"Gazing up into the darkness I saw myself as a creature driven and derided by vanity, and my eyes burned with anguish and anger." This last passage from the story "Araby" by James Joyce from Dubliners has a great amount of significance in showing and telling us the theme of the story. The theme that emerges out of this final image of despair at the end of "Araby" is hopelessness and entrapment because the story shows the narrator, who remains unknown, feels trapped and does not have a sense of identity due to the endless routine given in the environment he lives in. The narrator feels a sense of imprisonment, which leads to trying to escape Dublin and chase a dream that is unrealistic to obtain by talking to a girl that he admires. The narrator comes to a realization that he can not have an ideal life, in the sense of finding love and experiencing new things that most people want; rather he learns to accepts the life he has, which cannot be changed. .
The boy's surroundings played a major role to his frustration of having the feeling of confinement due to his endless routine he lives everyday. This is why he refers in the story that North Richmond Street, is "being blind," meaning he's never seen anything more than what his community has to offer. Due to the fact that he lives in a two story house at a dead end, which in turns leaves him to feel isolated from society because of he is detachment from neighbors. Since he feels this emptiness, it enables him to live an endless routine of doing nothing, leading him from gaining any new experiences as he wishes too. He developed this paralysis of immobility in not moving forward with his life and not achieving his true desires. His surroundings have pushed him to make a difference in his life because he is unhappy in the situation he is in, especially with his obsession over the Mangan girl and wanting to go to the bazaar.
The narrator gains courage in making his escape from the dull life his has in Dublin by not only observing what is going on around him, but actually making changes and living his life the way he wants too.