Introduction
The short story by Raymond Carver, “So Much Water So Close To Home”, is based on a marriage that is on the verge of falling through. Throughout this story, Stuart, the husband to Clair displays quite a relatively high level of insensitivity towards a very painful hunting trip. The wife, on the other hand, makes so many interpretations of their marriage from the occurrence. There is a point within the story where the two confront each other (Carver 76). The exchange by the couple by the pond aids in reflecting the ideas of isolation, uncertain identity and despondency.
Call to adventure
On an annual fishing trip, in isolated high country, Stuart, Rocco, Carl, and Billy find the body of a girl in the river. They think it is too …show more content…
The relationship of Stuart and Claire is mired by their inability to converse effectively, and the scene in the country embodies the disconnection. Stuart resists any attempts of engaging in a significant conversation to do with finding the drowned body yet leaving it there a whole day. “How the hell I to know anything like that was would happen,” he asks of Claire, uninterested in pursuing the topic as he tries to direct her attention to the weather (Carver 76). Claire feels alienated by her husband’s refusal to take into consideration the moral implications that could come with his actions. She describes him, “he shakes his head and shrugs, as if it had all happened years ago, or to someone else” (Carver 76). She remains mesmerized by the possibility of her husband distancing himself from the incidence, just a day after returning from the trip. Because of this, the heroin starts to relate the aloofness of her husband to their marriage. Indeed, she even starts to imagine herself drowning in a pond. Sometime later, she thinks to herself, “this is crazy…we need to lock our fingers together. We need to help one another” (Carver 77). But she never gets to articulate those impulses. Rather, she withdraws and again starts to herself drowning, drifting “even faster around and around in the pond” (Carver 77). All the thoughts, she keeps to herself, and never shares them with anyone, not even her husband. This is a display is a real hero-able to bear the pain alone. Though, the withholding of the feelings eventuate an increase in the loneliness that she suffers at the