In a story that is simple yet compound, direct yet circuitous, beautiful yet heart wrenchingly sad, Raymond Carver has his reader hoping that this tale will never end. Popularly known as Ray Carver or Ray, to students of English Literature, he still features on the list of must-read American writers in the late 20th century.
Although Ray wrote several poems, he himself claims to have been hooked on to writing short stories ? each of them, classics in their own right, that readers across the world love.In one of his most famous short stories ? A small, good thing, Ray Carver weaves a separate world for his reader, the world of Scotty, Ann and Howard Weiss. Scotty was going to turn a year older, and his mother Ann Weiss had ordered a delightful cake for her son’s birthday party, at a bakery in the shopping center. As fate would have it, Scotty becomes the victim of a hit-and-run case on the morning of his birthday.
As he lies asleep in hospital, for much longer than a child should, his parents worry and fret, while doctors reassure them and the baker hounds them with mysterious calls, asking if they want the cake. Eventually, Scotty dies and his parents try very hard to grapple with the loss and who should come to the rescue, but the baker himself.There are several factors that make this story what it is. Firstly, the characterization of Ann, Howard, the baker, and even minor roles like the doctor and the Negro family, are simply superb. Add to this, the way Carver draws out the suspense in his story with the doctor’s hopeful replies.
Inadvertently, the reader finds himself hoping too, that Scotty will make it. The pathos in the story cannot easily be ignored as Ann and Howard almost seem to stagger from hour to hour, as their son refuses to wake up. But in Carver’s inimitable style, he includes one other factor that lifts this short story from a simple one to a truly memorable one. That factor would have to be the way he toys with food in A Small, Good Thing.One wonders, at the end of his story, what thing was he talking about? What exactly does Ray refer to as small and good? Scotty perhaps? Maybe, but surely Scotty was not a thing? Then could it have been Slug, the dog that “ate in hungry little smacks”? Hardly, his was too minor a role to even think of. So if we rule out people and pets, could it have been the accident itself? Impossible.
What good came of it? Although it was small. Having crossed off every item on the list, we are left with the obvious choice ? the warm, cinnamon rolls that Ann ate three of? That’s when the reader begins to consider the role of food in this short story. Surely, if Carver thought that a simple roll could classify for the title of the story, there would have to be other elements of food that played as important a role? I take a look at each one of them.Let’s start at the very beginning, at the very first paragraph. Carver conjures up a vivid image for his reader, of a birthday cake that definitely cannot be described as ordinary. It was a spaceship, with all the appendages one could think of ? a launching pad, a sprinkling of white stars, a red planet (Mars?), and the name that meant the universe, SCOTTY.
It’s obvious that as Ann Weiss picks the cake and goes over these details in her mind’s eye, she’s doing this for a boy that is extremely special. And just like the spaceship, Ann would have liked her son to go places, would have liked to reach for the stars, and would have liked him to own a fancy red planet. Like a great parent, she was leaving no stone unturned for her son’s birthday party. After all, when would she celebrate it next? Carver makes his point right at the beginning.The next food item that takes the reader by surprise is the bag of potato chips that Scotty and his friend are passing back and forth.
The attentive reader (or a reader parent) may wonder why Scotty and his friend were munching on chips early in the morning, on the way to school. Was it Scotty’s not so healthy breakfast? Or was it a midday snack that Scotty knew he may never eat? Also notice how Carver mentions that they were passing it back and forth, like a thing that they didn’t care too much about. After all, it was just a packet of chips. Why hold it close to one’s chest or guard it with one’s life? These two kids were treating the packet of chips just the way they were treating their own lives ? in a thoughtless and inattentive manner. Soon enough, Scotty steps off the curb, without caring to look if there was a vehicle approaching.
If only he had taken a little more care.At the hospital, Carver introduces more food ? coffee and juice. No solid food, just liquids. All meals at the hospital are seen as sinful by Howard and Ann. Carver shows them experiencing guilt at the very mention of breakfast or an extra minute at the cafeteria.
Everything had to be forsaken for the sake of their son. Perhaps Ann and Howard felt that foregoing their meals was the smallest of sacrifices they could do for a son who refused to wake up. Maybe God would be merciful if they fasted and eventually relearned how to pray.Interestingly enough, Carver also leaves remnants of food with the Negro family ? a little table littered with hamburger wrappers and Styrofoam cups.
Was he pointing to the emptiness that had descended in the family? The pointless existence of the cigarette the daughter was smoking ? was it an indication of a life that would go up in smoke?Just the way he begins his story, Carver concludes it ? with a scene set in the bakery, a scene with food and emotions running very high. Every thing in the last scene spells comfort for the bereaved couple ? the dull lighting, the wee hours of morning, the smell of the bakery and not to mention, the baker. At the end of this story, if food can be equated to a blessing, the baker then becomes God, who is doling out blessings by the minute.Susan Piperato, in her essay, Running from Ray, says, “The baker in ‘A Small, Good Thing’, offers solace to the couple grieving over their son who has been killed by a hit-and-run driver only after he has hounded them day and night throughout the duration of Scottie’s coma to pick up his birthday cake. What won me over to Carver was not only his mastery of irony and telling details, but his characters’ capacity to continue to yearn for things they know they are in no way capable of receiving; and Carver’s dialogue because the pathos of his characters’ lives is compressed enough for it to ring absolutely true.
Who would have expected that Ann and Howard would find relief and succor in the humble, abrupt baker? His warm cinnamon rolls are like drops of heaven that the couple devours. After having lived on coffee and juice, desperation and hopelessness, the rolls ? hope, warmth and life ? come as a much needed silver lining to Ann and Howard. As they break bread together, literally, they shared the pain of being childless, they broke a dark bread, smelled it and swallowed it.The dark bread ? why didn’t the couple enjoy every bite and swallow it instead? Was it a bitter pill, a deadly blow that life had dealt out to them? But it was like daylight under the fluorescent trays of light… for a bitter pill swallowed with a new found friend was definitely better than a pill swallowed in loneliness. And that’s what the Weiss couple had stumbled upon in the bakery ? food, warmth and a companion. What a picture Carver had carved!
