Modernist Women

In the Victorian fiction women's characterisation brought all female figures back to the stereotype of the "angel of the house" and represented women as subdued to the dominant male ideology.

The modernist characterisation of women breaks withe the tradition, in particular James Joyce overtake this stereotype analysing women from their own point of view and inner thoughts, feelings, passion, doubts giving the reader a more realistic and less idealistic image of women.

Eveline
In Dubliners on of the most interesting female characters is Eveline, a nineteen-year-old whose personality comes to the surface thanks to a complex vortex of emotions due to the contrast between reality as it is and as she would like it to be: between the monotony of her everyday habits and the research of an escape from the routine, the illusion of a better life, prevented by her fear of the unknown which lead back to the paralysis which mark all the characters of the Dubliners.

But her paralysis, her unability to leave a life she doesn't like, reveals her total submission to her father and to the society which expected women to be domestic angels. Indeed she spent he whole life doing domestic works to please her father which seems more like a master and the society and religion influenced her sense of duty at the point of making her give up on her aspirations.

Refusing Frank's proposal, she chooses a like of loneliness which seems the only possible way in such a patriarchal society even if this compromises the quest of her own identity. Indeed Eveline is still presented as a subjugated woman So she is still associated with the idea of women as "domestic angel"

Gretta Gretta embodies men's fear of women's unfaithfulness and reveals their jealousy and desire of control over women.

Molly Bloom
On the contrary Molly is an unfaithful and uninhibited woman characterised through her own stream of consciousness which puts the reader in direct contact with her thoughts (there is no punctuation and connectors) which proceed by free association and creates in the reader's mind the idea of a manipulative woman perfectly aware of her ability to seduce men.

Molly Bloom is ironically associated with the character of Penelope in Odysseys by Omero, but indeed they are very different: Penelope is the woman in need of protection who waits his husband, while Molly is clearly unfaithful and embodies James Joyce's vision of women: she is firstly sensuous and connected to the idea of fertility (right from her name), but above all she embodies the strong power women have on men.