[Download Free A Small Good Thing By Raymond Carver Pdf
Amancio Mccrae
"A Small, Good Thing," an award-winning story by American short story writer and poet, Raymond Carver, was published in Carver's third major collection of stories, Cathedral, in 1983. In his first two collections, Carver had established himself as a new and compelling voice in American literature and a master of the short story form. In Cathedral, he took his craft to new levels of insight into the human condition. "A Small, Good Thing" is generally regarded as one of Carver's finest stories, in which he goes beyond the spare narratives and unrelieved bleakness of some of his earlier work. The story is about Scotty, an eight-year-old boy who dies three days after being hit by a car as he walks to school. In language that is simple on the surface but reveals a host of telling details, Carver depicts the grief of the parents and their quarrel and final reconciliation with a baker who was baking a birthday cake for Scotty. Although tragic and disturbing, "A Small, Good Thing" conveys a message of forgiveness, kindness, and the healing power of human community.
Carver's father was a great storyteller and also read aloud to his son. Carver later attributed his desire to become a writer to his father. During adolescence Carver enjoyed fishing, hunting, and baseball, but his main goal was to write. He graduated from Yakima High School in 1956 and the following year married Maryann Burk, who was sixteen years old. By 1958, they had a daughter and a son and had moved to Paradise, California, where Carver entered Chico State College. At Chico, Carver studied under the novelist John Gardner.
For the next decade or so, Carver worked at a series of low-wage jobs, including gas station attendant and hospital cleaner, in order to support his family while he also continued his education. He received a degree from Humboldt State College in 1963, after which he moved to Iowa and enrolled in the Iowa Writers' Workshop. But due to lack of money he was unable to finish the two-year program. He returned to California in 1964 and lived in Sacramento, where he continued to work at odd jobs for several years. In 1967, he filed for bankruptcy and also had a drinking problem, but he was beginning to make his mark as a writer. His story "Will You Please Be Quiet, Please?" was included in The Best American Short Stories, 1967. In 1968, his first book of poems, Near Klamath, was published, followed in 1970 by a second collection, Winter Insomnia.
In the early 1970s, Carver took on a series of temporary teaching positions, at the University of California at Santa Cruz, then University of California at Berkeley, and the Iowa Writers' Workshop. However, teaching seemed to exacerbate Carver's alcohol abuse, and in 1974, he was fired from the University of California at Santa Barbara for failure to meet with his classes. He filed for bankruptcy again.
In 1976, Carver's first collection of stories, Will You Please Be Quiet, Please?, was published by McGraw-Hill to critical acclaim. However, Carver was still plagued by alcoholism and was hospitalized several times for treatment. He finally gave up alcohol in June 1977, and his life took a more positive turn. In that year, his second collection of stories, Furious Seasons, was published by Capra Press.
In 1981, Carver's third collection of stories, What We Talk About When We Talk About Love, was published by Knopf. Critical praise was unanimous, and Carver was regarded as a master of the short story genre. In 1983, another collection of stories appeared, again published by Knopf. This was Cathedral, which contained the story "A Small, Good Thing." The book was nominated for a National Book Critics Circle Award and the Pulitzer Prize. "A Small, Good Thing" won an O. Henry Award and appeared in the Pushcart Prize annual.
In 1984, Carver, who had by this time divorced his first wife and was living with the poet Tess Gallagher, moved to Port Angeles, Washington. His collection of poetry, Where Water Comes Together with Water, was published by Random House in 1985, and another poetry collection, Ultramarine, appeared in 1986.
In 1987, Carver, who was a heavy smoker, was diagnosed with lung cancer. Two-thirds of his left lung was removed, but the cancer reappeared the following year. In June 1988, Carver married Tess Gallagher. He died of lung cancer on August 2 at his home in Port Washington.
"A Small, Good Thing" begins on a Saturday afternoon in an unnamed American city. Ann Weiss, a young mother, drives to the shopping center and orders a chocolate cake for her son Scotty's eighth birthday, which will be on Monday. The baker is a taciturn man, and Ann does not take to him. He promises the cake will be ready on Monday morning.
On Monday morning, Scotty is walking to school with another boy when he steps off the curb at an intersection and is knocked down by a car. The car stops but when Scotty gets to his feet and looks as if he is all right, the car leaves the scene. Scotty walks home but then collapses on the sofa and loses consciousness. He is taken to the hospital, where he is diagnosed with mild concussion and shock. He is in a deep sleep, but Dr. Francis, his doctor, says this is not a coma. Ann and her husband, Howard, wait anxiously at the bedside.
That evening, Howard returns home to bathe and change clothes. As he walks in the door, the phone rings. A voice on the other end of the line says there is a cake that was not picked up. Howard does not know what the man is talking about and hangs up. While Howard is bathing, the phone rings again, but the caller hangs up without saying a word.
Howard returns to the hospital after midnight. Scotty has still not awakened, but Dr. Francis insists there is nothing to worry about and that he will wake up soon. A nurse comes in and checks on Scotty. She tells the parents he is stable. The parents are worried but try to reassure themselves. Dr. Francis examines Scotty and again says he is all right other than a hairline fracture of the skull. He is not, according to the doctor, in a coma; his sleeping is the restorative measure the body is taking in response to shock, and he should wake up soon.
The parents try to comfort each other. Both of them have been praying. An hour later, another doctor, Dr. Parsons, enters the room and tells the parents that they want to take more x-rays of Scotty, and they also want to do a brain scan. He explains that this is normal medical procedure. Scotty is wheeled out on a gurney. His parents accompany him to the x-ray department and then return with him to his hospital room.
They wait all day, but Scotty still does not wake up. Dr. Francis continues to assure them that the boy will wake soon, but Ann and Howard become increasingly anxious. On his next visit, Dr. Francis confesses that there is no reason why Scotty has not awakened yet, but he still insists the boy is in no danger. Pressed by Ann, he admits that Scotty is in a coma, but that all the signs are good.
Ann goes home to take a bath and feed the dog. On her way out of the hospital, she cannot find the elevator and enters a small waiting room in which a black man and his wife and teenage daughter are waiting for news of their son, Franklin. The man explains to Ann that Franklin was stabbed in a fight, even though he was not directly involved in it.
Ann returns home. At five o'clock in the morning, after she has just fed the dog, the phone rings. The man says a few words, mentioning a problem to do with Scotty, and then hangs up. Ann calls the hospital, but there has been no change in Scotty's condition. Howard thinks the caller may have been the same person who called him earlier. He wonders whether it might be the driver of the car who knocked Scotty down. Maybe the man is a psychopath and has somehow got hold of their telephone number, he suggests.
Just before seven in the morning, Ann returns to the hospital, where she inquires at a nurses' station about the condition of Franklin. A nurse informs her that Franklin died. When Ann enters Scotty's room, Howard tells her that the doctors have decided to run more tests on the boy. They are going to operate on him, since they do not know why he is not waking up. Just then Scotty opens his eyes and stares straight ahead, then at his parents. The parents are relieved and talk to him, but he does not respond. He opens his mouth and howls, then seems to relax, but stops breathing.
The doctors say that his death is caused by a hidden occlusion, and that it was a one-in-a-million chance. Dr. Francis is shaken and commiserates with Ann and Howard. He says there will be an autopsy.
At about eleven o'clock, the Weisses drive home and try to deal with their shock and grief. Ann calls her relatives; Howard goes outside to the garage, where he sits down and holds Scotty's bicycle. Then the phone rings, and it is once more the mystery caller, talking about Scotty. Ann swears at him and hangs up. She collapses over the table and weeps.
Much later, just before midnight, the phone rings. Howard answers, but the line goes dead. They both know that it is the same caller. Ann says she would like to kill him. Then she suddenly remembers the birthday cake and realizes that it has been the baker calling her to harass her for not collecting the cake.
Ann and Howard drive to the shopping center to confront the baker, even though it is about midnight. Ann knocks twice on the back door of the bakery. The baker comes to the door and recognizes Ann but says he is busy. He says he still has the three-day old cake and she can collect it if she wants to, for half-price. He repeats that he is busy and has to get back to work. Ann angrily tells him that Scotty is dead. She feels dizzy and begins to cry.
The baker's manner softens. He fetches two chairs and asks Ann and Howard to sit down. He sits down also and tells them how sorry he is about Scotty's death and sorry for his behavior, too. He asks them to forgive him. He makes them some coffee and offers them some fresh-baked cinnamon rolls. He says it is good to eat something in a time like this. Ann eats three rolls, and she and Howard listen as the baker tells them about his loneliness and what it feels like to be childless. He speaks of his repetitive, empty work as a baker, preparing for other people's celebrations. They talk until daylight, and neither Ann nor Howard thinks about leaving.
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