Summary Of Cathedral By Raymond Carver Cathedral

Oftentimes, people sharing a meal can change the bonds between each person present drastically. Raymond Carver’s “Cathedral” uses communion to show how sharing a meal can bring people closer together. The husband, his wife, and the blind man Robert share a evening together of communion and conversation, which challenges how the husband perceives people classified as different. The juxtaposition between the wife and husband and his slight change in attitude towards Robert represents how ignorance can hinder people’s abilities to accept people for who they are as opposed to who they physically appear to be in Raymond Carver’s “Cathedral”.
The main character speaks of the blind in a repugnant way. He says things such as “his being blind bothered me” and “a blind man in my house was not something I looked forward to” all within the first paragraph of the story. The author had included in the story that the husband had never met a blind person, so one could deduce that his negativity towards the blind was unfounded and ignorant. His wife, however, did not feel this way towards the blind man, Robert. “They’d become good friends, my wife and the blind man”; she liked him for him, and her willingness to form a friendship with Robert was not dependant on what disabilities Robert did or did not have. Without the negativity, the husband would’ve been able to make a friendship with Robert like his wife had, but since he has this sense of ignorance when it comes to people who are