The Influence Of Blindness In Raymond Carver's Cathedral

The lack of insight and awareness can essentially provide an individual with "blindness" due to various misconceptions and predetermined feelings of superiority regarding the unknown that can ultimately damage relationships and manipulate our overall development within society. Despite music being exemplified as Sonny's savior due to its significant benefits such as providing confidence and happiness, the narrator failed to recognize and accept his decision to pursue a career in jazz because it contradicted his own beliefs of structure and stability. Likewise, in Raymond Carver's Cathedral, the narrator allowed outside factors as well as his enhanced value on vision influence his feelings toward Robert because he has never encountered someone with a physical disability. In both short stories, the narrators essentially undergo a spiritual awakening by overcoming

their own "blindness" toward foreign concepts in order to strengthen relationships through achieving a deeper understanding. Although both narrators ultimately change their perspectives from pity to compassion, James Baldwin's Sonny's Blues demonstrated how the struggling narrator's mindset was drastically influenced by his own guilt which nearly destroyed the relationship with Sonny.
Despite being unable to truly understand others, the greatest difference between Sonny's Blues and Cathedral was the overall mindset of both narrators that ultimately allowed them to fall victim to their own one-sided beliefs. Sonny felt disrespected and a sense of inferiority due to his brother's lack of support toward jazz music since it lacked structure and stability because musicians are just "good time people" who don't have "bright" futures due to their careless lifestyles; these feelings are due to the psychological concept known as Egoistic Motivation because the narrator appears to be motivated by making his saint like mother proud since he disobeyed her final wish of protecting Sonny as well as helping himself get over the death of his daughter, Gracie.
"I simply couldn't see why on earth he'd want to spend his time hanging around nightclubs, clowning around on bandstands, while people pushed each other around a dance floor. It seemed — beneath him, somehow" (Narrator 37).
However, due to the significant value placed on vision, the narrator developed feelings of pity toward his wife's longtime friend, Robert because he can't experience various visual pleasures such as traveling through different locations or even his own wife. Despite being able to function properly, the relationship between Robert and the narrator represented various societies because many individuals aren't truly able to comprehend the idea of blindness, which causes a variety of misconceptions regarding how they function during their everyday lives.
"I wasn't enthusiastic about his visit.

He was no one I knew. And his being blind bothered me. My idea of blindness came from the movies. In the movies, the blind moved slowly and never laughed. Sometimes they were led by seeing-eye dogs. A blind man in my house was not something I looked forward to" (Narrator 77).
The misconceptions demonstrated by both narrators arose from a variety of influences such as guilt and entertainment that ultimately allowed each individual to view their counterpart negatively.
The lack of understanding can essentially plague individuals with internal conflict due to the sense of isolation. Due to the lack of understanding and acceptance exhibited throughout Sonny's Blues, Sonny developed an addiction to heroin, which served as his "escape" from the everlasting problems within Harlem due to poverty and racism that plagued the adolescents.
"I'm glad Mama and Daddy are dead and can't see what's happened to their son and I swear if I'd known what I was doing I would never have hurt you so, you and a lot of other fine people who were nice to me and who believed in me" (Sonny

31).
However, despite his unfortunate struggles with drug abuse, Sonny had undergone a self-transformation resulting in a newly found purpose in life involving music because it had provided him with both an identity and control over his own destiny unlike the majority of children residing in Harlem; due to his determination to achieve in order to become great, Sonny would replace his addiction of heroin with knowledge for jazz which ultimately allowed him to learn how to master the piano regardless of opposing views. Likewise, in Cathedral, the narrator's wife suffered from depression because she wasn't able to create meaningful relationships due to her first husband's inability to provide her with a stable foundation due to his career with the military. As a result of her previous struggles, the narrator's wife feels the need to "protect" Robert and essentially pity him due to his disability because he has been the most consistent influence throughout her life.
"My wife's officer was posted to one base and then another. She sent tapes from Moody AFB, McGuire, McConnell, and finally Travis, near Sacramento, where one night she got to feeling lonely and cut off from people she kept losing in that moving-around life. She got to feeling she couldn't go it another step. She went in and swallowed all the pills and capsules in the medicine chest and washed them down with a bottle of gin. Then she got into a hot bath and passed out" (Narrator 78).
Both short stories Sonny’s Blues and Cathedral exhibit the importance of strengthening relationships through obtaining a deeper understanding in order to allow relationships to flourish. By the end of Sonny's Blues, the narrator begins to realize that Sonny's bebop allows him to escape reality and essentially cleanse his soul by allowing him to display his own struggles into songs that people can relate to as well as embrace. This was a significant moment that ultimately reconnected the distant brothers because Sonny was able to make a connection with his music that provided the narrator with the ability to finally experience the "freedom" that Sonny had craved.
“Freedom lurked around us and I understood, at last, that he could help us to be free if we would listen, that he would never be free if we would listen, that he would never be free until we did. Yet, there was no battle in his face now. I heard what he had gone through, and would continue to go through until he came to rest in earth" (Narrator 49).
Despite society viewing blindness as a physical weakness, Robert was able to "see" on a deeper and more meaningful level, which allowed various relationships to flourish due to the intense intimacy unlike the narrator who was fixated on appearances rather than feelings. As a result, Robert was able to influence the perspective of the narrator through the portrait of the cathedral, which allowed for compassion to manifest since Robert was able to use his "weakness" as an asset.
"But I had my eyes closed. I thought I'd keep them that way for a little longer. I thought it was something I ought to do" (Narrator 87).
Despite possessing ignorant beliefs, both narrators managed to enhance their perspectives and evolve as individuals in order to achieve acceptance and a mutual understanding with Sonny and Robert.
Perception can influence one's views and judgments by instilling a corrupt mindset of superiority that can ultimately ruin relationships by providing an individual with a lack of insight. Despite the narrator’s beliefs in music not being realistic and blindness being a weakness, both narrators allow their ignorant views to be based off different influences that ultimately labeled Sonny and Robert has weak individuals amongst society. The idea of isolation was a major theme in both stories that provided both Sonny and the narrator’s wife with significant pain that led to their involvement with drugs in order to “escape” the lack of understanding and happiness they had experienced. Despite both narrators possessing various misconceptions and predetermined thoughts toward both Sonny and Robert due to their diverse lifestyles, they were ultimately able to achieve a newly improved perception by experiencing their “freedom” in order to strengthen their relationships.