t relates to character and setting. "Araby" begins with the evocation of a childish experience of a dingy environment, followed by his romantic attachment to a girl, and ending with the visit to the Araby bazaar. In this story, the boy achieves a revelation that marks the end of childhood, and the shift to adolescence. The narrator is a boy who seems to be remembering these days from some distance in time. He has reached the time of life when he is changing from child to adolescent, and this is represented by his attraction to Mangan's sister, whose image stays with him. The image is more potent for the boy than the reality, and it is an image of escape from his own life. The underlying theme of the story is escape, but escape not in reality but in fantasy. The bazaar Araby is an escape from the decay of the city just as the boys escape from the confines of school every afternoon. Araby becomes the goal for
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