Polly Mooney's initial character introduction in "The Boarding House" paints the picture of an unintentional seductress—a young woman who glances upwards when she speaks in what men might interpret as a coquettish manner, regardless of whether or not her actions bear the weight of intention. In order to shed further light on how Polly's mannerisms are read by (presumably) the men she interacts with, Joyce includes an oxymoronic simile in this character description:
Her eyes, which were grey with a shade of green through them, had a habit of glancing upwards when she spoke with anyone, which made her look like a little perverse madonna.
"Madonna" is another name used to refer to the Virgin Mary, who gave birth to Jesus Christ. In the Bible, Mary becomes pregnant with God's Son without ever having sexual intercourse. The oxymoron of a "perverse madonna," to which Polly is likened, draws on a core contradiction present in Irish Catholic society: the need for women to simultaneously be virginal, sexless beings, but become pregnant and have sexual allure when men demand it of them. This paradoxical theme emerges across Joyce's literary portfolio, within which he explores the ongoing clash between religious moral values and modern youthful scrutiny of sexual mores.
Polly and her mother are narrative foils in "The Boarding House," each serving as examples of stereotypical "female innocence" and "female cunning," respectively. These stereotypes derive from a misogynistic paradigm that does not allow for moral complexity or nuance in women; they can be either of two things—a pure and innocent victim or a scheming, promiscuous villain. The coexistence of innocence (or ignorance) and knowledge is paradoxical within such a reductive paradigm. This contradiction comes to bear in a conversation Polly has with her mother regarding her affair with Mr. Doran:
Polly had been made awkward not merely because allusions of that kind always made her awkward but also because she did not wish it to be thought that in her wise innocence she had divined the intention behind her mother’s tolerance.
The narrator describes Polly's knowledge of sexual and romantic matters as a "wise innocence" that allows her to divine her mother's intentions. This oxymoronic phrase parallels the internal contradictions at play within Irish Catholic female sexuality: women must be virginal and innocent but bear children (i.e. the Virgin Mary); they must know about sexuality so as not to transgress, but pretend that they know nothing so as not to offend in polite society. Polly feels awkward because she does not wish to alert her mother to her imperfect innocence.
