Question

What symbolism is found in this excerpt from James Joyce's "Araby"? North Richmond Street, being blind, was a quiet street except at the hour when the Christian Brothers' School set the boys free. An uninhabited house of two storeys stood at the blind end, detached from its neighbours in a square ground. The other houses of the street, conscious of decent lives within them, gazed at one another with brown imperturbable faces.

Answer 1

The description of the neighborhood, it describes a cold, worn-down, neighborhood, that could symbolize a prison, based on the first sentence that had to do with setting people free. The neighborhood is decribed as stony and "imperturbable" so it could also mean that the school symbolizes freedom and the neighborhood means imprisonment, or capture. Of course, this is only based off f what I have just read, I haven't actually ever read the book.

Answer 2

Answer:

"The boys being set free symbolizes them being free from the rules of the school". And "The blind street symbolizes the aimless and drab life on North Richmond Street."