I've heard its a good collection of stories, havent actually read it myself

His prose is almost unbelievably plain, and his stories are very straightforward. It worked for me, but some might not like that sort of thing.

>>7739442
Your selling him short; he's terse but through what he holds back - and if you read closely you'll realise there are so many points at which he's chosen to supply less than concrete meaning, when such would have presented itself as the natural choice - he manages, in some of his stories, to communicate the world his characters really well: they themselves often lack the will or the ability to perceive the roots of their problems, they are anxious without quite knowing why, they scrabble around those plain, dimly lit passages, looking for something Carver will often only choose to share with the reader.

Some of his stories are just shit though, Popular Mechanics is awful

>>7739469
also there's a chance that Liche (think that's how you spell it) is responsible for a good deal of the "indeterminacy" which Carver is lauded for.

>>7739469
you're *

>>7739483
It's Lish, no?

Birdman

5/5, top notch atmosphere. Prose is extremely good, shame about the legions of shit imitators it spawned.

>>7739483
No, Lish just pruned the stories down in a way that compliments the prose. It's interesting reading both versions of the stories, Carver can occasionally get very melodramatic on his own and Lish tends to cut down on that. I prefer the What We Talk About versions.

>>7739387

that one is representative of what people view as Carver's style, but my favorite is Cathedral.

>>7739387
BEGINNERS THE UNBASTARDIZED VERSION IS VASTLY SUPERIOR IN EVERY WAY.

>>7739761
Ugh, I know it's the natural state of this board to be contrarian, but I really feel that Beginners is strictly inferior. Lish molded the works into their prime form. Carver alone is fine, but I wouldn't get a copy of Beginners unless I was was a fanboy. Which you might turn out to be, idk.

>>7739760
my nigga

>>7739493
yore *

his form works identically with his characters and themes.

and while sometimes there is a benefit of writing a form or with characters ironically related or opposites, his specific characters could NEVER escape the form they are represented within. This is intensely stifling writing, and an absolutely indefensible critique of America. No one can point out how awful america is more than carver.