Now I'm going to carry out the denotative analysis of "Eveline"

"Eveline" is a short story, from Dubliners, written by James Joyce.

Considering the title I expect the short story to speak about a woman or a girl whose name is Eveline. Reading the text I understand that the protagonist of the story is Eveline ,which is a girl of about 19 years old who lives in Dublin. So the short story tells about adolescence.

The other main character are: her father, her mother, her brothers and sisters (her family) and Frank who is her lover.

The story starts with  Eveline watching out of her home's window. She starts thinking about her past. She remembers her childhood and , in particular, the field where she used to play with her brothers and sisters and with the neighbour's children.

Her brothers and sisters are grown up and they don't  live there anymore, her mother is dead and the Waters, a family who lived near there, had gone back to England. Many things were changed and now she is going to go away like the others. She has got the intention to leave home, even if we don't know where she wants to go.

 Eveline hates her job at the Stores and Miss Gavan, her employer.

Her life in Dublin is a hard life, she is sad and she afraid of her father's violence .In her new home instead it would  not be  like that ,she would be married and people would treat her respect.

At this point, it is revealed the name of the mysterious person that Eveline should marry. This person is Frank, he is a sailor and Eveline describes him as a very kind man. She wants to go with him to Buenos Aires in order to start a new, better life. Eveline's father found out the affair, but he didn't like this situation and he didn't want Eveline to meet Frank.

She remembers the last night of her mother's illness: Eveline has promised her mother to look after the family and in particular to look after her father who is always drunk. Eveline is unable to act and to make decisions because she still feels connected to this promise. She doesn't know what to do.

The story has a unhappy conclusion: she is unable to take a decision and at the end the boat leaves and Eveline misses the opportunity to change her situation leaving with her boyfriend.