Dubliners

Dubliners is a collection of fifteen short stories all set in Dublin and all featuring classic Irish characters:

“The Sisters”
“An Encounter”
“Araby”
“Eveline”
“After the Race”
“Two Gallants”
“The Boarding House”
“A Little Cloud”
“Counterparts”
“Clay”
“A Painful Case”
“Ivy Day in the Committee Room”
“A Mother”
“Grace”
“The Dead”

I remember reading this collection of stories long ago, and I remember that the stories surprised me with the memorable characters and unexpected plots.

I was not quite as taken with the stories or the characters this time. Did I remember what was going to happen? Is that what led to my disappointment with the second reading of Dubliners? Or was it simply that I am at a point in my life where I hope to find some characters who have admirable qualities in the pages of the books I read, and this did not happen? I'm not sure what happened, but I didn't connect as strongly with the plight of the characters or with the difficulties of the characters' lives on this read.