Re: today's suck

Jake McHenry (seymour@ktis.net)
Fri, 09 Apr 1999 15:02:04 -0500

But in spite of Beers' criticism I wonder how close he was to the truth. I
mean, I for one have always considered it a very real possibility, fingers
crossed eternally even, that Seymours poetry really existed the way that
Salinger stated. The convenient little saving grace found in the fact that
his widow doesn't want them published always seemed like a cop out. (And I
could care less if it is and I will tell you why.) And perhaps Salinger
really is holed up in his small cement studio with a sunroof  cranking out
the most sublime poetry we could imagine. (And, listen, I hope you all can
just accept the word poetry for what it is and what you know I mean. I don't
need a ton of responses flaming me and saying that I cannot see the poetry
in his stanzaless words. I see it all too well, as far as that goes.) But
isn't that a hell of alot of pressure to put on yourself? But I am quite
sure, for good or for bad, that Will is right about the "proof" of Seymours
poetry. As before, anything is possible and there just might be a stack of
secret scribbled notebooks with the initials S.G on the cover and inside we
find words that make us curl up on the couch and sleep for days. I doubt it
though. I doubt that Salinger himself could live up to the sheer perfection
of S. and knows damn good and well that poetry like Seymours would be
impossible to write. (Write, I say.) But don't we all feel like we have read
his poems before? Like Will, I can imagine it. And isn't that something so
perfect about Salinger in and of itself? (That we can read and feel and
imagine Seymours poetry and we are moved and uplifted by it without having
ever "read" it.) Many things sound better on paper but never live up to
their promises in real life. Who wants to be let down?


 -----Original Message-----
From: WILL HOCHMAN <hochman@uscolo.edu>
To: bananafish@lists.nyu.edu <bananafish@lists.nyu.edu>
Date: Friday, April 09, 1999 1:44 PM
Subject: Re: today's suck


>Well, Ambrose Beers at http://www.suck.com today really criticizes
>Salinger but I wondered if Beers's inability to sense the "pure poetry" of
>Salinger without the stanzas and Beers's inability to see genuine
>spiritual insights in Salinger's fiction (and being) is much more than his
>own inabilities to imagine what Salinger points toward...in other words, I
>don't expect Salinger to prove the "pure poetry of seymour" because I can
>imagine it...same with spiritual directions...he's not offering a how to
>and never did...anyhow, I thought it was interesting to read though only
>half the links really worked, will
>