Call If You Need Me

by Raymond Carver

  Text based on manuscripts found in Raymond Carver’s home in Port Angeles, Washington. Published in slightly different form in Esquire [New York] 134, no. 2 (August 2000): 132–37.

  VANDALS

  Text based on manuscripts found in Raymond Carver’s home in Port Angeles, Washington. Published in slightly different form in Esquire [New York] 132, no. 4 (October 1999): 160–65.

  CALL IF YOU NEED ME

  Text based on a single hand-corrected typescript found among the Raymond Carver papers in the William Charvat Collection of American Fiction at the Ohio State University Library. Published in slightly different form in Granta [London], no. 68 (winter 1999): 9–21.

  FIVE ESSAYS AND A MEDITATION

  MY FATHER’S LIFE

  Text from F2, 13–21. First published in Esquire [New York] 102, no. 3 (September 1984): 64–68. Reprinted as “Where He Was: Memories of My Father” in Granta [Cambridge, England], no. 14 (winter 1984): 19–28. Source for “Photograph of My Father in His Twenty-Second Year”: AOU, 7.

  ON WRITING

  Text from F1, 13–18. First published as “A Storyteller’s Shoptalk” in New York Times Book Review, 15 February 1981, 9, 18. Reprinted in Short Short Stories, ed. Jack David and Jon Redfern (Toronto: Holt, Rinehart and Winston of Canada, 1982), 199–202.

  FIRES

  Text from F1, 19–30. First published in Antaeus [New York], no. 47 (autumn 1982): 156–67. Published in slightly different form in Syracuse Scholar [Syracuse University] 3, no. 2 (fall 1982): 6–14. Reprinted in In Praise of What Persists, ed. Stephen Berg (New York: Harper & Row, 1983), 33–44.

  After John Gardner’s death in a motorcycle accident on 14 September 1982, an excerpt from “Fires” appeared under the title “John Gardner: A Trial by Fire for a Young Writer” in Chicago Tribune Book World, 26 September 1982, 1–2. To the excerpt RC added:

  Now, the news of his death having just reached me, I’m sitting here this morning trying to make sense out of the senseless—and of course I can’t. My feeling of personal loss is terrific but in time I’ll be able to accommodate that. (That’s what I tell myself, anyway.) But his loss to the national literature is tremendous and incalculable.

  I’m trying to remember things. I remember the last time I saw him alive. It was last March, at his place in Susquehanna, Pennsylvania. We’d spent the night, Tess Gallagher and I, and John was taking leave of us that morning out in the drive. There was snow on the ground, but the weather wasn’t so bad—the sun was out and I had my jacket over my arm. We gave each other a hug. “Have a good trip back,” he said. “Drive safely.”

  “You bet,” I said.

  Then he grinned, and I grinned. We were leading charmed lives, and we knew it. We’d talked about it the night before. He’d won his bout with cancer, and I’d won mine with alcohol. And we’d come a distance from Chico. “Good-bye, John,” I said.

  JOHN GARDNER: THE WRITER AS TEACHER

  First published as “John Gardner: Writer and Teacher” in Georgia Review [University of Georgia], 37, no. 2 (summer 1983): 413–19. Reprinted, in slightly different form, as RC’s “Foreword” to Gardner’s On Becoming a Novelist (New York: Harper & Row, 1983), xi–xix, and in F2, 40–47.

  FRIENDSHIP

  Text and photograph from Granta [Cambridge, England], no. 25 (autumn 1988): 155–61.

  MEDITATION ON A LINE FROM SAINT TERESA

  Untitled statement from Commencement [15 May 1988] (West Hartford, Conn.: University of Hartford, 1988), 24–25. RC received an honorary Doctor of Letters degree from the University of Hartford at this graduation ceremony. The “Meditation” was his last-written work of prose.

  EARLY STORIES

  FURIOUS SEASONS

  Text from Furious Seasons and Other Stories (Santa Barbara, Calif.: Capra Press, 1977), 94–110. Previously published under the title “The Furious Seasons” in December [Western Springs, Ill.] 5, no. 1 (fall 1963): 31–41. An earlier version of this story, also titled “The Furious Seasons,” appeared in Selection [Chico State College], no. 2 (winter 1960–61): 1–18, and was RC’s first published short story.

  THE HAIR

  Text from Toyon [Humboldt State College] 9, no. 1 (spring 1963): 27–30. This issue of Toyon, the Humboldt State College literary magazine, was edited by RC. A revised version of “The Hair” appeared in Sundaze [Santa Cruz, Calif.] 2, no. 6 (7–20 January 1972): n. pag. That version is reprinted in Those Days: Early Writings by Raymond Carver, ed. William L. Stull (Elmwood, Conn.: Raven Editions, 1987), 19–23.

  THE AFICIONADOS

  Text from Toyon [Humboldt State College] 9, no. 1 (spring 1963): 5–9. RC published “The Aficionados” under the pseudonym “John Vale.”

  POSEIDON AND COMPANY

  Text from Toyon [Humboldt State College] 9, no. 1 (spring 1963): 24–25. A slightly different version of “Poseidon and Company” appeared in Ball State Teachers College Forum [Muncie, Ind.] 5, no. 2 (spring 1964): 11–12.

  BRIGHT RED APPLES

  Text from Gato Magazine [Los Gatos, Calif.] 2, no. 1 (spring–summer 1967): 8–13.

  FRAGMENT OF A NOVEL

  FROM THE AUGUSTINE NOTEBOOKS

  Text from Iowa Review [University of Iowa] 10, no. 3 (summer 1979): 38–42. RC did not continue the novel beyond this point.

  OCCASIONS

  ON “NEIGHBORS”

  Untitled essay from Cutting Edges: Young American Fiction for the ’70s, ed. Jack Hicks (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1973), 528–29. Source for “Neighbors”: WICF, 68–73.

  ON “DRINKING WHILE DRIVING”

  Text from New Voices in American Poetry, ed. David Allan Evans (Cambridge, Mass.: Winthrop Publishers, 1973), 44–45. Source for “Drinking While Driving”: AOU, 3.

  ON REWRITING

  Published as RC’s “Afterword” to F1, 187–89. RC’s dates of composition for several works are unreliable.

  ON THE DOSTOEVSKY SCREENPLAY

  RC’s untitled introduction to Dostoevsky: A Screenplay by RC and Tess Gallagher, Capra Back-to-Back Series V (Santa Barbara, Calif.: Capra Press, 1985), 7–12. A slightly different version of this essay appeared in NER/BLQ [New England Review and Bread Loaf Quarterly, Hanover, N.H.] 6, no. 3 (spring 1984): 355–58.

  ON “BOBBER” AND OTHER POEMS

  Published as “Occasions” in The Generation of 2000: Contemporary American Poets, ed. William Heyen (Princeton, N. J.: Ontario Review Press, 1984), 24–26. RC’s dates of composition for several poems are unreliable. Source for poems: AOU: “Bobber” (42), “Prosser” (33–34), “Your Dog Dies” (6–7), “Forever” (48–49), “Looking for Work” (13, 237–38), “Wes Hardin: From a Photograph” (36–37), “Marriage” (37–38).

  ON “FOR TESS”

  Untitled essay from Literary Cavalcade [Scholastic, Inc., New York, N.Y.] 39, no. 7 (April 1987): 8. Source for “For Tess”: AOU, 138.

  ON “ERRAND”

  Untitled essay from The Best American Short Stories 1988, selected from U.S. and Canadian magazines by Mark Helprin with Shannon Ravenel (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1988), 318–19. Source for “Errand”: WICF, 419–31.

  ON WHERE I’M CALLING FROM

  First published as “A Special Message for the First Edition” in Where I’m Calling From, The Signed First Edition Society (Franklin Center, Pa.: The Franklin Library, 1988), n. pag. [vii–ix]. Reprinted as “Author’s Foreword” to WICF, xi—xiv. RC in fact published his first short story, “The Furious Seasons,” in 1960.

  INTRODUCTIONS

  STEERING BY THE STARS

  “Foreword” to Syracuse Poems and Stories 1980, selected by RC (Syracuse, N.Y.: Department of English, Syracuse University, 1980), iv-v. The quotation attributed to Ezra Pound (“fundamental accuracy of statement.…”) is not to be found in Pound’s ABC of Reading (1934). Contents: Andrew Abrahamson, “Five Places with Rob and Haines”; Brooks Haxton, “Thanksgiving Friday”; Anthony Robbins, “Kathy” and “Vita Nuova”; Marianne Loyd, “Everyone Has a Hobby”; Ron Block,
“My Feral Child” and “Charles Billiter”; Penelope Phillips, “from Minding the Heavens” (“To Leonhard Euler”); Jay Grover-Rogoff, “Homage to Redon: Ophelia among the Flowers”; William C. Elkington, “Leech”; Allen Hoey, “When the Cows Come Down to Drink”; Nancy E. LeRoy, “The Red Couch”; David O’Meara, “A Country for Old Men.”

  ALL MY RELATIONS

  “Introduction” to The Best American Short Stories 1986, selected from U.S. and Canadian magazines by RC with Shannon Ravenel (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1986), xi—xx. Contents: Donald Barthelme, “Basil from Her Garden”; Charles Baxter, “Gryphon”; Ann Beattie, “Janus”; James Lee Burke, “The Convict”; Ethan Canin, “Star Food”; Frank Conroy, “Gossip”; Richard Ford, “Communist”; Tess Gallagher, “Bad Company”; Amy Hempel, “Today Will Be a Quiet Day”; David Michael Kaplan, “Doe Season”; David Lipsky, “Three Thousand Dollars”; Thomas McGuane, “Sportsmen”; Christopher McIlroy, “All My Relations”; Alice Munro, “Monsieur les Deux Chapeaux”; Jessica Neely, “Skin Angels”; Kent Nelson, “Invisible Life”; Grace Paley, “Telling”; Mona Simpson, “Lawns”; Joy Williams, “Health”; Tobias Wolff, “The Rich Brother.”

  THE UNKNOWN CHEKHOV

  Untitled statement on The Unknown Chekhov: Stories and Other Writings, trans. Avrahm Yarmolinsky (New York: Ecco Press, 1987), outside back wrapper.

  FICTION OF OCCURRENCE AND CONSEQUENCE

  “Introduction” to American Short Story Masterpieces, ed. RC and Tom Jenks (New York, Delacorte Press, 1987), xiii—xvi. The essay is signed off by both editors. Contents: James Baldwin, “Sonny’s Blues”; Ann Beattie, “Weekend”; Gina Berriault, “The Bystander”; Vance Bourjaily, “The Amish Farmer”; Richard Brautigan, “1/3, 1/3, 1/3”; Harold Brodkey, “Verona: A Young Woman Speaks”; Carol Bly, “Talk of Heroes”; Raymond Carver, “Fever”; Evan S. Connell, “The Fisherman from Chihuahua”; Frank Conroy, “Midair”; E. L. Doctorow, “Willi”; Andre Dubus, “The Fat Girl”; Stanley Elkin, “A Poetics for Bullies”; Richard Ford, “Rock Springs”; Tess Gallagher, “The Lover of Horses”; John Gardner, “Redemption”; Gail Godwin, “Dream Children”; Lawrence Sargent Hall, “The Ledge”; Barry Hannah, “Water Liars”; Mark Helprin, “Letters from the Samantha”; Ursula K. Le Guin, “He Forest”; Bernard Malamud, “The Magic Barrel”; Bobbie Ann Mason, “Shiloh”; James Alan McPherson, “The Story of a Scar”; Leonard Michaels, “Murderers”; Arthur Miller, “The Misfits”; Joyce Carol Oates, “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?”; Flannery O’Connor, “A Good Man Is Hard to Find”; Grace Paley, “The Used-Boy Raisers”; Jayne Anne Phillips, “The Heavenly Animal”; David Quammen, “Walking Out”; Philip Roth, “The Conversion of the Jews”; James Salter, “Akhnilo”; John Updike, “The Christian Roommates”; Joy Williams, “The Wedding”; Tobias Wolff, “The Liar.”

  ON CONTEMPORARY FICTION

  Untitled contribution to “A Symposium on Contemporary American Fiction,” Michigan Quarterly Review [University of Michigan] 26, no. 4 (fall 1987): 710–11.

  ON LONGER STORIES

  “Introduction” to American Fiction 88, ed. Michael C. White and Alan Davis (Farmington, Conn.: Wesley Press, 1988), xi—xv. RC served as guest judge of this second annual American Fiction competition. Contents: Antonya Nelson, “The Expendables” (first prize); Paul Scott Malone, “Bringing Joboy Back” (second prize); Sandra Dorr, “Writing in the Dark” (third prize); Ursula Hegi, “Saving a Life”; Patricia Page, “Escapade”; Mary Elsie Robertson, “Parting Words”; Michael Blaine, “Suits”; Mark Vinz, “Almost October”; Donna Trussell, “Dream Pie”; Scott Driscoll, “Waiting for the Bus”; Pat Harrison, “The Winner”; Gordon Jackson, “In the Garden”; Toni Graham, “Jump!”; Michael Hettich, “Angels”; Patti Tana, “Harbor Island”; Ron Tanner, “The Hart House”; Stephen Tracy, “Fools’ Experiments”; Lila Zeiger, “Fine Details”; Leslee Becker, “The Funny Part.”

  BOOK REVIEWS

  BIG FISH, MYTHICAL FISH

  Title and text from Chicago Tribune Book World, 29 October 1978, 1, 6. A slightly different version of this review appeared as “A Man and His Fish” in Texas Monthly, December 1978, 222, 225.

  BARTHELME’S INHUMAN COMEDIES

  Title from Chicago Tribune Book World, 28 January 1979, 1. Text from “Barthelme the Scribbler,” Texas Monthly, March 1979, 162–63.

  ROUSING TALES

  Title from Chicago Tribune Book World, 13 May 1979, 1. Text from untitled version in San Francisco Review of Books 5, no. 5 (October 1979): 23–24.

  BLUEBIRD MORNINGS, STORM WARNINGS

  Title and text from San Francisco Review of Books 5, no. 2 (July 1979): 20–21. Reprinted in American Book Review 2, no. 2 (October 1979): 2, and Quarterly West, no. 10 (winter-spring 1980): 125–26. A shorter version of this review appeared as “Van Gogh Field: Troubling and Unforgettable Stories of the West,” Chicago Tribune, 25 August 1979, sec. I, p. 13. A later revision became RC’s “Foreword” to We Are Not in This Together: Stories by William Kittredge (Port Townsend, Wash.: Graywolf Press, 1984), vii–x. The second quotation attributed to Kittredge (“What you do matters.…”) is not to be found in “The Van Gogh Field” or any other story by Kittredge. Compare, however, the statement attributed to “Miller” in RC’s unfinished novel, The Augustine Notebooks: “What we do matters, brother …” (173).

  A GIFTED NOVELIST AT THE TOP OF HIS GAME

  Title and text from Chicago Tribune Book World, 20 January 1980, 1. A slightly different version of this review appeared, untitled, in San Francisco Review of Books 5, no. 10 (March 1980): 10.

  FICTION THAT THROWS LIGHT ON BLACKNESS

  Title from Chicago Tribune Book World, 18 May 1980, 1, 10. Text from untitled version in San Francisco Review of Books 6, no. 1 (June 1980): 19.

  BRAUTIGAN SERVES WEREWOLF BERRIES AND CAT CANTALOUPE

  Title and text from Chicago Tribune Book World, 26 October 1980, 3.

  MCGUANE GOES AFTER BIG GAME

  Title and text from Chicago Tribune Book World, 15 February 1981, 5. A shorter version of this review appeared, untitled, in San Francisco Review of Books 6, no. 4 (January—February 1981): 22.

  RICHARD FORD’S STARK VISION OF LOSS, HEALING

  Title and text from Chicago Tribune Book World, 19 April 1981, 2. A slightly different version of this review appeared, untitled, in San Francisco Review of Books 6, no. 5 (March-April 1981): 29–30. In summarizing the novel, RC has rearranged the sequence of several passages.

  A RETIRED ACROBAT FALLS UNDER THE SPELL OF A TEENAGE GIRL

  Title and text from Chicago Tribune Book World, 5 July 1981, 1.

  “FAME IS NO GOOD, TAKE IT FROM ME”

  Title and text from NewYork Times Book Review, 22 April 1984, 6–7.

  COMING OF AGE, GOING TO PIECES

  Title and text from NewYork Times Book Review, 17 November 1985, 3, 51–52. RC’s quotations from the letters of Hadley Richardson are highly condensed, with a number of separate letters run together. For Jeffrey Meyers’s response to RC’s review, see “Hemingway’s Biographer,” NewYork Times Book Review, 8 December 1985, 85.

  RAYMOND CARVER

  Raymond Carver was born in Clatskanie, Oregon, in 1938. His first collection of stories, Will You Please Be Quiet, Please? (a National Book Award nominee in 1977), was followed by What We Talk About When We Talk About Love, Cathedral (nominated for the Pulitzer Prize in 1984), and Where I’m Calling From in 1988, when he was inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Letters. He died in August of that year, shortly after completing the poems of A New Path to the Waterfall.

  ALSO BY

  RAYMOND CARVER

  CALL IF YOU NEED ME

  Call If You Need Me traces the arc of Carver’s career, not in the widely anthologized stories that have become classics, but through his uncollected fiction and his essays. Here are the five “last” stories, discovered a decade after Carver’s death. Here also are Carver’s first published story, the fragment of an unfinished novel, and all his no
nfiction—from a recollection of his father to reflections on writers as varied as Anton Chekhov and Donald Barthelme. Call If You Need Me invites us to travel with a singular artist, step by step, as he discovers what is worth saying and how to say it so it pierces the heart.

  Fiction/Literature

  CATHEDRAL

  “A dozen stories that overflow with the danger, excitement, mystery and possibility of life.… Carver is a writer of astonishing compassion and honesty … his eye set only on describing and revealing the world as he sees it. His eye is so clear, it almost breaks your heart” (Jonathan Yardley, The Washington Post Book World).

  Fiction/Literature

  FIRES