Will You Please Be Quiet, Please?

“Will You Please be Quiet, Please” is a short story collection that explores the human condition in the blue collar, working class citizens of the 1960’s in America. Carver is known not only for his minimalist style of writing, but also for his habit of basing many, if not all, of his stories on his own real life experiences. In this collection, Carver shows modern life as a series of hardships whereby ordinary people, who have the odds stacked against them, must battle for survival. He explores this idea in many of his stories, using themes such as a consistent pattern to which he creates his males characters, the effects of worldly events that are not explicitly named nor even mentioned, and the failure of the American Dream.
Carver consistently creates male characters from the same basis of personality. Each of his characters are dissatisfies with their existences, and many of his characters feel isolated and alone. This feeling of failure and helplessness closely resembles Carver’s own self-professed feelings during his first marriage after the first ten happy, ‘idealistic’ years. Carver creates characters that reflect himself, hence why characters such as the presumed ‘Mr Slater’ in ‘Collectors’ is dealing with what seems to be the aftermath of a devastating divorce. Carver writes ‘Mr Slater’ as lost, alone and without purpose, shown by his constant twice of looking ‘through the curtain for the mailman.’ This shows that the passage of time for this man is marked by nothing other than the comings and goings of the mailman. Further showing this sense of helplessness that proves Carver’s idea that ordinary people must struggle for survival, is the underlying message of the story ‘Collectors’, which refers to the loss of personal identity. Imagery such as the vacuum cleaner sucking up the ‘little bits of ourselves’ that are left each night on a mattress, shows the character Aubrey Bell slowly taking away what is left of ‘Mr Slater’s identity. ‘Mr