In a
Critique article, Bill Mullen described Carver's fictional world as a place where people "are employed in either traditionally low-paying occupations like logging, mill, or factory work, or in neo-blue-collar, service-industry equivalents like mini-mart operator or apartment manager." They worries revolve around survival: will the old car start? Will they lose their job or become unable to keep up with their bills? "The quiet economic sufferings of Carver's socially immobile characters," added Mullen, "rendered in skeletal, affectless prose, reminds . . . critics of Carver's own distinctly blue-collar roots in the logging town of Yakima, Washington, and of his testimonials in interviews to the working class as 'my people.'"
Life Parallels Art
Carver's own life paralleled that of one of his characters. Born in the hardscrabble logging town of Clatskanie, Oregon, on May 25, 1938, Carver was the first of two sons born to "C.R." (Clevie Raymond) Carver and Ella Beatrice (Casey) Carver. A native of Arkansas, C.R. had "walked, hitched rides, and rode in empty boxcars when he went from Arkansas to Washington State in 1934, looking for work," as Carver reported in his essay "My Father's Life," collected in Fires: Essays, Poems, Stories. C.R. worked on the construction of Grand Coulee Dam for a time and then returned to Arkansas to be with his family.
This is a free page. This page contains 200 words. This
biography contains 5,984 words (approx. 20 pages at 300
words per page).
Read the rest of this Biography with our Raymond Carver Access Pass.
