Raymond Carver What We Talk About Love

Carver’s “A Serious Talk” is another short story that perfectly demonstrates the damaging affects of alcohol addiction on both the addict and those who surround them. In the story, a woman named Vera is visited by her ex-husband Burt, who arrives to give

Carver’s short story “Cathedral” is about a man and a woman who are married. The woman’s blind friend Robert, whose wife just died is coming to stay with them because he plans on visiting his dead wife’s relatives nearby. Robert knew the man’s wife because she worked for him one summer, reading to Robert. The wife and Robert stayed in touch over the years by sending tapes to each other, and letting each other know about what was going on in their lives. When the man hears Robert is coming over he makes idiotic comments about Robert’s wife and felt that Robert would be a burden on them because he is blind. The man and the woman proceed to argue over the situation. The wife tells her husband, “If you had a friend, any friend, and the friend came to visit, I’d make him feel comfortable” (Carver, “Cathedral” 34). The man responds to this by stating, “I don’t have any blind friends” (Carver, “Cathedral” 34). When Robert finally arrives, they converse, drink, and eat together. After, the wife goes upstairs, the man and Robert begin to smoke some weed together. While the wife was sleeping, they start watching TV together and talking. Robert asks the man to explain to him what a cathedral looks like because cathedrals came up on the TV. The man has trouble explaining it and cannot describe to Robert what a cathedral looks like. Then Robert asks the man to draw a cathedral with him. Robert request that the man close his eyes, and they begin to draw. This is where the story ends and it seems that this is when the man became aware of the difficult lives blind people live as he could not explain what a cathedral looked like, and he could not see his drawing.

What is love? How is love express? Where can I find it? All in all, it is obvious to distinguish that love is the essential emotion of human every time and everywhere. Some people may confuse about that, however, it is an arduous job to describe it due to the diversity. Some people believe love likes delicate and charming roses, which makes you stand and appreciate for the admiration. Some people approximates the bright light of the lighthouse, which illuminates the backing way of the sailing people. Some people confirm love equals

Carver lived most of his life in a world which could not provide the luxury of

With a unique and brilliant style of writing, Raymond Carver has left a lasting and outstanding impact on the history of short stories. Even though Raymond Carver left a long impact, his life was of the opposite. Like Raymond Carver’s famous award winning stories, his life was short. Raymond Carver was born on May 25th, 1938 in Clatskanie, Oregon, a mill town on the Columbia River. Carver grew up in Yakima, Washington. Carver had three members to his small family, his mother, his father, and brother. Carver’s only had one sibling, his younger brother, James Franklin Carver. Carver’s mother worked as a waitress and a retail clerk while Carver’s father worked as a fisherman and a saw mill worker. Many say that a skilled sawmill worker and

After analyzing Raymond Carver's "What We Talk About When We Talk About Love," it is easy to see that there are several different ideas concerning true love that the characters in the story are in dispute over. Terri's idea of real love is the most valid out of the group at the table. All of the members of the group are rather confused as to what real love is. Terri is included as one of the confused. However, I believe that she is the closest to understanding what love is. A key piece of evidence demonstrating her understanding of love is her remark to Laura and Nick. She scolds the couple for basing their relationship on physical aspects, rather than emotion or passion. Terri, like the rest of the party, is on her second marriage.

In Raymond Carver’s story “What We Talk About When We Talk About Love,” there is a wide array of opinions concerning the true definition of love. I believe that the character with the most absurd idea of love is Mel. Mel is Terri’s second husband. He claims to only believe in spiritual love. In his past, Mel spent “five years in seminary.” This is obviously what he bases his idea upon. Mel declares that if he could go back in time, he would enjoy being a knight in armor to shield him from other people. This reveals to me that Mel is emotionally closed off and concealed from other people. Furthermore, as seen through his wife, Terri, Mel does not have the passion inside him that is necessary to experience love. The only love that Mel does experience is the love toward his children, but that is love in a different sense. Loving his children is a natural instinct. They are born into his care, and are made with his own blood. His love for them was not searched for. It just came to be when they were born. Mel’s relationship with Terri, or any other women that he may have encountered in the past is distant and indifferent as to who they are inside. Mel’s ideas toward love are

Throughout history there have always been politicians, successful businessmen and many other people with authority who have turned out to be quite different from their facade. Why, honey? is a short story by Raymond Carver. The story is about a mother who writes a letter about her ‘evil’ son to an anonymous person. During his childhood he showed many signs of dishonesty, and only got worse when he grew older.

In literature, authors may get inspiration from real life events. For Raymond Carver, rather than writing about his own life, he wrote fictional stories, poems and books, but each can relate to his personal experiences. Alcohol plays a dominant part in Carver’s life, from child to adult. Due to this, his texts revolve around alcohol in some form, most often an alcoholic main character. Through Carver’s writing, he displays family tensions often as a result of alcoholism. Sara Kornfeld Simpson, instructor at Boston University, states that in Carver’s short stories “alcohol serves as a social lubricant that diminishes inhibitions, which allows hidden tensions and emotions to emerge.” (Simpson). Raymond Carver’s personal experience with alcoholism led him to create fictional texts that revolve around alcohol and have characters that may reflect his personal life, leading into his career as a writer.

McManus, Dermot. “Cathedral by Raymond Carver.” The Sitting Bee, The Sitting Bee, 25 Dec. 2013, sittingbee.com/cathedral-raymond-carver/. Accessed 9 Feb. 2017.

A story is at its best, when after reading the story the reader stays pondering about it. This happened to me when I read a short story called Why, honey? by Raymond Carver. It is centered around the relationship between mother and son, whose names are not mentioned . Themes of the story are truth and fear, and there is no “they lived happily ever after ”- kind of ending.

Love cannot be defined in one sentence or even a paragraph. Every human has his or her own definition of love because people usually define love based on their cultures, backgrounds, social classes, educations, and their societies. In this essay, the main point will be the different kinds of love that Carver illustrates in his story “What We Talk about When We Talk about Love.” In Carver’s story, there are some points that I can relate to my personal experience. There are a few characteristics and symbols in the story that are really important to understand in order to define what a real love is and find the intention thrown out the story. These characteristics includes, Mel, Terri and Ed and Terri’s relationship. Furthermore, symbols

   Love is one of the most confusing emotions that one can experience. It is simple yet complicated, unconditional but demanding, overused and unique. It is hard to explain what its means to feel love, to feel loved, or to be in love, however, there are aspects of love that are easily expressed. For example, ones unquestionable affection to the one they love, or the hardships and sacrifice that is endured for loved ones, and the underlying fact that once it is experienced it is not easily dismissed. The play Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller describes love in just these ways, and, most of all, as the ultimate moral value that is the eternal bond that keeps people together. One can

Love is also defined in the dictionary as "strong affection," "warm attachment," and "unselfish loyal and benevolent concern for others" (439). All of these definitions are completely correct, but the dictionary does not explain how it feels to love someone. The reason that an explanation for this feeling is not found in the dictionary may be because love is so different for each individual person. In my experience, "strong affection" does not even begin to cover the sensation and emotions a person feels when he or she is in love. Love is compared to "the extraordinary sun / splashing its light / into astonished trees" in Denise Levertov's "Love Poem" (2-4). Like the sun, love is great and bright and fills a person with extreme joy. Love is greater than anything else a person could ever experience. A lover can even be better than a summer's day, as the speaker in Shakespeare's poem suggests. He compares his lover to a summer's day by saying that she is "more

“Where I’m Calling From” by Raymond Carver is a short story about a man’s struggle with Alcoholism, and his encounters at a drying-out facility or treatment center. The story itself seems very straight forward in the way it’s presented, 3rd person perspective, narrative writing style, realism (ENotes.com), but in actuality there’s a lot more to the story. The story displays numerous themes such as the narrators own self-destruction, his fight to overcome his addiction, and his possible feelings of regret and responsibility. Carver also uses tone, imagery, and symbolism to take the audience to places they might not experience in their own life. This short story by Raymond Carver is worth analyzing because there’s much more to it than what is on the surface, from the numerous themes presented throughout the story, to the use of imagery and symbolism to drive the story through its stages.