A man transcends those things that compose him, greater than the sum of his parts; but, suppose a man builds himself off of a foundation of lies, to himself and to others. Mr. Duffy of “A Painful Case” and Gabriel of “The Dead” serve as chief examples of this deception by living lives designed to impress upon others a view of a certain kind of man: one versed in matters of the mind and of society. They both engage with women betrothed, by oath or soul, to others, they dislike Dublin and her people, and they both find that they simply aren’t the men whom they believed themselves to be.
A man may think himself the archangel, when he merely fails to see that he forgot to get out of character; so it is, also, with those seeking the title “übermensch.” …show more content…
Duffy keeps the works of Wordsworth buried beneath his terse, commanding religious script and some assorted works of Friedrich Nietzsche, a suppression of an ever-present romanticism so as to hold more highly those works that emphasize the individual and their need to rise above all others. He lives separate from Dublin, in the small village of Chapelizod, as “he wished to live as far as possible from the city of which he was a citizen and because he found all the other suburbs of Dublin mean, modern and pretentious.” Yet again, he shows his disdain for his fellow common man. But, Mr.Duffy cannot deny his humanity for some superhuman ideal, he bares the limitations of man and his fickle mind; he cannot live up to those things he wishes to become. His readings show his desire to leave behind man and ascend to something greater, but then he comes to meet a woman who seems to fit into his world: one that would listen quietly and attentively until they would give some input that please him and stimulate his intellect. Upon this woman’s total acceptance of him, he realized that he strove alone in that world for high-minded, rugged individualism and moved to separate himself from her. Unlike a man above the masses, though, Mr. Duffy feels a void crept into his soul upon hearing of her
A man may think himself the archangel, when he merely fails to see that he forgot to get out of character; so it is, also, with those seeking the title “übermensch.” …show more content…
Duffy keeps the works of Wordsworth buried beneath his terse, commanding religious script and some assorted works of Friedrich Nietzsche, a suppression of an ever-present romanticism so as to hold more highly those works that emphasize the individual and their need to rise above all others. He lives separate from Dublin, in the small village of Chapelizod, as “he wished to live as far as possible from the city of which he was a citizen and because he found all the other suburbs of Dublin mean, modern and pretentious.” Yet again, he shows his disdain for his fellow common man. But, Mr.Duffy cannot deny his humanity for some superhuman ideal, he bares the limitations of man and his fickle mind; he cannot live up to those things he wishes to become. His readings show his desire to leave behind man and ascend to something greater, but then he comes to meet a woman who seems to fit into his world: one that would listen quietly and attentively until they would give some input that please him and stimulate his intellect. Upon this woman’s total acceptance of him, he realized that he strove alone in that world for high-minded, rugged individualism and moved to separate himself from her. Unlike a man above the masses, though, Mr. Duffy feels a void crept into his soul upon hearing of her