Review Of Raymond Carver's Cathedral

Everyone at one point has judged a book by its cover. In the short story, “Cathedral”, Raymond Carver creates a narrator who bases off ideas and assumptions about blind people from movies. The narrator has never interacted with a blind person before the day where his wife invites her friend, who is named Robert, to stay. The narrator and Robert have never met, but the narrator has a strong dislike towards Robert before meeting. The narrator’s closed-mindedness and misconceptions leads him to judge Robert, however after a few hours of interaction, the narrator learns more about him and grows to have a new perspective about people not being who they think they are.

Often as apart of the Hero's journey, the main character or characters undergo a journey in which the way they see the world is changed. In Raymond Carver’s ‘Cathedral’, the narrator is troubled by Robert’s, his wife’s friend, visit and blindness. Through the narrative the narrator obliviousness is transformed. ‘A General in the Library’ By Italo Calvino, demonstrates how General Fedina and his officials overcome censorship and suppression through knowledge and the transformative power of books. In ‘A General in the Library’ By Italo Calvino and Raymond Carver’s ‘Cathedral’, both protagonists undergo obstacles resulting in a change of perspective after impromptus event that alters their lives and precipitates an

In this short story by Raymond Carver begins with a man whose wife invited a good friend over named Robert and is blind. Before Roberts Arrival, the wife’s husband, whose name is Bub, does not know what to make out of his wife’s good friend Robert coming over to their house. Carver utilizes a story of a blind man who changes Bub’s outlook in life. Through the narrators changing character, theme of loneliness and jealousy, and the cathedral being a symbol at the end of the story, this brings together a powerful message in the story when one blind man and one man with sight share an evening together drawing out a cathedral.

In “Cathedral” by Raymond Carver which shows a narrators insight and reflection of himself by gaining better perspective and knowledge of Robert. At first the narrator's attitude towards Robert coming to visit his wife exhibits a lot of close-mindedness. He purely judges the fact that Robert is blind and how his only idea of blindness comes from “movies” (Carver 105). The narrator initially is fearful of meeting a blind man due to his experience of never meeting one. Before meeting Robert, the narrator and his wife get in a argument. The narrator goes on to say “I don’t have any blind friends”, which causes the wife to lash back to say “You don’t have any friends” (Carver

“Cathedral” by Raymond Carver is a story that shows the sense of sight in relation to vision, but it shows that the sense of sight requires a much deeper engagement. The narrator, who Robert calls “Bub,” is astonishingly shortsighted or “blind” while the blind man is insightful and perceptive. Bub is not blind, but Robert is. Therefore, he assumes that he is superior to Robert. His assumption correlates with his idea that Robert is unable to make a female happy, nor is he able to have a normal life. Bub is convinced his ability to see is everything. So, he fails to look deeper than the surface and is why he doesn’t know his wife adequately. However, Robert sees much deeper than the narrator, although he cannot look at the surface. Robert’s ability to look deeper helps him understand through his listing and sense of touch. Throughout Robert’s visit, the narrator reveals he is closed minded and exposes how he views life in general. Bub is clobbered and it brings him to the epiphany that his views about Robert are actually a mirror image of how he views his life. His epiphany is shown through the author's use of appearance vs reality, irony, and vernacular dialogue; which shows Bub’s preconceived notations, the connection formed between Bub and Robert, and how out of obliviousness Bub gained insight.

Raymond Carver’s characters were considered to be very much like him: “’on the edge: of poverty, alcoholic self-destruction, loneliness” (Mays 32). His short story “Cathedral” is about a young couple, who have a visitor coming to stay with them. This visitor, Robert, is the wife’s friend, and he is blind. The narrator, the husband, has never met someone who is blind, was bothered by that. To him, being blind meant constantly needing help from others. His depiction of blindness was what he has seen in the movies. “I wasn’t enthusiastic about his visit… A blind man in my house was not something I looked forward to,” he tells the reader (Carver 32). His wife on the other hand, was very happy to see her old friend. She had worked for Robert

“Cathedral” written by Raymond Carver is a short story that unfolds as a first-person narrative of the main character named Bub. The story beautifully depicts the process of an individual who transforms from a person with lack of knowledge and ignorant towards knowledgeable soul, due to an encounter with his wife’s blind friend Robert, to an individual that is enlightened. The cathedral, in this story, is a mere subject brought up at the end of this story which becomes the object of Bub's enlightenment. “Cathedral,” tells a tale of Bub who through a blind man receives an eye-opening experience. The narrator starts off as intolerable, but towards the end of the story, with the assistance of a blind man makes him open-minded. Bub is clobbered and drives him to the epiphany of, how he views Robert mirrors how views his life. His epiphany is shown through the author's by the narrator’s jealousy, the consumption of alcohol, food, cannabis, and Bub’s wife falling asleep; which shows the narrator’s preconceived notations, the connection formed between Bub and Robert, and how out of obliviousness Bub gained insight.

In Raymond Carver's "Cathedral," the husband's view of blind men is changed when he encounters his wife's long time friend, Robert. His narrow minded views and prejudice thoughts of one stereotype are altered by a single experience he has with Robert. The husband is changed when he thinks he personally sees the blind man's world. Somehow, the blind man breaks through all of the husband's jealousy, incompetence for discernment, and prejudgments in a single moment of understanding.

The short story “Cathedral”, by Raymond Carver, is a thought provoking piece that focuses on the transition a man goes through to see the world with his soul. The story gives hope that people can change if given the chance to be better people. Over the course of the story, Carver uses both diction and description to explore themes in religion and morality.

In Raymond Carver’s “Cathedral”, the short story is told by a character within the story. The first-person point of view gives us a transparent visual of an important time in the narrators’ life. The narrator, who is “un-named” in the beginning of the story, uses blunt, flawless and a particular choice of words. This gives us as the reader a deeper connection with the narrator. The narrator begins this story by taking us through the changes he go through with the uneasy feeling of having a blind-man coming to his house to visit.

Cathedral is a capitivating story based on the lives of the narrator, his wife and a blind man. Raymond Carver is the author of this story, and he does an excellent job allowing the reader to delve into the lives of these characters. Through using the thoughts of the narrator, the reader is able to grab our attention because the story is made more realistic. The views expressed by the narrator in many senses exemplify the views of many in society and therefore the reader is able to make an emotional connection through the story.

We often perceive sight as our immediate and best tool for understanding the world around us, when in fact, it is not. There are other methods of understanding that go beyond our senses, methods that most people are unable to comprehend. In his short story “Cathedral”, Raymond Carver uses point of view to suggest that there are ways to perceive and understand something beyond just seeing it. In fact, Carver suggests not only that sight is only the most basic level of understanding, but also that true understanding comes from a feeling that is not one of any our five senses.

One of the Raymond Carver story where we can find a lot of religion symbols; it is “Cathedral.” The story develops an ironic situation in which a blind man teaches a sighted man to truly “see” for the first time. Near the end of the story, Carver has these two characters work together on a drawing of a cathedral, which serves as the symbolic heart of the story. The cathedral represents true sight, the ability to see beyond the surface to the true meaning that lies within. The narrator’s drawing of a cathedral has opened a door for him into a deeper place in his own world, where he can see beyond what is immediately visible. This story adds to our understanding of not only looking at the surface of things but to take a deeper look at things that are not always laid out.

In the “Cathedral,” Raymond Carver tried to portray two different aspects of blindness; one is a person who physically unable to see the world due to lack of eyes and other aspect concerns about narrator’s and his wife’s blindness who are not blind physical but socially and emotionally. In this story, there are various metaphors of blindness. One example of which is a blind person helping the other person (who is not visually impaired) to draw cathedral even though he hasn't seen one. Blindness is not a physical inability of a person; it's beyond than that. In the “Cathedral,” Robert wasn’t the one that was blind however, the narrator was blind.

Blindness is not limited to physical manifestation. In Raymond Carver’s “Cathedral,” the figurative blindness is immediately apparent through the narrator and his shallowness, irrational jealousy, and egotistical personality. His dismissive behavior and ignorance towards the feelings of Robert, his wife’s blind friend, speak negatively of his character and reveals his insecurities. While the narrator’s emotional blindness and Robert’s physical blindness initially inhibits their bond, it eventually leads the narrator to an epiphany and the beginning of a character transformation. The different forms of blindness allow the characters to bond and grow over the course of the story.