Gabriel Conroy in the story “The Dead” in James Joyce's masterpiece novel The Dubliners goes through an incredible transformation. Gabriel starts out as a self-centered and selfish person towards those around him, and especially his wife. He is constantly worried about what others think of him and his superiority over people. Gabriel treats his wife Gretta like a child and sees his relationship with her only through himself. However, through his wife's confession about her former lover Michael Furey, Gabriel has an epiphany that changes his entire outlook on life. At the end of the story, Gabriel's "generous tears" reflect a changed and better man. Gabriel, throughout the story, considers himself superior to those around him. The first quote Gabriel has in the story, states, “I will try, they did, Gabriel said, but they forget that my wife here takes three deadly hours to get dressed” (153). Gabriel here twice imposes superiority over women. The first time he waits for Miss Kate and Miss Julia to worry about his arrival because he is so important to them. The second case is aimed at his wife as she takes so much time to prepare, as if she were just a child to him. Moments later, Gabriel again makes this narcissistic claim: "Gabriel smiled at the three syllables she (Lily) had given to his last name and looked at her" (154). The smile indicates pleasure in Lily's accent which is indicative of her lower class like Gabriel, something he is proud of. To delve deeper into this socio-economic hierarchy that Gabriel is so fond of, he later thinks, “The indelicate click of the men's heels and the shuffle of their soles remind him that their degree of culture was different… half of the paper.. .is no longer the face for which Michael Furey had defied death” (193) and one can see that Gabriel knows that Gretta has not died in the full glory of some passion, but is rather withering sadly with age Le Gabriel's generous tears were those of pain and sadness towards his wife, which is completely contradictory to his aforementioned personality Gabriel, stuck in his self-centered and narcissistic mind, had his eyes opened by his wife Gretta and has began to feel emotions towards others. Gabriel listened to the story of Furey and his wife and realized that he was no different from anyone else through the epiphany of death is inevitable for Gabriel, Gretta, Julia and everyone anyone else he has come into contact with. Gabriel is a changed and better man by the end of the tale. Just as the snow fell outside Gabriel's window, it covered the ground where Michael Fury was buried.