Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man Quote analysis.

"Is a chair finely made tragic or comic? Is the portrait of Mona Lisa good if I desire to see it? Is the bust of Sir Philip Crampton lyrical, epical, or dramatic? Can excrement or a child or a louse be a work of art? If not,why not?" Page 232

This to me is the point in the novel where Stephen is really reaching his enlightenment as an artist. He had a mentally challenging childhood in which he questioned many things that most people would just accept without second thought. He was challenged with accepting his loss of innocence and his alienation from his country, family, and church. He questioned did any of this really matter, and now he is looking at the aesthetics of things. If a chair can be categorized as art much like a painting or a play. He pulls out the question of what the maker may have gone through to create the chair, if it was just quickly done without a thought or if passion was put into it, does that determine it comic or tragic? Is art something that makes you feel, something you want to see, something that maybe you don't want to see. Is excrement or a child or a louse a work of art? We do not usually say these things are but why? An image of a child may be beautiful or a louse may be tragic and show squalor and poverty. This quote embodies the issue that Joyce works up to address, the true meaning of art and the thought process that goes with.