Listening to stories is something that everyone enjoys. Everyone seems to enjoy them for different reasons too. Some listen to people tells stories because they want to know about what the person is talking about, other because they just want to hear that person talk, and others because they are just being polite and listening to the story so the person telling it does not get mad. When you truly listen to a story that someone is telling you, you can learn a lot. You can learn that you great grandpa was a war hero and that your grandma used to have a motorcycle or that your dad qualified for the Olympics. Stories are something that we need more of and that we need to ask to hear more of. Raymond Carver began writing short stories in 1958 and was “one of a handful of authors said to have revitalized the art of short story writing in the late 1900s.” He wrote in a minimalist way, going with a less-is-more approach. In Raymond Carver’s short story Everything Stuck to Him the ending really allows for you to understand the rest of the story. Everything Stuck to Him is a story that starts out happily with a girl just wanting to know about her childhood, but ends with a hint of discord. This is a story in which you have to read the whole thing in order to truly understand what is going on. When you look at the format of it, it seems as if it is just about a girl that has asked about her childhood and then her father told her the story. After he was done telling the story they had another conversation about how she “was interested.” Even though it had really not been that interesting of a story to someone else, to her it was her life. While reading this story, but to the person reading this, it is just a story. To the man telling the sto... ... middle of paper ... ...ies if Carver wanted it to be, but the two different stories together make up a completely complex and interesting story of its own. The ending of Raymond Carver’s short story Everything Stuck to Him really changes the way that you read the whole story. Throughout the story you question what is going on and how everything got the way that it is today, but by the end of the short story you start to understand everything that is going on. Even though this is a story within a story you have to pay attention to the details to get the whole story and to understand what it actually going on. When you just skim through this short story you do not realize the full story and then when you actually read it in detail you begin to realize how in depth and detailed this short story truly is. At the end of the story you realize that everything was really stuck to, or with, him.
Weele, Michael Vander. "Raymond Carver and the language of Desire." Short Story Criticism. Ed. Thomas Volteler. Detroit: Gale Publishing Inc., 1989. 36-41.
Upon reading Raymond Carver's short story of the Cathedral one will notice the literary devices used in the short story. When analyzing the story completely, one then understands the themes, motifs, metaphors, and the overall point of the piece. This leaves the reader with an appreciation of the story and a feeling of complete satisfaction.
Although Carver's technique could be viewed as a cheap trick, it can also be seen as a brilliant role reversal. Through utilizing both literal and figurative metaphors, the impact of the story is both emotional and realistic. Narrative choice is key to the success of the main character's ultimate revelation and the reader's appreciation of the story itself.
When reading or listening, people like to become immersed into the story itself to understand everything better and grow attached so you feel what the characters feel throughout the story. After un-immersing themselves from the story a person can easily find the theme the story from the plot and conflict. All in all, there is always a point to every story, no matter if they are fiction or nonfiction, they get their message across or create entertainment for the
The point of view from the narrators perspective, highlights how self-absorbed and narrow-minded he is. “They’d married, lived and worked together, slept together—had sex, sure—and then the blind man had to bury her. All this without his having ever seen what the goddamned woman looked like. It was beyond my understanding” (Carver...
If Tom would’ve fallen the only thing in his pocket, to identify him, would be the yellow piece of paper. Some would say that his work was his life, and that that yellow piece of paper would accurately sum up his life, but while Tom was outside on the ledge he realized that the most important things in life aren’t things, and went to the theater with his wife. Realizing this saved his life. The most important thing in life is no longer Toms life isn’t Toms work, but spending time with his wife.
A transformation took place during the story and it is evident through the narrator?s character. In the beginning he was lacking in compassion, he was narrow minded, he was detached, he was jealous, and he was bitter. Carver used carefully chosen words to illustrate the narrator?s character and the change. Throughout the story his character undergoes a transformation into a more emotionally aware human being.
Carver uses the themes of jealousy, prejudice, and substance abuse, not only because most readers can easily associate with one or more of these problems, but also because they can be used to create a character that is ignorant of and detached from the world around them. This blindness to reality can be related to Plato's "Allegory of a Cave", where the prisoners are limited in their world to only what they can easily view. Reality may not be just what is presented to us as there can exist a world that is unseen by many.
This book was very vivid in its description of all the hardships, hard work, and effort George Washington Carver put into his research. I learned that George was very dedicated to his research, and he proved this in many ways. George donated his entire estate to enable his research to continue, which coerces me to strive to do better for myself. Overall, this book gave me a real role model that I could strive to be like. I realized from reading the book that George never gave up, no matter how many people gave him a fight.
In Raymond Carver's 'The Bath' and rewritten version of the story entitled 'A Small, Good Thing', the author tells the same tale in different ways, and to different ends, creating variegated experiences for the reader. Both stories have the same central plot and a majority of details remain the same, but the effects that the stories have upon the reader is significantly different. The greatest character difference is found in the role of the Baker, and his interaction with the other characters. The sparse details, language and sentence structure of 'The Bath' provide a sharp contrast emotionally and artistically to 'A Small Good Thing'. In many ways, 'The Bath' proves to have a more emotional impact because of all that it doesn't say; it's sparse, minimalist storytelling gives the impression of numbed shock and muted reactions. The descriptive storytelling of 'A Small Good Thing' goes deeper into the development of the characters and although it tells more story, it ends on a note of hopefulness, instead of fear or desperation. Each story has it's own magic that weave it's a powerful. When compared to each other the true masterpiece of each story is best revealed.
Raymond Carver uses strategic dialogue and point-of-view to illuminate the themes of his stories. After reading “What We Talk About When We Talk About Love” and “ Cathedral” the reader is able to mend each piece of work together and understand how Carver creates his short stories.
In my opinion, I believe that the short story, Cathedral, is a clear representation that a person can change and can be able to understand personal feeling and emotions without trying to actually see them and/or touch them. Also, Carver makes the narrator seem as if he is a real person that the reader can relate to. Specifically, when the narrator feels awkward about his wife bringing the blind man for a visit or when he finally meets the blind man and offers him a joint. These experiences that the narrator has are real experiences that the reader may at one point also feel or encountered. Overall, the short story is one that should be read by all college students as it is a good genre and easy to read as well as to understand and relate.
The whole novel he was in control of what was happening. He made lists and plans and compiled data to sort through the mess of a tragic death. The key was the mystery that he was going to solve. It was the final piece of the puzzle. He had the question; all he needed was the answer. Alas, Oskar never thought that the question might not be his. He just assumed. But in the end, the key served no purpose in the hands of Oskar, just as his father’s death served no purpose to him. The chain that bound him to it held him back from moving forward. Once the bond was broken and Oskar was forced to accept that that epic adventure was over.
The Last Thing I Remember by Andrew Klavan is a very endearing and adventurous book. It is about Charlie West, an ordinary boy who did ordinary things. He enjoyed karate, he got the number of his crush, and he had some pretty great friends. That was all about to change after Charlie went to bed one night.
A short story is often made of 6 elements which are the point of view, character, setting, style, theme, and plot. In the short story “Popular Mechanics”, Raymond Carver mainly uses the plot to deliver his story. Although the story is told from a third-person point of view; the narrator is very objective and does reveal any thoughts or feelings of the characters. The story is told mainly through the dialogue of the two characters; Carver doesn’t fully describe the characters which keep them remain static and flat throughout the story. He also doesn’t give us many details of the setting either, but a house or an apartment somewhere. Although, Carver mainly uses plot in his story; he successfully deliver the story by fully using all the elements