The Creation Of Raymond Cover’s Fictions

Raymond Carver (1939—1988) is the most respected contemporary Americanshort-story writer and poet. After his death, he was named as “American Chekhov” byLondon Times. His major publications includes: the fiction collection—Catherdral,Will You Please Be Quiet, Please?, What We Talk When We Talk About Love?, FuriousSeasons and some others. In recent years, research on Carver is booming in theliterary field. Some writers, influenced by Carver, are pursuing the realist style, tryingto reflect the original appearance of life in their works.Most of Carver’s fictions focus on the life of lower social class in the latetwenties century. In his works, he successfully illustrates the life and sense ofAmerican working class. In his fictions, Carver reflects people’s hard living, insidesuffering, and emotional depressing by describing their poverty, unemployment andmarital problems. Readers can experience the loss, depression, wander, and evenpessimism in his works. Carver’s works play the determining role in the recovery ofAmerican realist writing. What we can see in Carver’s works is closely related to hisearly life and experience. Carver was born in a poor sawmill worker’s family. Hisfather was a heavy drinker. After graduating from high school, Carver worked at asawmill factory. Carver got married very young, which made him in poverty. Theheavy life load made him addicted to alcohol. After a long time, he successfullyabandoned drinking, but his health was seriously damaged and eventually died fromlung cancer. Carver ever said in an interview,“I am a member of the poor, so I havepity for them, for they are my compatriot.” Carver’s fictions reflect the true life andpeople’s words in heart, which readers can experience from his theme, expression andstyle.Carver is labeled as “minimalism” by critics. He inherited some of Hemingway’scharacteristics and developed his own features. Carver pushes “minimalism” up to a new level. Carver does not deliberately emphasize the form. There is even nointegrate story in most of his works, and the climax and ending are also not that clear.He usually reflects life in simple language and simple plot. Sometimes readers mayfeel confused, feeling that there is no ending for the story. His fictions leave readersmuch thinking, which is the very effect Carver has been pursuing.This thesis is divided into three sections:In the first section, the realism of Carver’s fictions is discussed.In general, that Carver can reflect the real life in his stories is determined by hisart view of realism. Carver thinks that what he has experienced and all he thought lifehas given him is worth illustrating in his stories. What Carver described is the life ofthe most common people and the most common events in that society. Thefirst-person narrator often joins in the plot with my perspective and directly expressesmy experience and feelings. Carver thinks it worthwhile to present people’s hard lifeand to embody their understanding.The second section sees Carver’s minimalism.The names of Carver’s fictions seem to be easily understood, however, everyname is the result of careful selection. Carver attempts to attract the readers with themost ordinary but memory-producing names. There are two features for Carver’snames: the interrogative pattern and easy to understand. The features are what Carverpursues for “minimalism”. The sentences in Carver’s fictions are short and brief,mainly nouns, verbs and pronouns, with few adjectives and adverbs. What featuresCarver’s language is: refined, obviously oralized, and especially refined dialogues.Some discourses are only to express the speaker himself, therefore, the say-to-oneselfpatterns often appear in his novels, making the readers more confused. And Carver’sstories usually have open ending, leaving the room for readers to imagine and thenfurthering the implications.Currently, most scholars have been doing research on Carver’s “minimalism” byfocusing mainly on the simple language. But after further study, it is easy to find thatthe “minimalism” Carver has been pursuing is not only the simple language but also the simple grammar and simple syntax. Carver does not pursue the brief in length, justgiving less modification for the description of feeling; in some excerpted stories, theinside description is even omitted. Carver has been trying to develop the story in areal and plain way and make his story reflect the real life.In the third section, Carver’s unique contribution is put forward.Raymond Cover inherited Hemmingway’s and Chekhov’s writing styles. He isconsidered the greatest American novelist. Though Cover’s minimalism wasinfluenced by other writers, he had differences from theirs and made his owncontributions. It will be discussed in this section.