How old is the narrator of "Araby" when he tells the story?

James Joyce's The Dubliners, which he wrote as a "stages
of man," has three stories devoted to the following
stages:

1. childhood


2. adolescence


3. mature
   life


4. public life


5. married
   life, which is inserted between adolescence and mature
   life.

"Araby" falls into the adolescent stage,
a stage in which the teen characters are all failures.  In the first paragraph of this
story, the narrator describes North Richmond Street, which is quiet until the Christian
Brothers' School sets the "boys free."  As he continues his description of his
neighborhood, the narrator describes his play with the other boys; they shout and play
"till our bodies glowed." Mangan's sister, for whom the narrator has an imaginative
infatuation calls her brother in for "his tea."  Later, when she speaks to the narrator,
he remarks,

readability="5">

When she addressed the first words to me I was so
confused that I did not know what to
answer.

The narrator's
 immaturity is clearly indicated by his play and his confusion when he does talk to
Mangan's sister, and it is suggested by the romanticized concept of love that he
constructs as the Arthurian knight pursuring "the grail," as well as his burgeoning
sexual feelings as he lies on the floor in the front parlour where he peeks through the
blind, watching her.  These indications, therefore, point to the narrator as a boy in
the early stages of adolescence.