What We Talking About When We Talk About Love By Raymond Carver

Both “The Right of Love” by Gene Lees and “The Canonization” by John Donne represent a form of forbidden love due to ethnicity and religion where both parties are fighting for the acceptance of their relationship. Donne, although catholic, falls in love with a non-catholic woman which is looked down upon by others. In his poem he states, “we in us find th’ eagle and the dove”,the two birds represent two polar opposite symbols, the eagle represent strength and courage, while a dove represents love and peace. Although a relationship between catholics and non-catholics were forbidden, they found a common ground in their love for each other. Differences can strengthen the love between two individuals, which is also shown in “The Right of Love”,

drops the subject” (pg.1331). Carver also uses the symbol of making a mess of his breakfast to

The short story What We Talk About When We Talk About Love, by Raymond Carver, is about two married couples drinking gin and having a talk about the nature of love. The conversation is a little sloppy, and the characters make some comments which could either be meaningless because of excessive alcohol in the bloodstream, or could be the characters' true feelings because of excessive alcohol in the bloodstream. Overall, the author uses this conversation to show that when a relationship first begins, the people involved may have misconceptions about their love, but this love will eventually die off or develop into something much more meaningful.

The author speaks of the shame of having the only outdoor toilet in the neighborhood, driving the oldest car in town but he also mentions the trips to Seattle they took as a family and how memorable that was for him. Carver had a complex relationship with his father that began with sharing the same name. Everyone is trying to find their own identity in life, For sons who are named after their fathers this seems to be a more difficult task.

While reading “Little Things” by Raymond Carver I began to realized that he was using several different literary devices to compose a story of many interpretations, such as: imagery, foreshadowing, symbolism, communication, conflict, expression, and suspense. “Little Things” is a tale of two stubborn parents that are separating without any self-tolerance or consideration of how their actions can affect their child. The statement made by Carver is that actions or words can lead to catastrophic endings. At the end of the story, he wrote “in this matter, the issue was decided” to imply that when a relationship involves a child, the intimate relationship between parents should be more empathic. A similar story that touches the same statement

Carver uses the device of repetition when the woman says a phrase to represent her being in denial of the dysfunctional relationship she is having with the man. “I’m glad you’re leaving! I’m glad you’re leaving!... I’m so glad you’re leaving! She began to cry.” By repeating herself many times about her being fine with the man leaving, reveals that she is not actually okay with that; however, she says it to make herself believe that she does not care when she truly does care. This is also revealed

Carver uses foreshadowing as a prominent element in this story. There are many examples of foreshadowing throughout the story. The first time the reader gets to see obvious foreshadowing is when the woman picks up the picture of the baby off the bed where the man is packing his belongings. “Then she noticed the baby’s picture on the bed and picked it up. He looked at her and she wiped her eyes and stared at him before turning and going back to the living room” (277). This small detail foreshadows that physical altercation that the couple will go through with the baby. The last big foreshadow that the reader gets is when the couple knocks over the flower pot. “The baby was red-faced and screaming. In the scuffle they knocked own a flowerpot that hung behind the stove” (277). This is very brief and only mentioned in this sentence. But this is the foreshadowing of the relationship that is broken, or even worse the baby being broken along with the relationship. While there are details at the beginning on the story, there are smaller things that can easily be looked over but are very important. The characters in this story, since it is minimalist fiction, are not ever given names. The characters are always just referred to as; the man, the woman, and the baby. The audience never finds out why the couple is breaking

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

Carver also emphasizes the contradictions within the characters themselves in the story, which illustrates the uncertainty of love, and how there is not a clearly defined approach to understanding it. Returning to the topic of Terri's previous marriage, Mel, her current husband, complains about his failure to understand how she could refer to that abusive relationship as love. However, later on when she corrects him while he is talking, he turns to her and asks her to "shut up" (Carver 767). Another important contradiction which takes place throughout the entire story, is how the four friends are discussing a subject which they all have had bad experiences with, since they have all been divorced and remarried. The contradictions throughout Carver's story symbolize how love can also contradict itself, and trying to understand love is impossible since so many particular cases can negate specific examples of love.

In the story of Carver’s “What We Talk About When We Talk about Love”, the author can been seen to tackle a distortion of romantic love, which conventionally perpetuated by love stories and fairy tales. This story challenges the convention of how a love story is being told where usually it ends happily. This allows the author, Carver, to present the reader with his or her own choice to interpret the meaning of true love through the story’s characters: Mel, Terri, Nick (as the narrator) and Laura as they talk about the meaning of love while they are drinking. Each of these characters has their own ideas of what love is. Terri seems to be approval of Ed’s, her abusive ex-lover violent jealousy as a sign of love, while Mel, her husband disagrees with her. Mel, speaks the most of the dialogues in the story can be inferred to be still learning the meaning of love. Through his story of the old couple, the readers may think that love can be eternal. However, Mel also contradicts this virtue by expressing his desire to kill his first wife whom he loved more than life before. As for the narrator, his love to Laura can be seen as a steady, drama free and uncomplicated love shown by his affections towards his newly-wed wife through kisses, smiles and touches. He also mentions, “In addition to being in love, we like each other and enjoy one another 's company. She 's easy to be with.” This contradicts with Mel and Terri’s idea of love which is rarely easy. Laura, the narrator’s wife

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.

This bitterness and sarcasm is revealed as strong characteristics of the narrator. Throughout the majority of the story, the narrator continues shows his distaste for any "happy" situation. Much like the hyphenated asides, Carver implements fragmented sentences behind description, to show the narrator pausing for a moment of color commentary.

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

Carver describes this scene with an emotional detachment, concentrating more on what is happening, rather than why. In her essay about understanding Carver's revisions, Hashimoto says that minimalistic writing describes the events as they transpire, allowing the reader to draw his own conclusions. It is most likely that this is Carver's goal.

Finding the Love of Your Life was written by Neil Clark Warren, PH.D., and in this book he explains his ten basic principles of finding the right mate to spend your life with. He teaches people how to understand the two different types of love: passionate love and companionate love. He states that many do not get past the passionate love portion which is why many people go from relationship to relationship when the passion wears off.