Literary Review of 'Cathedral' - Raymond Carver

“Cathedral” - Raymond Carver summary literary analysis. In “Cathedral,” looking is associated with someone’s vision, but seeing needs a more profound level of commitment. In the story, the husband shows that he can look. Because of this, he assumes he is above Robert (the blind man). The husband is sure that the ability to see is everything and he refuses to see anything beyond the surface. The blind man sees on a much deeper level and teaches the husband that seeing implicates more than just looking.

Raymond Carver uses various themes in this short story. Vision being one of them. “I wasn’t enthusiastic about his visit. He was no one I knew. And his being blind bothered me”. Here Carver incorporates the theme of vision. Through the narrator, he tells the reader how unsettling his visit was. Carver further incorporates this theme “when describing events like Robert's wife's death . . . of the two-dimensional nature of his character, a man with little or no human interaction whose ideas about people and places are developed via television and the movies”.

Blindness. Another theme in this short story with two different meanings. Robert’s absence of sight and the narrator’s lack of perception. The narrator states, “so we kept on with it. His fingers rode my fingers as my hand went over the paper. It was like nothing else in my life up to now” as they drew the cathedral, the narrator had his eyes closed. Carver integrates this theme through Robert’s actions. He “heals” feelings towards blindness of a man who can see through his senses allowing the reader to understand that the narrator needs to see the world like Robert to feel undamaged.

Through these themes, “Cathedral” shows us something very important about life and other people. Carver lets us know that vision and blindness are two of the biggest factors that give us false perspectives on life and how we see people we have not met yet. The appearance of a person we do not know can be very different from what it really is, and you will not know that until you put yourself in their shoes and see life as they see it.

Works Cited

• Caldwell, Tracy M. “Raymond Caver’s ‘Cathedral.” Literary Contexts in Short Stories: Raymond Carver’s “Cathedral,” Mar. 2006, pp. 1-8 EBSCOhost, search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&AuthType=shib&db=lkh&AN=18898049&site=ehost-live.
• Carver, Raymond. “Cathedral.” The Norton Introduction to Literature, edited by Kelly J. Mays, shorter 13th ed., W.W. Norton, 2019, pp. 28-38.