The novel’s first scene shows an infant Stephen listening to his father’s nonsense fairy tale. Stephen’s thoughts and memories careen wildly – from a woman that sells candy on the street, to his mother’s warm smell, to his governess Dante’s brushes, to his neighbor Eileen. In the next scene, an older Stephen is in his first year of school at Clongowes; he is playing outside with the other boys and longing for the warmth and peace of study hall. He wakes up with a cold the next day and spends some time in the infirmary, where he hears that the Irish nationalist Parnell has died.