Cathedral

by RaymondCarver (Author)

• Used

  Paperback
  1999

  $12.52

  Raymond Carver s genius was a genius of selection. In these twelve stories the right word, the quick phrase, the unexpected allusion open up a whole new world of meaning behind the people and objects he describes. His is a world of ordinary human beings going about the unexceptional business of their lives, but his images acquire a strange, transforming power of their own. Nowhere is this alchemy more striking than at the end of the title story, where the hand of a blind man guides the hand of a sighted man as together they draw the cathedral the blind man has never seen. Many have seen this story, as marking a significant stage in Carver s transition to the more confidently poetic style of his mature work and the whole collection demonstrates the artistry of a writer with the desire and skills to expand his range and ambitions.

• Used

  Paperback
  1997

  $5.81

• New

  Paperback
  2009

  $12.27

  Raymond Carver said it was possible 'to write about commonplace things and objects using commonplace but precise language and endow these things - a chair, a window curtain, a fork, a stone, a woman's earring - with immense, even startling power'. Nowhere is this alchemy more striking than in the title story of Cathedral in which a blind man guides the hand of a sighted man as together they draw the cathedral the blind man can never see. Many view this story, and indeed this collection, as a watershed in the maturing of Carver's work to a more confidently poetic style.