Joyce believed that Catholic and English political interests vying for control of Ireland and the Irish people had left the country in a state of “paralysis” leading to an overall cultural decay. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, England’s subjugation of Ireland left it an impoverished country financially and culturally: it’s native language was dying, and it had endured famine and economic decline with little aid. Ireland possessed a long history of failed nationalist rebellions against the English, and the best hope for a diplomatic path to Irish “home rule,” the Anglo-Irish Protestant politician Charles Stuart Parnell, had just been destroyed—when Parnell was discovered to have had an affair with a married woman, the Catholic hierarchy in Ireland abandoned their support for him, ending his political power and the hope for Irish self-rule along with it. While the references to paralysis and decay in “An Encounter” are subtle, the narrator’s strict Catholic-school environment, his boredom, and, ultimately, his struggle to act to protect himself from the sexually perverted old man with the decaying teeth all point towards the environment of cultural decay and individual paralysis.
The narrator’s boredom with his routine is the first kind of paralysis he experiences in “An Encounter.” After Joe leaves for the priesthood, the narrator and the other boys keep playing Joe’s games despite the fact that they don’t have a leader and some of the boys don’t even enjoy the games, hinting at the boys’ difficulty in creating a new order for themselves. Furthermore, Father Butler’s rebuke at school reveals how harshly the boys are reprimanded for even the smallest steps out of line, clueing the reader into the attitudes that make it so hard for the narrator and his friends to change their lives, and the way that even the institutions that might support the Irish cause are in practice more concerned with maintaining their own power. Even the language of the section of the story before the narrator’s journey reinforces the idea of paralysis as the narrator describes his “reluctant” companions and “the restraining influence of the school.”
On the journey across Dublin, the language in “An Encounter” points to the boys’ experience of paralysis even as they attempt to break out of their routine. The narrator notices the “docile” horses and describes how he and Mahony are “shouted at” for their “immobility,” and although they walk a long way from their starting place to Ringsend, they don’t actually make it to their planned final destination and end up simply lying down in a field. When the old man enters the field and speaks to the narrator and Mahony, the narrator notes how the man’s mind seems to be “magnetised” by his own words. Once the man starts on a subject, it is difficult to deter him from it—and even the narrator finds himself almost hypnotized by the way the man speaks despite his underlying feelings of discomfort. As soon as the old man’s perversion is clear and the narrator realizes he is in danger, he still can’t seem to bring himself to move or defend himself, instead staying frozen in place until the last possible second. While his escape might seem a departure from his usual paralysis, his sense of shame about his lack of bravery suggests that the narrator himself doesn’t see it that way.
The details that Joyce includes about the narrator’s Dublin surroundings further point to the cultural, social, and economic decay that Joyce perceived in Modern Ireland. The “ragged” boys and girls that the narrator and Mahony encounter provide a window into the poverty that many residents of Dublin lived in at the turn of the 20th century, and Mahony’s lack of sympathy for them points to the lack of responsibility wealthier Catholic Dubliners feel towards their poorer Catholic neighbors despite their religious commonalities. Even the background of the boy’s hoped-for destination, the Pigeon House, supports the idea that Dublin is in decline. Once an Irish port, then an English military fort, and finally a sewage and power plant, the Pigeon House has gone from a symbol of Ireland’s connection to the wider world, to a symbol of England’s military oppression of Ireland, to a plant that literally processes waste and rot. Finally, the strange old man’s appearance—his shabby suit, his “good” accent but perverted speech, and his mouth of decaying yellow teeth—invite the reader to draw parallels between the man and the wider culture. His body and his morals are all in a state of decay, and he seems trapped in his own routine, making the younger boys suffer for it. Meanwhile, the fact that the old man, who admires famous Irish writers, is himself perverted suggests that the culture itself has become similarly corrupted.
Related Themes from Other Texts
Paralysis and Decay ThemeTracker
Paralysis and Decay Quotes in An Encounter
It was Joe Dillon who introduced the Wild West to us… Every evening after school we met in his back garden and arranged Indian battles. He and his fat young brother Leo, the idler, held the loft of the stable while we tried to carry it by storm; or we fought a pitched battle on the grass. But, however well we fought, we never won siege or battle and all our bouts ended with Joe Dillon’s war dance of victory.
His parents went to eight-o’clock mass every morning in Gardiner Street and the peaceful odour of Mrs Dillon was prevalent in the hall of the house.
A spirit of unruliness diffused itself among us and, under its influence, differences of culture and constitution were waived. We banded ourselves together, some boldly, some in jest and some almost in fear: and of the number of these latter, the reluctant Indians who were afraid to seem studious or lacking in robustness, I was one. The adventures related in the literature of the Wild West were remote from my nature but, at least, they opened doors of escape.
Everyone’s heart palpitated as Leo Dillon handed up the paper and everyone assumed an innocent face. Father Butler turned over the pages, frowning.
“What is this rubbish?” he said. “The Apache Chief! Is this what you read instead of studying your Roman History? Let me not find any more of this wretched stuff in this college. The man who wrote it, I suppose, was some wretched scribbler that writes these things for a drink. I’m surprised at boys like you, educated, reading such stuff. I could understand it if you were… National School boys. Now, Dillon, I advise you strongly, get at your work or…”
This rebuke during the sober hours of school paled much of the glory of the Wild West for me and the confused puffy face of Leo Dillon awakened one of my consciences.
With Leo Dillon and a boy named Mahony I planned a day’s miching. Each of us saved up sixpence. We were to meet at ten in the morning on the Canal Bridge…We arranged to go along the Wharf Road until we came to the ships, then to cross in the ferryboat and walk out to see the Pigeon House. Leo Dillon was afraid we might meet Father Butler or someone out of the college; but Mahony asked, very sensibly, what would Father Butler be doing out at the Pigeon House.
Mahony began to play the Indian as soon as we were out of public sight. He chased a crowd of ragged girls, brandishing his unloaded catapult and, when two ragged boys began, out of chivalry, to fling stones at us, he proposed that we should charge them. I objected that the boys were too small, and so we walked on, the ragged troop screaming after us: “Swaddlers! Swaddlers!” thinking that we were Protestants because Mahony, who was dark-complexioned, wore the silver badge of a cricket club in his cap.
In my heart I thought that what he said about boys and sweethearts was reasonable. But I disliked the words in his mouth and I wondered why he shivered once or twice as if he feared something or felt a sudden chill. As he proceeded I noticed that his accent was good. He began to speak to us about girls, saying what nice soft hair they had and how soft their hands were and how all girls were not so good as they seemed to be if one only knew. There was nothing he liked, he said, so much as looking at a nice young girl, at her nice white hands and her beautiful soft hair. He gave me the impression that he was repeating something which he had learned by heart or that, magnetised by some words of his own speech, his mind was slowly circling round and round in the same orbit.
He stood up slowly, saying that he had to leave us for a minute or so, a few minutes, and, without changing the direction of my gaze, I saw him walking slowly away from us towards the near end of the field. We remained silent when he had gone. After a silence of a few minutes I heard Mahony exclaim:
“I say! Look what he’s doing!”
As I neither answered nor raised my eyes Mahony exclaimed again:
“I say…He’s a queer old josser!”
“In case he asks us for our names,” I said, “let you be Murphy and I’ll be Smith.”
After an interval the man spoke to me. He said that my friend was a very rough boy and asked did he get whipped often at school. I was going to reply indignantly that we were not National School boys to be whipped, as he called it; but I remained silent. He began to speak on the subject of chastising boys. His mind, as if magnetised again by his speech, seemed to circle slowly round and round its new centre. He said that when boys were that kind they ought to be whipped and well whipped…I was surprised at this sentiment and involuntarily glanced up at his face. As I did so I met the gaze of a pair of bottle-green eyes peering at me from under a twitching forehead. I turned my eyes away again.
I waited till his monologue paused again. Then I stood up abruptly. Lest I should betray my agitation I delayed a few moments pretending to fix my shoe properly and then, saying that I was obliged to go, I bade him good-day. I went up the slope calmly but my heart was beating quickly with fear that he would seize me by the ankles. When I reached the top of the slope I turned round and, without looking at him, called loudly across the field:
“Murphy!”
My voice had an accent of forced bravery in it and I was ashamed of my paltry stratagem. I had to call the name again before Mahony saw me and hallooed in answer. How my heart beat as he came running across the field to me! He ran as if to bring me aid. And I was penitent; for in my heart I had always despised him a little.
