Raymond Carver & Haruki Murakami

What We Talk About When We Talk About Love & What I Talk About When I Talk About Running

The shared story between two storywriters

“Without a doubt, Raymond Carver was my greatest literary teacher and greatest companion.”

-Haruki Murakami

It was in 1983 when Haruki Murakami began translating Raymond Carver’s novels. Murakami’s translation of “Where I’m Calling From” received favourable reviews in Japan, so he headed to Port Angeles to inform Carver of this himself. As fate may have had it, the two became good friends.

Carver was born in the small town of Clatskanie in Oregon, USA. He began smoking and drinking at the young age of ten, which was often the case with children raised in the rural Western United States at the time. He went on to show severe alcohol dependence during his mid-20s. But after many attempts and failures, he was able to stop drinking near his late 30s. He lived ten years free of alcohol dependence, a particular period which he terms as “gravy.”

Raymond is considered one of the most influential novelists since Hemingway. He is a master of realism and minimalism, and considered to have inherited the spirit of Chekhov.

In all frankness, it would be hard to deny the fact that Raymond Carver was an outstanding writer whom achieved a clear, independent position in the genealogy of American short stories. At least half of the 60 short stories he left behind will be continuously read and considered classics.

Raymond Carver Short Story: Cathedral

Raymond Carver’s “Cathedral” Adapted Short Film

Carver’s last ten years could be likened to the strenuous stirring of a rich gravy to be poured onto a well-done chunk of meat. He eventually passed away at fifty due to a cancer spreading in his brain.

Nevertheless, Carver’s life was by no means considered a good quality of steak. His entire life was filled with hardship and disappointment. Born into a family of sawmill workers, he spent most of his childhood in a poor residential environment with no toilets, in the small western basin of Yakima.

He married at 19 and became the head of a family with two children. Carver managed to earn money one week and barely survive the following week— in exception to a few times that occurred in his 40s. After finding himself deep in alcohol dependence, he declared bankruptcy, and his wife and children left him. Carver found himself in the pits, devoid of friends. Yet even in such circumstances, he did not give up his literary career.

Carver hated his father, who was alcohol-dependent. Just as Carver mirrored his father’s alcoholism, Carver’s daughter also closed her eyes to alcoholism.

Raymond Reads: What We Talk About When We Talk About Love

Raymond Carver Reads: “What We Talk About When We Talk About Love”

Carver began a new life with his second wife, Tess Gallagher, whom helped remove his alcohol dependence. Despite the circumstances, he never wrote a “foolish novel.” He hated the easy shortcut. Even his fiction was sincerely written, from the warm depths of his heart and widths of his mind.

Raymond went through the ups and downs of life as a father while fighting alcoholism. Eventually, he passed away at the age of 50. He expressed feeling that he had received more than enough love throughout his life.

Tess was sure to preserve his study as it was before he died. Carver’s typewriter was covered with white paper, as if waiting for the punch of the first letter of his next novel.

Murakami was also one of the people who loved him.

Shocked by Carver’s death ahead of his visit to Japan in 1988, Haruki decided to translate his entire collection into Japanese as a sign of condolences and respect. The first volume came out in 1990 and the last eight in 2004, a whopping 14 years of dedicated work.

Murakami ordered a long bed in anticipation of the tall novelists’s visit in 1988. Had Haruki Murakami and Raymond Carver ever met in Japan, Murakami’s guest room complete with the custom-ordered bed would have certainly warmed Carver’s stay. Unfortunately, the bed is still cold, waiting for a guest who will never arrive.

“I only met him once, but that one meeting left an unforgettable deep warmth in my life. Thank you, Ray.”

-Haruki Murakami

I envy their friendship.

Are you fond of Raymond Carver’s works? Which of his titles is your favourite?