A married couple is expecting the visit of the wife’s friend, a blind man. The wife met the blind man, named Robert, ten years ago, while working for him in Seattle. The wife’s man has never met the blind man and therefor he is a bit nervous about his visit.
When you read the title of the short story, “Cathedral”, you immediately thinks the story might have a religious theme or that’s the story take place in a cathedral. However, in Carver´s short story, the cathedral functions as a symbol; it represents the cathartic turning point in the narrator´s (the wife’s husband) life. The narrator is a person who finds he is sceptical against blind people. When his wife’s blind friend comes to visit the couple, the narrator’s prejudices are gradually dismantled a long as the meeting is happening. As he get to know the blind man he eventually comes to understand that people cans see without even looking, as he draws a cathedral with his eyes closed, as the blind man (Robert) request.
The story begins directly: as the first-person narrator announces in a conversational tone that his wife´s friend, Robert is coming to visit them; “This blind man, an old friend of my wife’s, he was on his way to spend the night. His wife had died”. (p. 1, ll. 1-2). Already in the beginning of the text offers the readers detail about the context of the visit with the blind man and the narrator´s feelings about it: “I wasn´t enthusiastic about his visit. He was no one I knew. And his being blind bothered me.” (p. 1 ll. 7-9). The introduction also shows the readers the narrators conflict: He is sceptical against blind people. And he is probably also jealous about his wife’s ten-year history with Robert.
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