You will prepare and submit a term paper on In Raymond Carver's, short stories, How does one reach enlightenment. Your paper should be a minimum of 1000 words in length.

You will prepare and submit a term paper on In Raymond Carver's, short stories, How does one reach enlightenment. Your paper should be a minimum of 1000 words in length. The purpose of this paper is to analyze how one reaches enlightenment in Raymond Carver’s short stories. Thesis of the paper can be put as enlightenment is reached through spiritual transformation of an individual who becomes capable of valuing his/her own self, others, and relationship with others. Writer’s short story Cathedral, which was published in 1983, analyses the issue of human ignorance. Cathedral belongs to literary subgenre called psychological realism. Carver’s literary device is narrator’s passing from the state of insecurity to complete openness. The main character is sure about what he does and what he needs to do. However, as the story unfolds the narrator gets enlightened with the help of a blind person. Such order of events has rather symbolic meaning. Ironically, the thesis of the paper can be sated as, in Carter’s Cathedral enlightenment is reached through blindness. This short story can be described as a journey into one’s inner self or one’s enlightenment.