‘‘Eveline’’
STEVEN DOLOFF
In the Dubliners story ‘‘Eveline,’’ Joyce invites a comparison between his
protagonist and the seventeenth-century French saint Margaret Mary Alacoque
(1647–1690) through a reference to a ‘‘coloured print’’ observed on
Eveline Hill’s wall of the redemptive ‘‘promises’’ made to followers of
the liturgical devotions prescribed in the nun’s visions (D 37). Against
Alacoque’s spiritual life of voluntary chastity and self-sacrifice (ecclesiastically
sanctified by her beatification [1864] and canonization [1920]), Eveline’s
discomfiting self-denial for her family appears a sad waste, less
virtuously chosen on her part than imposed by paternal intimidation and
manipulation.1 Scholars have proposed additional influences upon the
composition of this story, but there may be one, as yet overlooked, to be
found in a book listed in Joyce’s library, Franc¸ois Rene´ de Chateaubriand’s
novelette Atala (1801).2
Chateaubriand, the Gallic writer most influential in the nineteenthcentury
romanticization of Catholicism, first gained his literary notoriety
with the publication of Atala, a tragic tale of love and Christian faith
among the American Indians during colonial times. The story was later
included in the author’s highly popular apologia for Christian faith, Ge´nie
du Christianisme (1802), which made him the most prominent French
writer of his day.3
In the story, a Natchez brave, Chactas, is captured by an enemy tribe
in Florida. About to be tortured, he escapes through the assistance of a
princess of that tribe, Atala, who is a Christian. The two flee through the
forest, get caught in a storm, and are rescued by a Christian missionary,
Father Aubry. Atala and Chactas are in love, but his heathen faith and
the hint of some painful ‘‘secret’’ she harbors obstruct their happiness.
250 sworn and fo rlorn
When Chactas agrees to accept Christianity, their problem seems resolvable,
but then he and Father Aubry find Atala has...