awakens a sense of freedom in Stephen that he will not be able to suppress later on in the novel, he still cannot help but feel overwhelming guilt about what he has done. At the retreat, he listens to Father Arnell’s sermon about hell that seems to be targeted directly at him, turning his tremendous guilt into fear. He has failed to avoid sin and for that he will suffer the most horrible fate that anyone could ever imagine…spending eternity in hell. He feels so ashamed that he is unable to repent in his own church at Clongowes, but rather wishes to find a place as far removed from the college as possible. This shame and guilt makes him vulnerable when the director at Clongowes confronts him about becoming a priest. He envisions the power he would have and thinks that if he were a priest that his superior piety would save him from the wrath of hell. For him it seemed the only plausible escape. His experience with the prostitute is essential in Stephen’s reanalysis of his attraction to Emma Clery. He realizes now that her flirtatious gestures were not reserved for him alone, and he suspected that she flaunted her charm to many men. He becomes angry at the idea that women did not remain pure for their own sake, but only out of their religious fear that their souls would be damned if they sinned against the church. This point seems to be the height of Stephen’s confusion until his encounter with the Bird Girl, the final step in his complete transfiguration into the artist.While waiting for his father outside the publichouse, Stephen wandered on to Bull to reflect and to escape the anxiety he felt waiting to hear word about the university. He heard a few of his classmates calling out to him and the sounds of his own name made him think of the mythical Dedalus. Like the myth, Stephen wanted to fly up like a bird. This may be a foreshadowing of Stephen’s leaving Ireland and flying past the “net...
