Re: leaps of illogic, re. Carver and Kafka

John Smith (johnsmiii@yahoo.com)
Fri, 27 Aug 1999 23:01:10 -0700 (PDT) 

Carver didn't do for me what he did for everyone
else.
 The setting was ordinary and there were no
breaks in
logic, as opposed to the setting in the Country
Doctor
and the logical inconsistencies such as a horse
that
can fit through an entrance made for a pig.  The
mood
was surreptitiously eery in Carver's, and
explicitly
eery in Kafka's.  In both stories, the characters
weren't defined to the T so that the reader's
imagination can work, however, I gleaned more
from the
Coutnry Doctor's character.  The doctor's
defensive
mechanisms and his causal psychology were obvious
as
he moved through three roles, that of the doctor,
that
of the common man, and then of the patient.  The
theme
of the story is obvious, but it means something
different to everyeone.  I saw it as proof that
even
trained proffessionals, of which Kafka uses a
doctor
as an example, are prone to unconscious
motivations
when confronted with a problem involving more than
just a topical abrasion, rather dealing with
matters
of the heart, and that these emotional issues sway
anyone's judgement and therefore the institutions
they
represent.  The medical establishment Kafka
portrayed
is now outdated and still foreign, but the grit
of his
point remains.  The theme of the story is not what
gripped me, it was the doctor's progression from a
defensive proffessional (deified by the patient's
parents) who wants no emotional involvement, to
the
human capable of making mistakes (as he takes a
second
look at the wound), to the patient who is meant
to pay
for his mistakes like Job and suffer his due
punishment (when he is stripped of his clothes,
occupation, social stature and so on).  He feels
most
comfortable, it seems, when he looks after
everyone
else.  He wants to soothe the boy's worries and he
doesn't care about wearing his coat back home in
the
wintery night.  Carver's story has no real
progression
besides what he allows the reader to know and how
drunk the guests become.  He givbes you a slice of
life that gets the melon working to prepare
superficial dictums of what America is supposed to
mean.  This slice of life may be right and true,
but
I've always thought it's the writer's job to
show the
reader the steps the author has taken towards a
resolution.  I read Carver's story this
Christmas and enjoyed it for what it was worth,
but it
doesn't do for me what it did for everyone else. 
So
the man is at the bottom of the barrel, so what? 
So
he is romanticizing the idea of the marital hell
that
these kids may encounter, big deal.  The girl
couldn't
explain to her friends why her dance with him was
so
weird, because Carver knew the mention of it would
ruin it because one thought leads to another.  If
this, why that, and so on.  If
he
would've said, "and so the man wished the couple
would
never travel the roads he's been mauled on," the
story would be diminished because Carver would be
impinging on our imaginations that stem from our
experiences.  I'm glad he didn't
explain what was happening behind the scenes in
WHy
Don't You Dance now that I know that my initial
suspicions, inchoate because there were no
details,
were correct, there simply isn't much substance
to the
story if you have not hit marital rock bottom.  He
gets the imagination going by using the techniques
that minimalists have employed for years.  If the
quality of writing lies in the editing, then so
be it,
I have no say on that, but it does not produce a
gripping story in the context of Why Don't You
Dance. 
I was annoyed by the fac that Carver left no
message,
that we're supposed to pull one from the sky
based on
what we feel.  Well, here's the message I got: the
socioeconomic virtues are no longer relevant to
what
middle class Uranus is suffering (BS).  Carver's
style
utilizes a nice idea, to give the reader complete
control of his/her own imagination, but I prefer
Kafka's finger-pointing to Carver's wave from the
sinking Titanic.  I'll read Cathedral, but the
more I
think about Carver, and the less I feel like
writing 
this message, the more I think that Kafka was ten
times the man Carver is.  That's a superficial
opinion, but what the hell, I'm not leaving you to
guess why I'm annoyed by this exaltation of
Carver.   

--- Laughing Man <the_laughing_man@hotmail.com> wrote:
> I have this image of Mr Spock giving me that
> troubled brow right now, 
> saying: “restrain your leaps of illogic, Doctor!”
> 
> But I have to tell you, fellow fishes: posts like
> these about Raymond 
> Carver, they give me that “paranoid in
> reverse”-feeling. Jason’s general and 
> Tim’s specific analysis of Carver stories makes me
> want to run back to my 
> book shelves for a full evening of digging and
> reading. It’s gray and rainy 
> today, so the timing would be perfect, were I not at
> the office
> 
> For trigger happy fishes, which made the mistake of
> deleting the posts too 
> fast, read the extracts attached below.
> 
> I have a comment about Kafka, though. John seemed a
> bit disappointed about 
> our Kafka not being serious enough. Personally, I
> have always wanted to get 
> out of the door when people get that “now this is
> serious stuff so don’t you 
> smile”-look in their face when talking about Kafka.
> Kafka is funny as hell, 
> and very very serious at the same time; there is no
> paradox in that you miss 
> a lot of his qualities if you don’t appreciate his
> black humor.
> 
> In an anthology of German short stories, the Kafka
> introduction told an 
> Kafka anecdote I can’t help retelling, superficial
> as it may be (that has 
> certainly never stopped me):
> (free from memory and, as usual, badly translated)
> 
> “Kafka is told to be a dark prophet. Is there really
> no hope, we ask?
> 
> - Ooh, Kafka says, of course there is hope. Lots of
> hope. An infinite amount 
> of hope.
>    Only not for us.”
> 
> 
> /The Panegyric Man
> 
> 
> John:
> 
> >From: John Smith <johnsmiii@yahoo.com>
> >Has anybody read, 'Why don't you dance?'  I've
> heard
> >Carver was an amazing author but I found myself
> >puzzled when I caught that story in a reprint.  Why
> is
> >the man's dancing with her supposed to be so
> mystical?
> >  Granted, it's strange for a man to reposition his
> >bedroom furniture on his driveway and ask a
> stranger
> >to dance, but what is this story supposed to
> >represent?  I've read some cryptic Kafka and it
> isn't
> >nearly as puzzling as Carver's story, if it is
> >supposed to resonate with meaning.  Is there some
> sort
> >of mystery hidden between the lines that he expects
> us
> >to assemble?  I've only read that one story, maybe
> if
> >I was more acquainted with his style I would see
> what
> >message he attempts to convey.  Is it a puzzle or
> >maybe a symbolic portrayal of suburban life?  I'd
> love
> >to hear anyone's thoughts on the story and Carver.
> 
> 
> Jason:
> 
> >From: jason varsoke <jjv@caesun.msd.ray.com>
> >Ah, Carver, so close to my heart, so close to the
> bottle.  I haven't read
> >'Why don't you dance?' but I think I can lend some
> insight into Carver.
> >Reading him is a little strange.  His pieces are
> often very poetic in the
> >sense that picking appart the details never gets
> you close to the whole.
> >And that's what you have to take in, the whole. 
> You see, Carver has a
> >slow fuse.  You look at everything that's going on
> in the story and often
> >ask yourself, so what?  Then, often on the last
> page, the emotion
> >explodes.  Actually, it's more like a
> supersaturated suspended collodial
> >solution.  (If you know what I mean, you'll know
> exactly what I mean)
> >Adding that last detail renders the entire thing in
> front of you.  If you
> >want, probably the best, example of this, read
> "Cathedral."  That story is
> >amazing.  Right at the end you have this very
> strange feeling, and you are
> >the main character.  You just are.
> […]
> >    So my suggestion is, don't look at the details,
> look at the whole.
> >Kafka can be understood through the details, as can
> JDS.  But for Carver,
> >is just the whole.  i guess it's like looking at
> those stereograms.  You
> >can't do it by parts, you either got it or you
> don't.
> 
> 
> Tim:
> 
> 
> >From: Tim O'Connor <tim@roughdraft.org>
> >
> > > Why is
> > > the man's dancing with her supposed to be so
> mystical?
> >
> >He's lost everything: his family life, his hope,
> his future, and and
> >has all this possessions, which are pretty much
> everything that is
> >left of his life, out on the lawn for sale.  He's
> lost human contact.
> >He has lost everything.
> >
> >Along comes a young couple.  The don't know why all
> this household
> >material is out in the yard; all they know is that
> a strange man
> >seems to be emptying his house for no reason at
> all.  It's suffused
> >with sadness and melancholy and regret all the way
> through.
> >
> > >  Granted, it's strange for a man to reposition
> his
> > > bedroom furniture on his driveway and ask a
> stranger
> > > to dance, but what is this story supposed to
> > > represent?
> >
> >Carver himself had a few brushes with the bleak
> side of life, and I
> >suspect that in this story he was showing us a man
> who had very
> >literally hit absolute bottom.  The innocent couple
> knows little or
> >nothing about it.  Perhaps this ruined man was like
> them once; so
> >many Carver characters start innocent and end up
> cynical.
> >
> > > I've read some cryptic Kafka and it isn't
> > > nearly as puzzling as Carver's story, if it is
> > > supposed to resonate with meaning.  Is there
> some sort
> > > of mystery hidden between the lines that he
> expects us
> > > to assemble?  I've only read that one story,
> maybe if
> > > I was more acquainted with his style I would see
> what
> > > message he attempts to convey.
> >
> >Yes, reading more Carver ("So Much Water...." and
> the story in, I
> >think, "Cathedral," in which a man with no hands,
> only hooks, goes
> >door-to-door selling people pictures of themselves
> in front of their
> >houses) would help  you put him in his own context.
>  But I think
> >"Dance" stands pretty strongly on its own.
> >
> >It's not like Kafka, who impregnated his work with
> menace and dread.
> >Carver's dread always seems to take place in the
> unforgiving sunshine
> >of parking lots or the overcase days or the sad
> hours of the evening.
> >Kafka, at absolute bottom, is hilarious; his
> friends said that as he
> >read his work aloud, he could barely keep from
> laughing at what he
> >had written, at the underlying perversity of it. 
> There is very
> >little funniness in Carver.  His people and places
> are weatherbeaten.
> 
=== message truncated ===

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