Re: Want to get depressed?

Mattis Fishman (mattis@argos.argoscomp.com)
Wed, 10 Dec 1997 09:38:44 -0500 (EST)

Hello all,

   Regarding the Letters to JDS, it looks like I'm going to taking
an unpopular view. As far as some people seem to have reacted that
the idea of such a book is commercializing or taking advantage of
Mr. Salinger, I do not disagree. But the letters themselves! (not counting
the obviously facetious ones), I am surprised I did not find an
oversized watch enclosed.

  "Dear J. D. Salinger, My name is G... T... and I have to find
   out what does J.D. stand for in your name and where were you born?
   Thanks... P.S. I loved your book 'The Catcher in the Rye'"


   What strikes me is not people's perhaps pretentious (a long lovely
alliteration) comments on his reclusive habits, but the fact that there
is anyone at all who feels compelled to try to communicate with JDS in
particular. I think we look differently at ourselves when the mirror
has Salinger's name engraved in it.

  "Dear J. D. Salinger,I really enjoyed your book The Catcher In The Rye.
   My enlish teacher gave it to us to read as a class assignment. From
   the beging of the book it got me very interested. I see alot of myself
   in Holden. I am often undesided on what I want to do in my life. I
   even at times do distructive things such as Holed. I am 16 yrs. old
   just as Holed. So I understand what he was going thorough. Please more
   good books such as The Catcher In The Rye. Yours truly J... P..."

   On the Public Radio show "All Things Considered", there used to be
periodic segments dealing with an older woman who wrote letters to Mel Ott,
the long-ago player with the then New York Giants baseball team. It did
not seem to matter that he had been dead for quite a while. The letters
were great.

   "[Dear] John Keats,
    John Keats, John. Please put your scarf on.
    [yours truly, J. D. "Seymour" Salinger"
honi soit...
Mattis