Raymond Carver is well known for his minimalistic style. When it comes to writing, Carver is an expert at telling a story in as few words as possible while still getting the point across. In “The Bath”, Carver’s use of minimalism creates a mimetic experience for the reader and allows the audience to make personal connections with the hidden messages throughout the story. The plot is portrayed as realistically as possible, to make the audience understand how such a tragic event can have serious consequences on the victim’s family. In this particular passage from “The Bath”, Carver focuses on the near-inarticulateness of the boy’s mother, who is living in mental and emotional isolation. After the boy’s accident, his mother has trouble voicing…show more content… In few words, the reader is given a brief indication of her true feelings. Carver writes, “She stood at the window with her hands on the sill. She was talking to herself like this. We’re into something now, something hard,” (255). The only thing that the boy’s mother seems to truly understand is the gravity of her son’s situation, and is equally as terrified of its outcome. The mother’s interior dialogue is also revealing of her current feelings. Usually a character is described as thinking or wondering to themselves during an interior dialogue. However, the mother is “talking to herself” (Carver 255). This highlights her emotional isolation from the other characters, especially the husband. Readers then become fully aware of the mother’s emotional state through a simple sentence: “She was afraid” (Carver 255). In no more than three words, readers are able to understand the amount of fear that is circulating throughout the mother’s body. Even more, this sentence stands alone in its own paragraph. While the language continues to be simple and straightforward, readers are still able to sense the feeling of helplessness and fear that the boy’s mother must be…show more content… This passage is significant because it pays attention to both the internal and external conflicts experienced by the victim’s mother. The unvaried language and simple sentence structures leave the reader searching for clues to gain a better understanding, just as the mother is trying to do through her interactions with the cryptic doctors. The text describes, in the most realistic manner, what it feels like for a person to be stuck within themselves, overcome with feelings of hopelessness and loneliness even though they are surrounded by those they love. Carver’s mimetic writing reproduces reality by touching on psychologically realistic aspects of such a tragic situation through parental shock and anxiety during a tragic, yet ordinary