The Cobweb Essay & Criticism

The Cobweb Critical Overview

Ultramarine was widely praised when it was released in 1986. Reviewing the collection for the New York Times Book Review in 1987, Patricia Hampl wrote, "This book is a treasure, one to return to. No one's brevity is as rich, as complete, as Raymond Carver's." Although academic criticism of Carver's writing focuses on his fiction rather than his poetry, a few critics have addressed the poems in Ultramarine, and interest is likely to increase over time. In his study of Carver's writing, Raymond Carver, Adam Meyer calls Carver "a poet of considerable skill" and argues that "The Cobweb" is a projection of his own death. "Carver produced poems that are deserving of much more attention than they have received to date," Meyer writes, noting that critical interest in Carver's poetry is "primarily for its similarities to and difference from his fiction." In his own study of Carver's...
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