This chapter, the longest and most intricately analytical section of the novel, examines the influences (family, country, and religion) which have shaped Stephen's life thus far. It shows Stephen stripping himself, layer by layer, of each of the confining shackles which restrict his maturing artistic soul.
Unlike previous sections of the novel, this chapter is written in a lyrical and fragmented, discursive style. It reveals Stephen's metamorphosis into an artist as he rambles from subject to subject in an attempt to resolve his conflicts, and it summarizes Stephen's experiences thus far. Finally, we see Stephen putting them into perspective before he liberates himself in order to pursue his future as an artist living abroad — free from family country, and religion.
When the chapter begins, we see a parallel between the pile of pawn tickets and Stephen's pawning his integrity for a blind, unexamined loyalty to family, country, and religion. Stephen feels that his life has a profound purpose — ironic, really, in view of the pile of pawn tickets before him and his seemingly hopeless, humble beginnings. As he leaves for the university, his soul is battered by the sound of "his father's whistle, his mother's mutterings, and the screech of an unseen maniac" (a mad nun crying, "Jesus! O Jesus! Jesus!"). In this brief scene, Joyce gives life to the three forces which Stephen wants to free himself from — his family, his country, and his religion. We see Stephen's father's ever-demanding egotism (a symbol of family); we feel the oppression of Stephen's mother's continuous, submissive martyrdom (a symbol of country); and finally, we hear the irrational, lost call of a nun (a symbol of religion). Desperate to escape these three restraints which chain his restless soul to a subservient, doomed future, Stephen commits himself irrevocably to freedom, vowing to escape beyond the "echoes" of the voices which "threaten to humble the pride of his youth."
