sends him and that he has listened carefully, remembered all this, and takes pleasure in recounting it to somebody else.

Even the narrator's churlish comments to his wife give a sense of a more decent and kindly character than the words themselves would suggest, when his wife points out how uncharacteristic and unworthy of him they are. It is through the subtle build-up of this narrative voice that Carver uses an initial mild hostility to prepare the reader for the narrator's eventual affinity for the blind man. We quickly discern that his occasional curmudgeonly remarks conceal a kind heart and that he will be considerate to his visitor, despite his apprehension.

The author's decision to use first-person perspective is crucial to the story "Cathedral." The narrator gains the reader's confidence in part by admitting to having some negative thoughts. He then proceeds to show how he learned to overcome at least some of his biases through interacting with Robert. The other characters are significant only as they appear through his eyes.

He seems to have been searching for a new direction or insights, as his relationship with his partner comes across as rocky. By allowing himself to learn from Robert, he not only extends himself in a friendly way and gets to know the other man but also gains insights into his partner and himself. Now he can empathize a bit with her because he understands some of the qualities she values in Robert. He can also shed some of his jealousy because he has developed his own relationship with him.

Carver’s choice of first-person point of view for the narrator in “Cathedral” provides a clearer portal of view into the feelings, attitudes, and isolation of the narrator, who is never named aside from the nickname of “bub” given him by Robert. When the narrator “speaks,” his mood and inner traits are revealed by his tone of “voice.” This adds to the effectiveness of the story because we hear things he doesn't directly or intentionally reveal; as a result, we know him at a deeper level.

For instance, the narrator’s resentment of others’ close relationships with his wife, who is also never named, is apparent from comments he makes. For example, his remarks, “we didn’t ever get back to the tape. Maybe it was just as well. I’d heard all I wanted to. … Now this same blind man was coming over to sleep in my house,” are bitingly negative when he speaks of the tape recording they listened to (but during which they were interrupted) and of Robert’s upcoming overnight stay: the narrator is bristling with resentment that is indirectly revealed in his tone.

In another instance, the narrator’s fear of unknown people is unintentionally made apparent in other comments he makes, such as the way he always makes references to Robert as blind:

“I don’t have any blind friends,” I said.
She had this blind man by his coat sleeve.
The blind man let go of his suitcase and up came his hand.

The fear of others that the narrator unintentionally reveals adds to the effectiveness of the story by drawing us deeper into an experience of his psyche since his feelings, though unintentionally revealed, are as veiled for us as they are for him. Incidentally, the reference to Robert’s blindness is a metaphor for the narrator’s general isolation, which he and Robert dissolve together when they move hand-in-hand through the motions of drawing the cathedral--a spiritual sanctuary.

If a third-person narrator had told us the character is resentful and fearful--and had named him--the perception of his isolation would be reduced. In other words, the narrator would be connected in some degree to the character in order for him/er to reveal the character to us. Also, if a third-person narrator were narrating the crucial climactic moments of the story, the immediacy and sense of participation would be reduced. In other words, being told about their two hands moving together by a third-person witness reduces our own experience of the moment, whereas a first-person narrator allows us the parallel experience of having our minds move together with the narrator’s while his hand moves together with Robert’s.

As a result of this parallelism, this unity of movement, which is created by the first-person narrator, we feel for ourselves the possibility of connectedness with others--the possibility of deliverance from isolation--as the narrator discovers it. This imparts and empowers Carver’s message rather than merely tells it as a third-person narrator would do. These are some important ways in which the first-person point of view contributes to the effectiveness of Carver’s story.

The point of view comes from a pretty sarcastic and rude man, who seems to be bitter and sardonic about pretty much everything in his life.  Why he is so bitter, why he seems so unhappy, isn't super clear; but he obviously has issues with his wife and marriage, and potentially some jealousy issues in regards to Robert, before he even shows up.  This attitude contributes to the effectiveness of the story, because it provides a nice contrast to the ending, to the fact that this bitter, whiny man can be touched by something.  As he draws the cathedral, he states in his simple, straight-forward way, "It was like nothing else in my life up to now."  For the narrator, that statement is pretty big, and it wouldn't have meant as much if he had been a happy, go-lucky type of guy who was impressed by anything and everything.  Nothing impressed him.  Of his wife's ex, he writes, "Her officer—why should he have a name?"  Of his wife's poetry:  "I didn't think much of the poem."  Of the blind man's tragic loss of his wife:  "Pathetic".  Of his wife's attempted suicide:  "But instead of dying, she got sick."  This is a man impressed by nothing, cynical about everything, and pretty unpleasant.  The fact that drawing cathedrals with Robert was "like nothing else" in his life up to that point is made all the more significant because of how unimpressionable the man is.  It makes the ending more profound, touching, and effective.

It is clear that the first person point of view selected is a rather interesting choice for this excellent story. However, I think that deliberately choosing to tell the story through perhaps the most unsympathetic character, the husband who appears to be deliberately rude to both his wife and his guest, we see the transformation that the guest manages to bring about in the character of the narrator that much more clearly because of his earlier rudeness.

As the story begins, we see that even though Robert has just lost his wife, the narrator is still rude about the way that he feels threatened by the invasion of his personal space. He crassly jokes about taking Robert bowling, and when Robert comes draws attention to his blindness by asking questions such as which side of the train he sat on in his journey and then pointedly turns on the TV when conversation runs dry.

However, in spite of this, it is clear that the narrator's conversation with Robert, especially when he is asked to draw a cathedral so that Robert can "see" what they look like, has a big impact on him, triggering an epiphany as the narrator chooses to keep his eyes closed even when Robert tells him to open them:

But I had my eyes closed. I thought I'd keep them that way for a little longer. I thought it was something I ought to do... My eyes were still closed. I was in my house. I knew that. But I didn't feel like I was inside anything.

The narrator for perhaps the first time in his life is able to empathise with another human being, and his experience of blindness, albeit temporary, is actually something that is very liberating for him. To have the story narrated from this character's point of view allows us to appreciate and understand the massive change that the narrator experiences through meeting Robert.