So Much Water Close To Home

1641 Words7 Pages
A young girl is raped, killed, and ignored by four men on a trip who found her, but this is merely the background story. In the short story So Much Water Close to Home, the wife Claire narrates in first person her suspicions of Stuart, her husband and one of the four men, and how it puts an even larger strain on her already troubled marriage. Author Raymond Carver illustrates how finding oneself must be done alone and not through a lover. In So Much Water Close to Home, the rape story covers up and yet still accentuates the disconnection within the household between Stuart and Claire. Carver uses the background story to unveil problems within the home and marriage. Throughout the story there are major conflicts that act as decoys towards the real problem. The real problem that Carver is trying to convey to the audience is that Stuarts and Claire’s marriage is…show more content…
Another incident is when Claire is driving to the funeral and the male mechanic does not have any hope for her that she can make it herself. He says words as “it’s quite a drive for a woman” and “I’d offer to drive you” which only put an emphasis on how he thinks that Claire is weak merely because of her gender (495). Later on, Claire runs into an issue with an unknown male on the road. Because this is a male character, Claire already feels as if she is the weaker and less dominant person. If this were female versus female then there would be no reason for Claire to pull over or roll up the windows or even lock the doors (496). Claire is genuinely scared for her life because she knows this man is very capable of over powering her. Claire is again the weaker role with her husband. Stuart goes off and does male things with his friends like going on trips, going fishing, playing poker while Claire calls these boyish things to do (486). All of these aspects of Claire being weaker and less dominant put a negative strain on their

More about So Much Water Close To Home

Open Document