Empoword

Part Two: Text Wrestling 226 however, the only thing the narrator cares about is that the blind man touched his wife’s neck. At this point in the story the narrator still only cares about what’s right in front of him, so hearing retellings means nothing to him. When Saul is introduced in the Bible, it is as a man who spent his time persecuting the followers of Christ and “made havoc of the church” (Acts 8.3-5). From the very beginning of the story, the narrator makes it known that, “A blind man in my house was not something that I looked forward to” (Carver 34). He can’t stand the idea of something he’d only seen in movies and heard tell of becoming something real. Even when talking about his own wife, he disregards the poem she wrote for him. When he hears the name of Robert’s deceased wife, his first response is to point out how strange it sounds (Carver 36). He despises Robert, so he takes out his aggression on the people who don’t, and drives them away. The narrator’s wife drives to the train station to pick up Robert while he stays home and waits, blaming Robert for his boredom. When they finally do arrive, the first thing he notices about Robert is his beard. It might be a stretch to call this a biblical parallel since a lot of people have beards, but Carver makes a big deal out of this detail. The next thing the narrator points out, though, is that his wife “had this blind man by his coat sleeve” (Carver 37). This draws the parallel to another biblical story. In this story a woman who has been suffering from a disease sees Jesus and says to herself, “If I may but touch his garment I shall be whole” (Matt. 9.21). Before they had gotten in the house the narrator’s wife had Robert by the arm, but even after they were at the front porch, she still wanted to hold onto his sleeve. The narrator continues to make observations about Robert when he first sees him. One that stood out was when he was talking more about Robert’s physicality, saying he had “stooped shoulders, as if he carried a great weight there” (Carver 38). There are many instances in the Bible where Jesus is depicted carrying some type of heavy burden, like a lost sheep, the sins of the world, and even his own cross. He also points out on multiple occasions that Robert has a big and booming voice, which resembles a lot of depictions of a voice “from on high.” After they sit and talk for a while, they have dinner. This dinner resembles the last supper, especially when the narrator says, “We ate like there was no tomorrow”