Description

Due to rights issues, the audio of this interview is not available online. Please contact San Diego State University, Special Collections and Archives if you wish to be granted access to the original audio. Larry McCaffery and Sinda Gregory interview Raymond Carver in his house in Port Angeles, Washington. The interview begins with a discussion of why Carver had recently returned to publishing poetry after an interview the previous year that indicated he would focus more on fiction. Carver talks about his background and how that, including his alcoholism, influenced his writing. Carver responds to questions about the “pared down” writing in his stories. Carver explains his dislike of experimentalism in fiction for the mere sake of experimenting. There is discussion over why Carver has only published short fiction and whether he would write a novel. An edited version of this interview appears on pages 66 to 82 of Alive and Writing: Interviews with American Authors of the 1980s, ed. Larry McCaffery and Sinda Gregory, University of Illinois Press, 1987. A taped over recording of Lou Reed’s album New Sensations underlies the left channel of the interview through the first 45 minutes. A taped over recording of Tina Turner’s album Private Dancer underlies the left channel of the interview through the second 45 minutes.