I'm translating a story (the Dubliners by James Joyce) and there's a boy who hears that his friend is dead but he's not sure. Next day he goes to his house and sees a cart which proves that his friend is dead. So the boy says: "I was disturbed to find myself at check."
I want the meaning of the sentence in quotation.
2007-07-06 09:49:41 · 4 answers · asked by speedo 3 in Arts & Humanities ➔ Books & Authors
The story you're referring to is "The Sisters," the first in the collection. The boy who narrates the story has befriended a priest, Father Flynn. Some of his relatives haven't approved of the friendship, and at the beginning of the story, as they reveal that the old priest has died, they voice their disapproval, much to the boy's annoyance.
The boy visits the house (actually a shop in which the priest had a room where he was cared-for by his sisters) and discovers a "card" -- not a "cart" -- on the door, formally announcing the death. The sentence you're referring to is: "The reading of the card persuaded me that he was dead and I was disturbed to find myself at check." He goes on to add: "Had he not been dead I would have gone into the little dark room behind the shop to find him sitting in his arm-chair by the fire, nearly smothered in his great-coat."
Clearly the phrase "at check" has at least two meanings here: one, that the boy is stopped at a door he ordinarily enters. As in a chess game, no further moves are possible. The second (and related) meaning is that the boy's usual feelings are stopped -- in fact, his relationship with the priest who was acting as a kind of mentor to the boy is now over, abruptly "checked." The priest had hoped to convince the boy to eventually enter the priesthood, and that was frowned upon by the boy's relatives (they seem to feel it's "unmanly" and a little too intellectual.)
The rest of the story is concerned with the boy (who oddly virtually disappears from the narrative) reconsidering his own feelings for the old man and the priesthood.
2007-07-09 15:32:20 · answer #1 · answered by warnwood06 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
It's difficult to say with out knowing the context. Can you tell us what's going on in the scene?
2007-07-06 17:02:24 · answer #2 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
not sure friend dead by evidence of gun and is eitheer of accused by giving weapon or feels like responsible by conscious that caused or drove person to it or maybe the killer who knows
2007-07-06 17:29:19 · answer #3 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
more definition
2007-07-06 17:28:07 · answer #4 · answered by navid_blue2005 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋