I’ve been reading a book called Writing Tools: 50 Essential Strategies for Every Writer by Roy Peter Clark. I’m not ready “to review” it yet, but it made me aware of something that I missed in my review of James Joyce’s short story, Araby.

I missed the whole theme of blindness!

—Which, Roy Peter Clark assures me is a good thing. Well, sort of. Clark advises us to use symbols and not cymbals in our writing. Apparently Joyce was quite a master at this. Good to know as I contemplate reading Ulysses.

For a top-notch analysis of the blindness theme in Araby, visit literaryi1200.wordpress.com/2011/03/01/blindness-in-joyces-araby/

I would not even have delved into this except that Clark points out that Joyce was blind. (An Internet search says he was not completely blind.) I didn’t know any of this!

Missing blindness is kind of odd when I think about it. I’ve been struggling with my eyes lately and my eye doctor even told me that with the amount of reading I do, it’s normal for me to feel like I’m going blind. (oh yay)