#raymond caver

[iammadeofjam]

Cooking Thoughts

The pan was starting to smoke. She poured in more oil and turned on the fan. She hadn’t been to an auction in twenty years, and now she was getting ready to go to one tonight. But first she had to fry these pork chops. It was bad luck their fridge had gone flooey, but she found herself looking forward to this auction. She began missing her dad. She even missed her mom now, though the two of them used to argue all the time before she met her husband and began living with him. She stood at the stove, turning the meat, and missing both her dad and her mom.

- Raymond Carver, “Preservation”

[yueyingji]

On July 8,1980, Raymond Carver wrote a devastating letter to editor Gordon Lish regarding to the publication of his third story collection, What We Talk About When We Talk About Love (originally titled ‘Beginners’). Lish more than halved the length of Carver’s manuscript and radically altered many of the stories, which caused the latter—who belatedly read and compared the edited versions of the book―deep worry and distress, “my very sanity is on the line.” Carver went so far as to request in the letter a halt production of the book. He further wrote, “I realise I stand every chance of losing your love and friendship over this. But I strongly feel I stand every chance of losing my soul and my mental health over it, if I don’t take the risk.” The overall reduction of the manuscript in word count was 55% and Carver's plea finally went in vain. The contract with the publisher remained in force and by this time the mechanisms of publication were out of his hands. Soon after the appearance of What We Talk About When We Talk About Love in April 1981, Carver restored several stories to their original forms in Fires, Cathedral, and the limited-edition book If It Please You.

[sinr925-blog]

The countryside out the window began to pass faster and faster. For a moment, Myers had the impression of the landscape shooting away from him. He was going somewhere, he knew that. And if it was the wrong direction, sooner or later he'd find it out.

The Compartment by Raymond Carver