The Meaning of Love in Carver 's What We Talk About When We Talk About Love Essay

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What We Talk AboutRaymond Carver’s \"What We Talk About When We Talk About Love\" appears to make the case that it is possible to hate the thing you love. This is the crux of what Terri describes, at least, in her abusive relationship with Ed. Ed used to drag Terri around by the ankles and beat and say, “I love you, I love you, you bitch!” She believed he meant it—his love was real. The wrath, however, as Mel points out was not love; it could not be. The only explanation, therefore, is that it is possible to have two contradictory passions at once, competing in one’s will, even to the point that one destroys the thing one loves. Such is not a new theme in literature, at any rate. Shakespeare touched on it in Othello. Carver touches on it here in this story.Sleevi (2012) contends that there are two versions of love—a violent one, and a kind one. Each demonstrates itself differently, but both have the same end goal—to be loved in return. This is evident in Carver’s story in the way the couples reach out to reassure and to be reassured in return: the way Mel reaches out to touch Terri’s cheek after he contradicts her about what love is; the way the narrator reaches out and touches the back of Laura’s hand to reassure her and to be reassured by her when they both speak their minds on the topic.

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There is a give-and-take, an action and reaction in the love concept. Even the act of talking about love is that way: there is no way to explain it or bring it up without having to…

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…overwhelms and oppresses. Is it because the object of their love is inadequate? Augustine tried to get at this problem of love in his Confessions and concluded that people’s hearts are restless until they rest in God (Allen, 1985). Perhaps that is why there seems to be no real rest for Carver’s characters: they are trying to rest in their love of some thing—some object, some romance, some honeymoon, some earthly idea, some person—but for love to find its fullest reciprocation it has to be placed in love itself, which is God, according to Augustine. At any right, nothing in Carver’s story challenges Augustine’s thinking: Carver’s characters come up short, overwhelmed perhaps in a way by misplaced love, love on the run, love seeking but not fully finding, love looking but not knowing for what, love expressing but not knowing what….....

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