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"Cathedral," a Short Story by Raymond Carver

Kennedy & Gioia, 6th edition (compact), pp. 91-101

Before trying to do the worksheet questions below, first you need to read the story, found in your textbook on the pages listed above.   There are also several supplementary sources you might be interested in:

LITERARY DEVICES WORKSHEET FOR “CATHEDRAL”

The main part of this worksheet is ten questions on the above story which you must answer for a daily grade.   You will submit your answers in the "Cathedral" Worksheet assignment within Blackboard.  The best way to do that is in these steps:

  1. Print out this link containing the questions, for reference.  In this worksheet, there are six questions worth 16 points each.

  2. Create a word processing file and in it, answer each question in one or several sentences.

  3. Alternatively, you could copy the six questions from this page, then paste them into your file and then answer each one.  However, do not paste anything but the six questions.  If you paste this entire web link with graphics, etc., I will reject your assignment.

  4. If you have pasted the questions, please type your answers in some other color or at least a different font, to make it easier for me to go straight to your answers as I grade many papers.

  5. You must number each answer to match the question.  If you pasted the questions into your file, then just use those numbers.

  6. You must answer in complete sentences.  I will deduct for one-word or two-word answers. 

  7. If you work with a classmate collaboratively, make certain that each of you words your answers in your own words!  If I get identically worded worksheet answers, that is plagiarism.  I will divide the grade by the number of students submitting identical answers.  Everyone must do his or her own work.  Collaborative learning is okay.  But if you could not sit down in front of me and answer the questions for yourself, then someone has done your work for you.

  8. Name your file Cathedral followed by your three initials (middle initial too, to avoid duplications).

  9. Save your file as Rich Text, as you did with Quiz One.

  10. Enter the Cathedral assignment in Daily Grades within Blackboard, and follow the further instructions to submit your assignment by the due date.

A Review of the Basic Interpretive Strategy

This exercise will help you see how several crucial literary devices work in this first short story, and that in turn will give you some idea of how they work in general.  The key thing to realize is that your knowledge of one device can build on other devices, so that they work like stepping stones to a good understanding of the work as a whole.  This might be called an “interpretive path.”

The basic interpretive path or strategy for many works of fiction and drama works this way:

  1. Social conflict of one or several particular kinds (gender, generational, socio-economic, etc.) will affect the protagonist (the main character).
  1. These types of social conflict will cause inner conflict in the protagonist (frustration, confusion, anger, guilt, and so on).
  1. As the intensity of the inner conflict mounts, the protagonist will experience an opportunity for character change which is caused by the intense stress of the inner conflict.  This is the climactic moment, the climax of the story.  The character change could be good or bad; it may occur, or it may not occur; but in any case, there is still a scene of climax where it could have occurred.
  1. The reader’s task then is to try to see what sort of moral lesson may be shown by the protagonist’s response to that moment of great stress.  That lesson is the theme.  Sometimes the behavior of the protagonist is a positive example of some way to handle such a situation; other times we are shown what we should not do—we are given a negative example, in other words.  Either way, there is a moral lesson, a theme.

Clearly, then, there are two early interpretive steps:  to identify the protagonist, and to identify the one or several particular types of social conflict he/she is subject to.  So for “Cathedral,” as a daily grade, answer these questions:

The Questions:  Ten Questions at Ten Points Each

First of all, note that there is a certain format to these questions.  Each one includes not only the question itself (or several, sometimes), but also some discussion.  Think of the discussion as "tips," to help point you towards a possible answer.  But to keep from being confused, note that the actual question I want you to answer will be underlined and in red,, like this.  Be sure to answer all parts of a question.  Don't rush, and don't just skim. 

1.  Who is the protagonist, in this story?  In your answer, explain why you chose who you did.  Tip:  you should judge the protagonist based on several factors:  Which character do we spend the most time with?  Which character is telling the story (probably it is his/her story, then)?  Which character changes, if one does?  Which character are we left to focus on at the end of the story?  When the same character is the answer to most or all of the above questions, that character is probably the protagonist. 

2.  Does the story have a character who acts as catalyst?  If so, who?  Briefly tell why.  To spot the catalyst, simply recall that a catalyst may do something to cause a change in the protagonist.

3.  What is the main type of social conflict in this story?  Tip:  The main type is shown by the obvious physical difference between the husband and Robert.  This type of social conflict does not have a readymade label, so say it this way:  “Those who are _____ versus those who are _____.” 

4.   What is a secondary type of social conflict, seen between "Bub" and his wife, in his jealousy regarding Robert's visit?  This one does have a readymade label, one you have already read about in earlier worksheets; it is called _______ conflict.

5.  Working from your answers to the first two questions, now describe the sort of inner conflict the protagonist feels; what specific, disturbing emotions does he feel?  List these emotions.

6.  Another useful way to understand the main character’s inner conflict is to see how it becomes more severe, in stages.  This is perhaps more obvious in this story than in many.  So in addition to naming specific emotions, now name at least two plot events which signal progressively more severe inner conflict in the protagonist.  Try to name events that signal major escalations in the inner conflict, not trivial ones.  For example, one stage is already happening even before the guest arrives, but other stages of inner conflict get progressively more intense.  To identify several other stages, consider that the protagonist really wants nothing to do with his guest; so you can track his inner conflict by noting events which force him into closer and closer contact with his guest. 

7.  When inner conflict becomes severe enough, a moment arrives when character change is possible.  Does the protagonist change?  If so, from what type of personality to what new type of personality?  I am not asking you to tell me he changes "from static to dynamic."  That may be true, but if he is in fact dynamic, what personality does he begin with, and what different one does he possibly end with? As a broad hint, consider that the main character, at the story’s start, seems very “closed off” and unwilling to experience anything new or different.  Does he change in regards to this by the end of the story? 

8.  Does this outcome seem good or bad?  Explain.  Note two things:  First, what I am asking for is not necessarily your opinion of whether it is a good or bad outcome, but how the author wants us to view it.  To help yourself determine the author's intent on this, pay attention to tone, mood (whichever term you prefer) in the climactic scene (about the last half page of the story).

9.  To see a theme, it helps to first see the issue clearly—the main challenge confronting the protagonist.  On the most immediate level, that issue is dealing with a blind man.  But let's broaden the issue, so it can apply more to our lives.  What if Robert were disabled in some other way?  Or what if Robert were not disabled at all, but rather was just different:  a different race or ethnicity, or having a different political viewpoint, or from a different culture, or socio-economic background?  Note how each of the second and third descriptions of issue is broader than the previous one. Is the story about only dealing with someone who is blind?  Surely not.  Is it about how to interact with someone who is disabled in any way?  That's a broader, more widely useful issue.  But isn't the story really talking about how to interact with any new and different person or situation?  What's the moral lesson about this, then?  Take the broadest statement of issue (the last one above), and working from that, write a statement of the story’s theme.  Use your own version of this wording:  “When a person is faced with ________________, he should ________________________.”  Note:  You can improve your theme even more if you can also include wording telling how doing this thing can actually help the one who does it.  Hint:  How does the protagonist grow as a person by the story’s end? One way to add such wording would be like this:  "When a person is faced with ___________________, if he will ________________then he may realize that _______________________."

10.  With a theme in hand, let’s look at the device of symbolism.  The story’s title is “Cathedral.”  Of course, the two men are drawing a cathedral.  But can the drawing of a cathedral be a symbol for the change taking place in the protagonist?  What sorts of things go on in a church, chapel, or place of the spirit?  Is spiritual growth one of those?  Tell several ways in which the main character’s living room acts symbolically as a cathedral, a place of the spirit.  In other words, what several things happen to Bub there which might happen in a sacred, spiritual place like a cathedral.  A related image is the “hand-holding” that makes Bub so uncomfortable.  Some spiritual faiths believe in a concept known as a “laying on of hands,” in which a healing or a transmittal of spirit takes place.  In what way does Robert laying his hand on Bub’s constitute a symbolic “laying on of hands” in the above sense?

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