A LITTLE CLOUD (KEY CONTEXT, SYMBOLS, CHARACTERS)

Question 1

Summary of A Little Cloud?

Answer 1

• Little Chandler meets his successful friend Gallaher, the meeting rouses feelings of envy, dissatisfaction at his own paralysis and inaction, which he externalises onto his child, however when his child bursts into a ‘paroxysm’ of tears he is fillled with shame and regret.

Question 2

What cluster is this story in?

Answer 2

• Adolecence

Question 3

key Characters?

Answer 3

• Little Chandler
• Gallagher
• Little Chandler’s wife
• Baby

Question 4

What is the signficance of the title?

Answer 4

• Symbolises the ephemeral nature of his aspirations, which like a cloud never take form (immaterial)

Question 5

Key conflicts?

Answer 5

• Bleak realism vs romantic idealism.
• Futility of escape (asks the great sisiphean question- should Chandler struggle against fate/paralysis?)
• Domestic obligations vs personalartistic aspirations

Question 6

What style is the story written in?

Answer 6

• Bleak depiction of Dublin life- realism/ naturalism

Question 7

What can you comment about the nature of the stories prose?

Answer 7

• The lofty and romantic prose conveys Chandler’s idealism and poetic aspirations, unrealised potential and tendency to self-delude.

Question 8

Summarise the key symbols in the narrative

Answer 8

• The Baby
• Lord Byron
• City of Dublin, Paris and London
• Bohemian cafe’s, Moulin Rouge
• Light and dark

Question 9

Little Chandler- Characterisation

Answer 9

• A passive dreamer who romantises the arts but lacks the courage to act.
• His false superority masks deep insecurity.
• His emotional repression results in emotional ouburst.

Question 10

Gallagher- Characterisation

Answer 10

• Who- successful journalist who boasts about his life abroad.
• Symbolise freedom, worldy success, hedonism and the lack of personal fulfilment (that even comes with leaving Ireland)

Dubliners are bounded by this paralysis- regardless of whether they leave (cultural problem(

Question 11

Little Chandler’s wife- characterisation?

Answer 11

• Symbolises domestic reality, and the constricting nature of marriage as a loveless insitution.
• Symbolic of the devouring mother
• Her maternal devotion excludes him emotionally.

Question 12

Lord Byron- Symbolism?

Answer 12

• Symbolic parallel- Byron is the idealised version of Chandler, as he repreesents the qualities he represses within himself (sexuality, passion, assertiveness)

Question 13

City of Dublin, Paris, London- symbolism?

Answer 13

• Dublin- Symbol of entrapment, paralysis, provincial, slow-paced juxaposes the cultural excitement, development embodied in the other cities.
• Paris- Symbol of gaeity, liberation and freedom ( to Chandler it represents the normalisation of immorality/cities of vice)
• London- Symbol of cultural advancement, Cosmopolitanism

Question 14

Moulin Rouge/ Bohemiam Cafe’s symbolism

Answer 14

• Cafes- Famous for attracting artists, writers who rejected mainstream bourgeoise society. Symbol of unfettered creativity, intellectual freedom, a world inaccessible to Chandler.
• Moulin Rouge- Decadence, sexual liberation, hedonism.

Question 15

Light and dark symbolism

Answer 15

• “He stood back out of the lamplight” - the lamplight represent clarity, warmth- thus his retreating into the shadows suggests the inverse of these qualities.
• Withdraws into himself- further emphasising paralysis and domestic failure

Question 16

Key themes

Answer 16

1. Moral, intellectual and cultural superority.
2. Futility/ fustration
3. Realism vs romanticsm
4. Friendship
5. Paralysis