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    Little Things by Raymond Carver

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    Abdussalam
    Little Things by Raymond Carver is a short story about a couple going through marital problems as they argue over keeping their child. As they each grasp the baby by its arms while packing, it seems the baby was harmed. The minimal narrative focuses on capturing the emotional reality of the characters and hinting that the situation depicts common relationship difficulties faced by many couples.

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    Little Things by Raymond Carver

    Uploaded by

    Abdussalam
    19K views2 pages
    Little Things by Raymond Carver is a short story about a couple going through marital problems as they argue over keeping their child. As they each grasp the baby by its arms while packing, it seems the baby was harmed. The minimal narrative focuses on capturing the emotional reality of the characters and hinting that the situation depicts common relationship difficulties faced by many couples.

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    Little Things by Raymond Carver is a short story about a couple going through marital problems as they argue over keeping their child. As they each grasp the baby by its arms while packing, it seems the baby was harmed. The minimal narrative focuses on capturing the emotional reality of the characters and hinting that the situation depicts common relationship difficulties faced by many couples.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as DOCX or read online from Scribd
    Download as docx
    19K views2 pages

    Little Things by Raymond Carver

    Uploaded by

    Abdussalam
    Little Things by Raymond Carver is a short story about a couple going through marital problems as they argue over keeping their child. As they each grasp the baby by its arms while packing, it seems the baby was harmed. The minimal narrative focuses on capturing the emotional reality of the characters and hinting that the situation depicts common relationship difficulties faced by many couples.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as DOCX or read online from Scribd
    Download as docx
    of 2

    Little Things by Raymond Carver

    Little Things by Raymond Carver is a story about a couple facing problems in their marital life.

    It is a very short, yet an interesting story. The story itself starts with a situation going on in a

    house where a couple is moving apart from each other. The man, packing a suitcase is ready to

    leave but also wants to keep the child with him. Both argue on keeping the child and grasp it by

    its arms. In the end, it seems like the baby was harmed in some way as it was pulled hard by both

    of them. It seems as if Carver had a close look at couples and families facing problems in their

    marriages. I am of the view that the general theme for this story was gothic fiction but it attempts

    to raise social issues within the families and their lives.

    The argument between the couple grows intense when the woman cries "Son of a bitch!” With

    these words crammed together in the story, one can conclude that the writer is comfortable in

    describing the intensity of such a gothic situation in harsh words. In "Little Things", the

    characters stand out more in the story rather than s narrator describing their situation. It is

    striking in a way that the message is conveyed directly to the reader. Raymond directly deals

    with the issues which he wishes to present to the readers. This story describes a situation in

    which most of the people find themselves now-a-days and that's what makes this so appealing

    and interesting. Although I was a bit surprised due to the use of over-dramatized language in the

    story which is normally socially and morally un-acceptable but perhaps the essence and true

    meaning of the story could not have been achieved without that. The writer is immensely skilled,

    daring and imaginative in the choice of his words and plot setting.

    His minimal narrative style and plot lines is effective in capturing the reality of his characters

    and their emotional behavior. The life of the characters is described in such a way that its theme

    seems closely related to Carver’s personal life. This story kind of surprised me because of its

    abrupt ending. The story ended without clear indication of who kept the baby or whether any
    harm was done to it. So, I think his description of the story was in-adequate. Perhaps he wanted

    to reduce the story merely to discuss the situation of couples facing problems in their lives. Even

    the reason of man leaving the house was not discussed. Was the husband not satisfied with the

    relationship or was it the woman who was discontented? Perhaps Carver wanted to hint that this

    is the kind of situation where the couple cannot be helped and the result is eventually dreadful.

    The second thing which surprised me was the title “Little Things” of this story. The title fails to

    describe any particular character or situation in the story. It communicates on objects or matters

    about which authors’ and readers’ thoughts and feelings may widely vary. Perhaps when the man

    was pulling the baby to himself, he was not caring that he could be hurting the baby and was

    regarding it as a mere little thing. They both were treating the baby more like a possession rather

    than a person.

    In our effort to make sense of and conclude the story, we can simply compare it to the lives of

    couples which have been drastically reached the level of separation from each other. This story

    can be judged as a work in which the writer has avoided to spell out his opinions more clearly to

    his readers.

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