“The Sisters” takes place in Dublin, Ireland in 1895. The story specifically focuses on the relationship between a lower-middle class family and a Catholic priest. Like in many of Joyce’s stories, the characters represent different elements of Irish (specifically Dublin) society. Father Flynn, for example, as a corrupt priest, represents the corruption of the Catholic Church as a whole. The men in the narrator’s life (his uncle and Old Cotter) represent secular Irish people who take issue with the Church, but not in any organized or politically powerful way. The women in the story (the narrator’s aunt and both of Father Flynn’s sisters) represent Irish people who venerate the Church even in the face of its obvious corruption.
It is important to note that, at the time in which the story is set, the Irish Nationalist movement was struggling in its efforts to push for independence from English colonial rule. In this story, Joyce is critiquing the Nationalist movement alongside the Catholic Church by highlighting how the two organizations were both corrupt and inappropriately enmeshed. He does this in subtle ways, like by mentioning how notice of Father Flynn’s memorial service was published in a Nationalist newspaper. It is important to note that Joyce wrote this story after the Catholic Church sabotaged the charismatic and effective leader of the Nationalist movement (Charles Stewart Parnell) because he had an extramarital affair, leading to several decades of waning political power.
