What Raymond Carver Talks About When He Talks About Love - Research Paper Example

[Insert Here] [Insert Your Here] [Insert and Number Here] 03 April What Raymond Carver Talks AboutWhen He Talks About Love The legendary Raymond Carver is known for his raw and stripped down realistic short stories that reflect his own life; What We Talk About When We Talk About Love is no exception. One of Carver’s most familiar stories, What We Talk About When We Talk About Love is also the title of one of his most notable collections of short stories. The title is perfect for the collection, because many of Carver’s stories are about relationships, sometimes from a woman’s perspective, but most of the time from his own (Moramarco).

He typically uses his characters to explore his own life, reflecting back to the reader, in this story, explaining to them exactly what it is when people talk about love and posing questions that make the reader think and become interactive in the life of the exposed author. The word “love” in and of itself is one of those words that has been the subject of pop culture advertising and has appeared in so much throughout the twentieth-century that many people may not even know what it really means anymore (Moramarco).

Carver portrays himself through the main character, Mel McGinnis, as he discusses his second marriage, excessive alcoholism, and of course, his failed first marriage. Granted, at the time the story was written, Carver was not yet married to poet Tess Gallagher, the couple had been living together for four years. This is very similar to the five years the main character in What We Talk About When We Talk About Love, Mel and Terri had been together. Nick, Mel's best friend in the story, and Nick’s wife Laura, had been together for eighteen months, which is the same amount of time as John Gardner, Carver's real-life friend, and John’s second wife, Liz Rosenberg.

Carver married Maryann in June 1957. She gave birth to their first child not long after they were married. Although the marriage lasted 20 years, it failed in 1977; Carver’s divorce from Maryann was final in 1982. In 1988, Carver married Tess Gallagher, after the two had lived together for nearly ten years. While Carver was not married at the time the story was written, and had recently separated from his first wife, Maryann, he was still successful in telling the tale of how love once was, or should have been.

In light of becoming a father at such a young age and juggling jobs he found unsatisfying, it is easy to see why Carver rely on drinking as a crutch (Stull). Kellerman stated that Carver took up drinking full-time, and preferred to drink over writing. His stories, prior to 1977, were cripplingly infused with alcoholism, and references to alcohol. Carver acknowledged that “there was a time when drinking figured very heavily. For a while I could hardly write a story without mentioning it. But I’ve beaten my alcoholism.

And in the last few years drinking has played a small or no role at all, in my stories” (Kellerman). On June 2, 1977, just after separating from Maryann, Carver ended his dangerous and unhealthy relationship with alcohol (Stull). As any other couple would, both, Raymond and Maryann tried their best to stay together, but were unsuccessful. Like Mel, Carver also has two children with his first wife. Carver had stated several times that his marriage influenced a lot of his writing, as well. He claimed that “marriage is one of those emotional reservoirs that go way back,” and that has “circled around it many times in [his] work.

It's not that only thing [he had written] about, but it's true [he had] circled around that in one way or another” (Kellerman). He generally found the topics of his writing in forbidding real-life situations that he had shared with Maryann for the 20 years of their marriage. His writing, poetic and deceptive, told the story of Carver, with different names, jobs, family, and friends. He wrote about men without jobs, wives who worked, but were bitter and frustrated with their husbands, and couples moving from city to city to stay ahead of the bill collectors.

Each of these topics can be found throughout Carver’s life. Writing afforded Carver the opportunity to release his feelings of guilt, agitation, and sorrow; he wrote not only about having love, but also losing it (Johnson). Moreover, Carver’s art constantly imitated his anxious, tormented life. His work focused on the reality of given situations. He stated in an interview, “I don’t have much respect for fiction that seems to be game-playing. I’m interested in stories that are grounded in the real world” (Kellerman).

The four characters in What We Talk About When We Talk About Love, recognize that love may not be understood, and it may not be easy to define, but it is known when felt. The story brings love to light in a number of its familiar forms—intellectual, spiritual, romantic, and sensual—posing a puzzling question as to which form of love is more genuine, if any (Miksanek). Carver won a great deal of fame for leading the wave of a new generation of writers into the 1980s with his collection of short stories (Stull).

Carver has put himself into his art, which is a revealing, and sometimes very difficult thing for an artist to do. They are opening themselves up to be completely unguarded for the world to see, judge, and analyze. At times, doing so can backfire and hurt the individual’s reputation. However, in Carver’s case, it can be said that he learned from his past through his writing, and did so in a healthy form of expression. “What we know and feel, how things fall apart, and what is left when they do, what holds in the purity of emptiness—these mysteries are Carver's concerns” (Phillips).

Works Cited Johnson, Joyce. "When we talk about love." New York Times 24 Sep 2006, Sunday Book Review. Print. Kellerman, Stewart. "For Raymond Carver, a lifetime of storytelling." New York Times 31 May 1988, Print. Miksanek, Tony. "Literature Annotations." Literature, Arts, and Medicine Database. New York University, 02 Aug 2005. Web. 3 Apr 2011. . Moramarco, Fred. "Carver's Couples Talk About Love." Whitman College. Whitman College, n.d. Web. 3 Apr 2011. . Phillips, Jayne. "The secret places of the heart.

" New York Magazine 20 Apr 1981: Web. 3 Apr 2011. . Stull, William L. "Biographical Essay." Whitman College. Whitman College, n.d. Web. 3 Apr 2011. .