Sentence No. 88 · 23 June 2026
Better pass boldly into that other world, in the full glory of some passion, than fade and wither dismally with age
James Joyce, Dubliners
James Joyce — Dubliners (1914) · Read it at Project Gutenberg
What holds this sentence together
The sentence runs on an implied comparative: "Better pass boldly into that other world" is set against "than fade and wither dismally with age." When "Better" opens a phrase, hunt for the "than" phrase to find where the second half begins.
How it appears in Sentle
On Sentle this sentence arrives in 6 pieces, shuffled, with the lines that lead up to it for context. A man lies awake beside his sleeping wife, contemplating mortality. Putting it back in the author’s order is the puzzle — and the order is rarely arbitrary, which is what the note above is about.
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