“I like it when there is some feeling of threat or sense of menace in short stories. I think a little menace is fine to have in a story. For one thing, it’s good for the circulation. There has to be tension, a sense that something is imminent, that certain things are in relentless motion, or else, most often, there simply won’t be a story. What creates tension in a piece of fiction is partly the way the concrete words are linked together to make up the visible action of the story. But it’s also the things that are left out, that are implied, the landscape just under the smooth (but sometimes broken and unsettled) surface of things.”
This quote, taken from Raymond Carver’s “Principles of a Story,” perfectly describes what he does in his short story, “Cathedral.” As I read “Cathedral,” I automatically assumed that this blind man is somebody the narrator’s wife had romantic relations with in the past. The narrator is clearly jealous of his existence and especially of the fact that he is going to stay in his home. We learn that the blind man’s wife just died which only makes us as the readers believe that something of an affair will occur when he stays over. This “tension” sticks with me until just before the end of the story.
Later we get to know the blind man and see that he really is something. He teaches the narrator how to see without actually seeing, as he does, without even trying to do so. He tells him to close his eyes as he draws a cathedral and the narrator ends up not even wanting to open his eyes to see what he drew. He felt like he was nowhere even though he knew he was in his own home. He was lost in his mind, in the world he created in his head without the help of his eyes.
Here, the tension dies. I no longer feel compassion for the blind man, for his lack of being able to see nor do I share the jealousy the narrator felt. I feel like the blind man can see more than I can. This was one of the most charming short stories I’ve read and I was essentially sucked in by the “sense of menace” that the introduction discharged.
