Eveline's Paralysis

Eveline is a typical girl that is contemplating the decision of whether to stay in her safe life that is the only one she has ever known, or to try and escape her past and run away with Frank. In keeping with the style of the Joycean Epiphany, Eveline has a sudden realization that she be happy and escape the pain of her past, only to be later brought back down to the mundane (the realization that she cannot leave). Eveline really wants to escape with Frank, but is stopped for many reasons. The first thing stopping her is that she does not actually love Frank, and the other is the realization that her past is all she has to define her character. Originally Eveline thinks Frank is the cure all to her painful and uninteresting life, but she realizes on the dock that she is who she is because of her hometown and because of her past. Moving to a new place won't change her, and if anything it will just further isolate her from any happiness of sense of place she has. Memories of the field, her mother, and her past, as well as obligations to her father and the need to keep a promise to her mother ultimately stop Eveline. Despite the fact that it is an incredibly difficult decision, Eveline's internal realization that she has too much invested in her home to ever leave it changes her originally eager run away from home into a frozen stance of paralysis.