Born in 1882 to a horticulturalist in Dublin, James Joyce attended the premiere boys' schools and the best colleges in England, all to end up writing about Ireland. In Joyce's short story, "A Little Cloud," a little man named Little Chandler finds himself the victim of a minor character and her womanly antics. Through small words and phrases, befitting the petite character, Chandler details his wife's dominating role in his life.

Annie, the wife, makes her presence known early on in the story as Chandler relives his bachelor days of poetry reading in the parlor which she squelched by making him shy and intimating that she does not like poetry. "[H]e had been tempted to take one down from the bookshelf and read out something to his wife. But shyness had always held him back; so the books had remained on their shelves. At times he repeated lines...