The soul of the artist in A Portrait of the Artist as a Young ManWhile A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by James Joyce unfolds , the protagonist Stephen Dedalus The personal vision is getting closer and closer to that of an "artist". Stephen attempts throughout the story to understand the inspiration he receives while being plagued by influences that seem to distract him. Stephen's thoughtful approach to his experiences leads him through his troubled youth to a refined understanding of his feelings about art. After explicitly stating his aesthetic theories, Stephen composes a villanelle whose classically Joycean structure and diction implicitly represent Stephen's entire story. Once the parallel is established, it becomes clear that the poem – and especially its recurring lines – represent the epiphany for Stephen in terms of self-discovery. In composing the villanelle, Stephen – at this point a raw and untested visionary – frees himself from the distractions of religion and sexuality to begin to grow specifically into his perceived role as the creator of his race's consciousness.***The structure of the villanelle of Stephen as a whole – from the construction of the verse to its length – is the first step towards a sense of A Portrait's overall purpose. Let us first consider why Joyce chose the villanelle as Stephen's method of communication. The aba rhyme scheme of this type of poetry, with not only final vowel sounds but entire lines recurring, forces the composer into a very narrow and orderly narrative space. Stephen's definition of art includes a "cadence" and a sense of fluidity (483). From this it is reasonable to conclude that this piece, with a strong rhythm and a fluid style, is the protagonist "... half of the paper ... sum" from stanza to stanza in the villanelle is, therefore, a representation of its growth over the course of the novel: moments of brilliant insight peppered through a slow (and still ongoing) process of growth – as at the end of the villanelle, Stephen returns to the first-person lyric style in his diary in the final section. Stephen's villanelle, as evidenced above all by his repeated rejection of ardor and enchantment, allows the protagonist to remove two troublesome distractions from his imagination as he begins to work toward the religionless, asexual soul of an artist "refined outside 'existence, indifferent, cutting the nails' (483).Nores:1-4 Merriam Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, tenth edition. Merriam-Webster, 1994.All other quotes from Joyce, James. The Portable James Joyce, ed. Harry Levin. New York: Penguin Books, 1976.