The Cathedral Short Story Analysis

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Recommended: Symbolism of the cathedral in Cathedral by Carver

The narrator of this story acts as the protagonist, but he is unnamed. He is a dynamic character which he changes throughout the story. The conflicts of this story are character vs. self, where the narrator is second guessing his wife’s feeling towards him and their relationship. Also, the narrator is experiencing conflict with himself because he realized that he was blinded his whole life but, now he can see clearly. Another conflict is narrator vs. wife, where this relationship doesn’t have strong communication skills and many insecurities. The ending is indeterminate because it’s simple and leaves you thinking what will happen with the characters. The climax of the story is when both the narrator and Robert begin to draw the cathedral together. The turning points …show more content…

The story explains that you can’t just see something by its external looks but, must dig deep and find a deeper meaning to what you are looking at. The story is about the narrator who meets a blind man, who has recently lost his wife. He figures out that he has lived his life without seeing it or being able to understand the people that which live among him. The central idea of this story is that is the narrator would’ve opened his eyes then he wouldn’t have had understood what Robert was trying to teach him about sight. Yes, the theme reinforces the notions of sight because many people don’t see what’s important in a person. They see the surface and miss what’s important, everything beneath it. This story provides many symbols, such as, the “cathedral” and “audiotapes”. The meaning of the cathedral is being able to see something for it true nature, seeing thing beneath the actual surface. The meaning of the audiotapes symbolizes blindness for example, when the narrator’s wife and Robert could communicate in person they would send each other tapes to keep in touch with each

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