40 pages • 1 hour read
So Much Water So Close to Home
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During Reading
Reading Questions & Paired Texts
Reading Check and Short Answer questions on key points are designed for guided reading assignments, in-class review, formative assessment, quizzes, and more.
Reading Check
1. Whom does Claire suggest might be calling?
2. What is on the front page of the newspaper?
3. Where does Claire tell Marnie she is going?
4. How does Claire respond to the woman’s statement that the killer had been caught?
5. Whom does Claire ask Stuart about at the end of the story?
Short Answer
Answer each question in at least 1 complete sentence. Incorporate details from the text to support your response.
1. What did the men find while camping at Naches River? How did they respond to finding this object?
2. After Stuart relays the story to Claire, what does Claire suggest they do? How does her husband respond?
3. Who are the Maddox brothers? What story does Claire share about them and how does Stuart respond?
4. Describe Claire’s interaction with the green pickup driver. What is the outcome of the situation?
5. How does Stuart respond to his wife’s arrival home? What does the couple do?
Paired Resources
“Female Domestic Violence and Alcohol Use”
- The American Addiction Center’s page on Female Domestic Violence and Alcohol Use examines the relationship among alcoholism, narcotics, and femicide.
- Shared themes include Isolation As Protection And Vulnerability and Gender Norms’ Harmful Effects On Women.
- Based on the text as well as the above resource, how does the use of alcohol relate to gender-based violence in relationships?
“Where Raymond Carver Is Now Calling From”
- This New York Times 2007 article reviews the effect of Carver’s story on the Australian film adaptation “Jindabyne.”
- This article relates to the same themes of the story: Isolation As Protection And Vulnerability, The Pervasiveness Of Doubt And Deception, and Gender Norms’ Harmful Effects On Women.
- Based on the text as well as the above resource, in which ways is “Jindabyne” a reflection of Carver’s story? In which ways does it depart from the original narrative?
Recommended Next Reads
What We Talk About When We Talk About Love by Raymond Carver
- “So Much Water So Close to Home” is a selection from this 1981 short story collection, a “Dirty Realism” classic that chronicles the daily lives and tragedies of ordinary people (please note: this connects with the first Full Essay Assignment).
- Shared themes include Isolation As Protection And Vulnerability, The Pervasiveness Of Doubt And Deception, and Gender Norms’ Harmful Effects On Women.
- Shared topics include notable authors of the Dirty Realism genre, and relationships and love.
- What We Talk About When We Talk About Love on SuperSummary
“A Following” by Charles Bukowski
- Bukowski’s poem centers on a conversation between two men in the context of loneliness.
- Shared themes include Isolation As Protection And Vulnerability.
- Shared topics include notable authors of the Dirty Realism genre.
- “A Following” on SuperSummary
Reading Questions Answer Key
Reading Check
1. Her husband’s (Stuart’s) mother (Paragraph 2)
2. The names of her husband and her husband’s friends (Paragraph 8)
3. She is going to a funeral. (Paragraph 29)
4. She says, “They have friends, these killers. You can’t tell.” (Paragraph 42)
5. Dean (Paragraph 43)
Short Answer
1. The narrator’s (Claire) husband Stuart along with three other men find the body of a nude girl in the area where they set up camp to fish. While one of the men suggests they return to town in order to report the incident, the other men say that they should stay since they were tired and “the girl wasn’t going anywhere.” (Paragraph 10)
2. After cleaning up the mess in the kitchen, Claire suggests to Stuart that they go for a drive. Stuart replies in the affirmative, noting that they can use the opportunity to buy more beer. (Paragraph 20)
3. Claire tells Stuart about the Maddox brothers, who killed and decapitated a woman in the town where she is from; however, they were allowed to go free. Stuart replies that she is making him “riled.” (Paragraphs 23-25)
4. On the way to the girl’s funeral, she allows a male driver of a green pickup truck to drive past her. After he sees her through the window, he signals for her to stop and gets out of the truck to talk to her. She can feel him looking at her body and refuses to roll down the window to talk to him. (Paragraphs 35-38)
5. When Claire arrives home from the funeral, she finds her husband drinking whiskey at the table. After learning that nothing has happened to their son Dean, he begins to initiate sex with her, and she engages under the pretense that he will “[h]urry” before their son sees. (Paragraphs 44-46)
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By Raymond Carver
