What We Talk About When We Talk About Love

Raymond CarverRaymond Carver was a man of few words. Often characterized by an economy that bordered on austerity, Carver’s stories were short and plainly written, and his terse prose lent itself perfectly to his favorite subject: working-class America. Aside from poetry, which was written in the same no-frills style, Carver devoted himself exclusively to short stories. What really set Carver apart from other authors, however, was his exploration of the dark side of Americana. In the simple lives of small town folk, Carver uncovered the violence, rage, and loneliness lurking just beneath the surface. Like many writers, his posthumous reputation has grown exponentially, and it is impossible to imagine any serious study of the short story that does not include the extraordinary work of Raymond Carver.

出版者:Random House

作者:Raymond Carver

页数:144

出版时间:2003-07-03

价格:USD 14.45

装帧:Paperback

isbn号码:9780099449843

图书标签:Raymond_Carver英文原版小说美国文学文学短篇爱情瑞蒙．卡佛

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Raymond Carver's "What We Talk About When We Talk About Love"

Commentary by Karen Bernardo

Raymond Carver's short story "What We Talk About When We Talk About Love" takes place in one sitting, or more precisely, one pre-dinner drinking bout. It is told in first person, with one of the four characters referring to himself as "I," but ironically this is the character about whom we know the least; he is merely the mouthpiece for the action, and all we know about him is that his name is Nick and he is married to Laura. His friend Mel is a cardiologist, married to Terri, and initiates the conversation of what love means. This conversation provides the central focus of the story.

Mel, Nick tells us, thinks "real love [is] nothing less than spiritual love." He cannot comprehend that his wife's abusive ex-husband, Ed, could possibly have loved her while he was dragging her around the room by her ankles. "That's not love, and you know it," Mel says. "I don't know what you'd call it, but I sure know you wouldn't call it love."

Terri, on the other hand, insists that it was. She has led a much less sheltered life and is also much less self-righteous than Mel; she understands that while objectively Ed could be regarded as sadistic, dangerous, and pathological, he operated out of a reservoir of strong emotion that was simply incapable of channeling itself in socially-acceptable ways. This strong emotion, when turned toward other human beings, erupted in violence. This is why he beat his wife and eventually committed suicide.

Ed, in fact, functions as a pivotal character in the story even though he is dead by the time the action occurs. He stands out in stark contrast to the little group drinking around the table, for, crazy as he was, he had life in him. Terri seems to look back to her days with Ed with a kind of nostalgia, because for all his crackling violence, she thinks he is more man than Mel will ever be.

Mel, for his part, presents the story's central question -- what is love -- because like the rest of the group he is imbued with a sense of loss, of regret, of unutterable sadness, for reasons he can not quite describe. He feels instinctively that it has something to do with love, and he's right in a way; it has everything to do with passion. The little group sees in alcohol a way to inflame the passion they once felt for living, or the passion they think they should feel. Mel notes that as much as they love each other, if they were all married to someone else, it would make no difference in their lives; one empty person is as good as another.

In fact there is in fact no passion in these people; the alcohol makes it worse, and at the end, when Mel says the gin is gone, Nick concludes the story with the words: "I could hear the human noise we sat there making, not one of us moving, not even when the room went dark." They can't move because they suddenly realize the fact that none of them have ever moved; their lives have always been, and will always be, empty and dark, and they no longer have gin to cover this up.

读后感

作为一个紧跟时代潮流的八卦爱好者，除了坚持收看网易新闻及评论，定期查阅豆瓣流行之外，我一直按时收看江苏台的《非诚勿扰》，某期，一位文艺青年送心仪女生本小说，我猜就是这本。当时我就愕然了，现在文艺青年装逼都开始秀这本书了，简直比45度仰望天空。悲伤逆流成河还令...  

卡佛的故事太简单了。小青年们在需要装逼时，往往喜欢使用卡夫卡博尔赫斯卡尔维诺纳博科夫之类的作家，他们用文字织迷宫玩智力游戏，从一个意象上就可以抽出无数条扯不断的支线丝网，每条支线都可以是金闪闪的装逼点。而卡佛的故事太简单了。就是个素面玻璃杯，一眼就能看穿，...  

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用户评价

所谓的极简主义中文翻译好烂，还是看原版吧。

其实每一篇可以用“one more thing”来完美概括

是present simple...下了个版本全书只有标题篇和beginner。。一度以为自己在看彗星来的那一夜。简介深刻。。

文字言简意赅，但是却简洁有力。

that's untold