Some thoughts on Teddy: It's almost two stories, isn't it? In one, Teddy stands on a suitcase, watches orange peels, talks to Booper and Myron, and writes in his diary. In the second, he has a long conversation with Nicholson. Then there is a brief third part, consisting mostly of a scream. I like the first part best. It's what Salinger does best: develop amazing characters, such as Teddy's truly ugly parents, describing their actions so you understand them instantly--and then you wonder if you understand them at all. The second part, in which Teddy explains his views and philosophy, strikes me as too didactic. It violates the "show, don't tell" rule of fiction writing. (Salinger, of course, is in a position to violate all the rules of fiction writing he wants to, and usually does, with great success--"Seymour : an introduction" would probably not get an A in a Creative Writing 101 class.) But Teddy's conversation with Nicholson is more like a dialogue to illustrate a point (like the Dialogues of Plato) than a work of fiction. What mostly fascinates me about Teddy is that Buddy Glass claims to have written it. That he was trying to get at Seymour's eyes when he described Teddy's. That Teddy can be interpreted as a reworking of A Perfect Day for Bananafish: instead of bananafish, you have apple-eaters; instead of a death by gunfire, you have a death (maybe) by a fall into an empty swimming pool; instead of Muriel's fingernails, you have Teddy's father's Gladstone suitcase; instead of Sybil mistreating small dogs, you have Booper mistreating Myron. Is Teddy Seymour reincarnated? (No, the dates don't work out: Seymour died in 1948, Teddy is 10 in 1952. But Teddy's description of his previous life, in which he met a lady and stopped meditating... interesting.) (Yes, I know, I did this chronological calculating stuff to prove that Holden couldn't have been killed in WWII, and some of you bananafish didn't like it: you pointed out that fiction and history are two different things. True, but if Salinger puts dates in all his stories, it's not an accident.) I took a cruise a few years ago, and watched the whole time for some orange peels to get thrown out the window, but it didn't happen. Becky