English - Student Works
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Browsing English - Student Works by Author "Copland, Sarah"
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Item Same author, same stories, different unity: a close comparative reading of a selection of stories from Raymond Carver’s What we talk about when we talk about love and beginners(2023) Carter, Kaitlyn; Copland, SarahThis essay provides a close comparative reading of three stories from Raymond Carver’s short story cycles Beginners and What We Talk About When We Talk About Love. A working definition of short story cycles is developed and referenced in the evaluations of these stories—this definition utilizes literary scholar Gerald Lynch’s work on the sub-genre. The close comparative analyses of “Why Don’t You Dance?”, “One More Thing”, and “Gazebo” reveal that both collections meet the criteria of short story cycles, however Beginners has a stronger unity that achieved through its shared themes. This supports the argument that Carver’s editor, Gordon Lish, exchanged Carver’s unity of theme in Beginners for a weaker unity of style in What We Talk About.