Essay On Similarities Between Cathedral And Blue Night By Raymond Carver

The sun and moon are completely different, but they both allow a sense of time. How can two different objects provide the same idea? A picture can have the same moral lesson as a short story can, depending on the viewers perspective. After reading Cathedral by Raymond Carver and viewing “Blue Night” by Edward Hopper, it’s shown they both share multiple similarities. Carver and Hoppers characters, settings, action and conflict have shown similarities because both use minimalism, realism and perspective. The two artists grew up almost the same which could explain why their work corresponds with one another. In Cathedral and Blue Night the minimalism is used to explain the characters, define the setting and guess about the conflict in the action. The minimalism shows in “Cathedral” when the narrator says “And his being blind bothered me” (209). The narrator had no real information about the blind man, but inferred what he’d be like. As in Hopper’s painting there is an emphasis on the man with makeup. The emphasis creates the mood because of the dark lighting allowing his face to be seen as “different.” When Robert eats dinner with the wife and husband in “Cathedral” the narrator explains “The blind man had the right away located his food, he knew just where everything was on his plate” (217). The setting for the blind was quite comfortable. The painting “Blue Night” shows the “clown” minding his own, smoking a cigarette while the men across from him are uncomfortable with