The Horses of "Araby"

Abstract

While the image of a “ponytail” comes readily to mind—and frescoes of Greek women displaying that hairstyle date back as early as 1600 b.c.— the word did not appear until 1916. However, the movement of Mangan’s sister’s dress and body is suggestive of the sway of a horse, and the swing of her hair is much like that of a horse’s tail; those descriptions are not accidental. In retrospect, perhaps even the smoothing and combing of the horse hints at an unspoken desire by the boy in the story to do likewise with Mangan’s sister’s dark hair. In any event, the fact that “mangan” is a Gaelic word meaning “abundant hair” lends further emphasis to a careful construction of the paragraph’s strong associative allusions. Joyce’s unique ability here to distill beauty from the decay of Dublin’s ashpits, and find music in the quotidian work of the stables, sensitizes him to other forms