Three Stories

As I was reading "The Little Disturbances of Man", I felt pity for Virginia. She is a hard working single mom living in a small town where everyone knows each other's business. I am sure it was extremely hard for her to lose her husband and then have everyone gossiping about her life. Welfare treated her terribly. The only good person in her life was John, but he was married. Virginia was also naive. At the end of the story, she was sure that her husband was still going to come back to her, even though he did not even go to the Army. I do not understand why she would even want him back after the way he treated her. What kind of a person tells their wife that their fat when they are pregnant and then sulks about sleeping on the coach? Overall, I found this story depressing. I think it is sad how many people get into bad relationships and then when they leave, the person wants them back even though they treated them horribly. It is also sad how many people have affairs with others when they are married. This story seemed very realistic, and perhaps that is why I found it so distressing.

I was curious why Joyce named the story "Two Galliants" because there was nothing galliant or heroic about the two men at all. They used the young woman as if she were a pawn in their game, and not an actual human being. The two men stole from her and treated her like a rag. I thought it was terrible that Corley made the girl wait for him. He was certainly not a gentleman. Corley was so proud of himself at the end when he showed Lenehan the coin he stole from her. It made me sick.

In "The Boarding House", Polly clearly has the power, as opposed to the two men who had the power in "Two Galliants". At the end, Polly seemed so happy because she knew that Bob was going to propose to her. She was crying and had been hysterical moments before, but she knew that Bob would marry her because of the obligations that society has placed on him and his moral obligations also. I wondered if Polly lied and said she was pregnant just so Bob would stay and marry her. If Polly was not pregnant, I do not believe Bob would have stayed, so to secure her happiness she made up a lie to bribe him into her life. I am not sure about this, but at the end I was startled by her joyfullness and I felt that she was scheming. In the end, Polly got what she wanted, but would she be happy in the future with a man who did not love her for the "right" reasons?