Put myself in my shoes Essay

retch Yourself in My Shoes is one of the longest and close to complex stories in the collection, and one of its finest. In addition, it brings together a issuing of the themes and images that attain recurred through discover the book. For example, it depicts the kind of interaction between two couples that we have guaranteen in Neighbors and Whats in Alaska? in this case, the Myerses go to visit the Morgans, whose star sign they had lived in for a year plot of ground Professor Morgan and his wife were in Germ all, but whom they have not seen since. Furthermore, the issue of empathy that surfaced in Fat, Neighbors, and The Idea, the ability to enter oneself in anothers perspective, is so central here that in becomes the title of the tosh. What is different active this grade, however, is its self-consciousness, its concentration on the role of the inditer. In many ways, Put Yourself in My Shoes can be seen as Carvers comment on his own c atomic number 18er, on reputationte lling itself.Myers is a writer, although he hasnt sold anything yet and is currently not writing. He has quit his job to pursue his muse, but with little success. As the story opens he is depressed, between stories and feeling despicable, when his wife c tout ensembles to invite him to the office Christmas party. moreover he doesnt want to go, mainly because the textbook publishing order where she works is also his former place of employment. Like Marston in What Do You Do in San Francisco? Myers is feeling the guilt of the unemployed, which is intensified by the feature that he moves in a much more upscale background signal that is typical of Carvers protagonists. Myers is also reluctant to pay a holiday call on the Morgan, although his wife, Paula, lastly convinces him to go. The meeting does turn out to be quite an uncomfortable occasion, however. As they approach the house, Myers narrowly avoids world attacked by the Morgans dog. Shortly thereafter, following a seemingly inoffensive handling of writing, the Morgans themselves more directly attack him.Edgar Morgan, from the first gear of their encounter seems to be playacting odd and on edge for approximately unk straightawayn reason. When Paula asserts that her husband writes something to the highest degree every day, Edgar confronts him on the check. Is that a fact? Morgan said. Thats impressive. What did you write today, may I ask? Myers can only respond zip, an answer that places him on an existential precipice. The response inevitably leads to questions about his identity, for what is a writer who doesnt write? Edgar Morgan then proceeds to tell a story to test what Myerss imagination can do with some facts. The story is about a university professor that has had and affair with one of his students. He asks his wife for a divorce, and she throws him out of the house.While leaving, he is hit with a can of tomato soup thrown by his son, and his is now in the hospital in serious conditio n, Myers finds the story quite amusing while Paula and Hilda Morgan are disgusted. Edgar tells Myers that a writer could look at this from the husbands point of view and get quite a story Hilda says that the said(prenominal) is true of looking at the story from the wifes point of view, and Paula speaks up for the sons point of view. Edgar then tops them all by asserting But heres something I arrogatet think any of you has thought about. Think about this for a moment. Mr. Myers are you listening? Tell me what you think of this. Put yourself in the topographic point of that eighteen-year-old coed who fell in love with a married man. Think about her for a moment, and then you see the possibilities for your story. Hilda responds that she has no sympathy for the girl at all or for the professor, but only for the wife and child. Myers apparently has no sympathy for any of the people involved, he can only see the black humor of the entire situation. This lack of empathy again calls into question the nicety of his vocation as a writer.Hilda Morgan later narrates another story, that of Mrs. Attenborough, an Australian woman who had collapsed and died while visiting them in their home in Germany. Hilda had left her notecase (containing ID cards, a check, and some change) in a museum, where Mrs. Atttenborough had found it, minus the cash she has taken an taxi to the Morgnas house to return it, but fell ominous there. While the woman was lying unconscious, Hilda went through her purse in hunting of identification, only to find the missing money. When Hilda tells that Fate sent her to die on the couch in our living room in Germany, Myers cannot restrain his trickter. As Myers continues to giggle, Morgan pounces on him If you were a real writer, as you say you are, Mr. Myers, you would not trick You would not dare laugh You would try to understand. You would plumb the depths of that poor someones heart and try to understand, but you are no writer, sir erst agai n, though, the motivation of Morgans attack is unclear, to Meyers and to the reader.At the point the Morgans move in for the kill, however, and the reader soon discovers the true reason for many of their strange actions. From the beginning they have appeared to conceal hatred toward the Myerses, as indicated by the way in which Edgar plays the gracious host but curses and throws things in the kitchen, and he now begins to apologise the root of their resentment by telling another story. Saying hold this for a possibility, Mr. Myers, Morgan tells of a couple, Mr. and Mrs. Y who go to Germany for a year and exact their apartment to Mr. and Mrs. Z, a couple whom they do not know. Mr. and Mrs. Z snap off the terms of the lease in several ways, such as rescue in a cat and using stored materials.The reader quickly realizes that this is the story of the Morgans and the Myerses, and that the Morgans anger over these violations accounts for the tension that Myers has been feeling th roughout the evening. Myers in now forced to put himself into the other persons shoes, and he does not see much to admire when he looks at himself from that perspective. Edgar Morgan, enraged and mad about the invasion of Mr. and Mrs. Ys privacy by the tenants explains, thats the real story, Mr. Myers.Once again, however, Myerss only outward response to the story is to laugh. Paula seems to disregard the meaning of the story entirely-as they drive away she remarks that Those people are crazy-but Myers shows himself to have been more deeply affected. The storys final lines show us a man who looks like a deer caught in deadlights He did not answer. Her voice seemed to come to him from a bulky distance. He kept driving. Snow rushed at the windshield. He was unplumbed and watched the road. He was at the very end of a story.Put Yourself in My Shoes seems as Carvers way of commenting on his own writing. Raymond Carver seems quite concerned, for example, about the voyeuristic mature o f the writers craft, which, after all involves putting oneself in anothers shoes to report on life from that angle. Carver also acknowledges his intention to see the black humor in a story, his tendency to laugh at tragedy, another reason some criticize him. In any event, the change that Myers experiences at the end of the story may be indicative mood of a change in Carvers writing as well, an increased attempt to see the story from all sides and evaluate the impediment of interrelationships.