Carver

A terrifying vision of ordinary human life in this country

When I see the warning, “parental discretion advised,” it usually applies to music. That doesn’t necessarily mean it’s good. However, when I see the warning regarding a book, I figure it should be mandatory reading. I found an old note referring to the first time I saw one; the book in question, a collection of short stories, had been penned by Raymond Carver. I think he should be read in school, if only to expose young people to succinct writing. That said I’m not sure which ages would be receptive or for whom it would be most effective. A couple of years after it was first published I discovered his collection, “Cathedral”. It affected me strongly enough that I did not seek out more of his work. Two decades passed before I came across the bestickered book in question, another collection, written before Carver got sober, titled, “Will You Please Be Quiet, Please?” I figure the sticker was a recent addition, applied after a too-sheltered status quo began claiming that both words and reality were threatening.

The 1976 New York Times review of the book contained the sentence, “No human blood is shed in any of these stories, yet almost all of them hold a promise of mayhem, of some final, awful breaking out from confines, and breaking through to liberty.” This notion of dark hopefulness is quickly dampened by the description of several typically Carver scenes, which are, “menacing, as are the spells of quiet and tensed apprehension ...” His spare, delightfully real and incisive prose puts one on the back foot almost immediately. He aims his pen at human nature, exposing our most dangerous, and self-deceptive qualities. Carver described the tone of his work as, “grave maybe, and somewhat dark”, which I think is a useful counterpoint to the current wave of books and blogs and Substack missives thumb-typed on touchscreens with browser tabs opened to Thesaurus entries for hope, promise, and optimize.