Point Of View In Raymond Carver's Cathedral

Words: 660
Pages: 3

In the short story “Cathedral” by Raymond Carver, the author shows how people understand a problem in a different perspective and learn how to judge a problem by using their mind. This story also presents a difference between looking, which is physical vision, and seeing, which is mind vision. The narrator in this story is a person, who does not know how to listen and appreciate people around him because he isolates himself to others. Robert, who is invited to the narrator house, is a blind man, but he can see people by his heart, because he knows eyes help people to see the physical thing but it cannot help people to understand others. Therefore, with a little help from Robert, he learns how to change his bad attitude, to care about his wife, …show more content…
The most interesting part of the story is when the narrator, “my wife”, and Robert watch TV together after their dinner. Since the wife has been fallen asleep, the narrator feels uncomfortable when being alone with Robert. Instead of talking to Robert, he offers Robert a drink, and some marijuana. In this passage, we see that they have differences in behaviors. Drinking is the narrator`s pastime, and it presents for person who prefers to remove himself from any social interactions, while Robert is smoking, which is represented to person who tends to have social relation. At this point, Robert is being more interesting in the narrator though because he accepts any new experience, even tries marijuana. We see that Robert tries his best to let the narrator see his willingness. The more they communicate, the more the narrator realizes his limitation in making friends. So, it is not surprise the narrator accepts to draw a cathedral when Robert convinces him. In the end when the narrator draws a cathedral he learns not having a vision can lead him know about himself, remove his own prejudices, and accept a new way of