way of hinting that there is hope for the conflict-ridden, morally bankrupt movement if it is led by the youth.
In the final pages of the story, Mrs. Kearney is full of rage over the fact that the Eire Abu Society refused to pay her the eight guineas they owed her for her daughter Kathleen’s performance and that they did so without shame. Joyce captures the depths of her anger in the following passage, using a simile in the process:
After that Mrs Kearney’s conduct was condemned on all hands: everyone approved of what the Committee had done. She stood at the door, haggard with rage, arguing with her husband and daughter, gesticulating with them. She waited until it was time for the second part to begin in the hope that the secretaries would approach her […] She stood still for an instant like an angry stone image and, when the first notes of the song struck her ear, she caught up her daughter’s cloak and said to her husband:
– Get a cab!
The simile in his passage—“She stood still for an instant like an angry stone image”—helps readers visualize Mrs. Kearney’s conduct in this moment and to understand the immensity of her ire. Anger is usually associated with the movement (as seen in the “gesticulations” Mrs. Kearney was making earlier), and the fact that she became so angry she cannot even move communicates how simultaneously angry and shocked she is by this whole experience. Mrs. Kearney’s rage (and eventual decision to flee from the scene) is tied to the fact that she feels belittled and disempowered as a woman in this moment.
It is also notable that Mrs. Kearney is compared to a statue here, as it implies a certain feeling of being stuck. In other words, her enraged reaction is not the type of pattern that is easily going to change. This is true of the Nationalist movement as a whole—most of the members of the Eire Abu Society also seem stuck in their ways and disinterested in learning or growing.
