Teddy
Becky Spiro Green (becky@HUNTINGTON.ORG)
Thu, 14 Aug 1997 10:39:36 -0700
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