Re: intelligence of the author vs. intelligence of the characters

Kim -- I remember the doll's head poem being talked about, but funny...I
don't remember the poem itself :). Was it supposed to be a haiku or
something?

And yes, I was referring to the John Keats poem. I actually like it --
rather touching -- and I wouldn't be surprised if Salinger did indeed
have quite a bit of poetry (maybe even "Seymour's" poetry) buried
somewhere in Cornish.

But I suspect he was wise not to publish it. It's probably alright.
But I agree...it's probably not Wordsworth.

Aaron -- I have one friend, in particular, who used to think as I and
you do. Then he contracted Viral Encephalitus.

Now he thanks God for meds.

Jim

Kim Johnson wrote:

> --- Jim Rovira <jrovira@drew.edu> wrote:
> > So I guess the real question is, "Can a 'smart'
> > author create a 'genius'
> > character?"
> >
>
> when 'time' magazine was harassing salinger in the
> early '60s for a cover article, i think they dug up
> his iq test from grade school or some such time. i
> don't recall the exact number but it was circa 115.
>
> >
> > There are ways of getting around this. A smart
> > author can research. Plus, you
> > don't even have to really directly depict the
> > character. We have oodles of
> > descriptions of Seymour's poetry, for example, but
> > only four lines of poetry --
> > and they're supposed to be juvenalia.
>
> jim,
> i think you're referring to the john keats poem. but
> salinger also quotes seymour's death poem. twice. once
> in 'zooey' where he gives the entire poem in english.
> once he refers to it in 'seymour: an intoduction'
> where he then says seymour wrote it in japanese and
> buddy gives a prose paraphrase. any which way one
> dices it--'the little girl on the plane/who turned her
> doll's head around/to look at me'--it doesn't strike
> me as poetry of the superlative level. though buddy
> goes on and on about seymour's poems, i confess i
> never totally believed these were the poems of one of
> the few indispensable american poets.
>
> > It's much easier to describe a genius, Wordsworthian
> > level poet than to write
> > his poetry :).
>
> i secretly believe that the 184 poems are in existence
> up there in cornish. salinger seems to have wanted to
> be a poet, in addition to a dramatist, in the early
> stages of his writing career. but i certainly don't
> think the poems, IF they exist, are at the genius
> level of the poets salinger professes to love: rilke,
> keats, blake, coleridge, rimbaud, lorca & some others
> from that list of writers
> .
> kim
>
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