Carver

Reading "They're Not Your Husband" by Raymond Carver and so wanting to scream...He seems as sexist and brutal (emotionally) towards woman as Phillip Roth is. This story, in particular, bothers me so much that I feel like I'm going to cry.

The main character, out of work, seems to be taking his lack of self-esteem and his unemployment out on on his wife, whom he convinces (rather mercilessly) to lose weight, at the expense of her health.

I think of the double standards when it comes to weight and women. Earlier in his collection Will You Please Be Quiet, Please? there is "Fat," a short about an obese man who is the object of sympathy and understanding rather than scorn and hatred.

Ultimately, I think the man in "They're Not Your Husband" is seen as a fool by both his wife and her co-workers at the coffee shop where she works. But, still, the attitudes toward women and weight really bothers me :(

There is a crispness to Carver's writing and an oddity to almost every selection I've read so far that is definitely intriguing and I find his characters (in some cases) as compelling and ill-behaved as those you'd find in a Shirley Jackson story.