Sports Illustrated
Erin McLaughlin (erinseyes@hotmail.com)
Sun, 06 Dec 1998 20:35:28 -0800 (PST)
I'm guessing that if Sports Illustrated started printing articles about
opera, people would STILL subscribe just for all those neat (free)
football phones with a $19.99 retail value. You don't get much on this
list, except occassional enlightenment, amusement, or stimulation.
I like soccer alot, but S.I. doesn't cover it entirely, and they talk
about other dumb sports like football, baseball, even boxing. Funny
thing is, I usually read it all, and I even read something interesting
once in awhile. Plus, I get the phone.
----Original Message Follows----
Date: Sun, 06 Dec 1998 04:00:12 -0500 (EST)
From: bananafish@lists.nyu.edu
Subject: BANANAFISH digest 532
To: "Discussions of J.D. Salinger's work" <bananafish@lists.nyu.edu>
BANANAFISH Digest 532
Topics covered in this issue include:
1) a poor old guesser
by Scottie Bowman <rbowman@indigo.ie>
2) Re: a poor old guesser
by jrovira@juno.com (J J R)
3) Re: what, exactly...?
by Paul Janse <PJanse@compuserve.com>
4) cross-country posting, or "did you think I meant country matters?"
by Matt Kozusko <mkozusko@parallel.park.uga.edu>
5) How much of this list deals with JD Salinger?
by TonyMyers1@aol.com
6) Re: Warranty
by Emily Friedman <bananafish_9@yahoo.com>
7) Re: How much of this list deals with JD Salinger?
by Emily Friedman <bananafish_9@yahoo.com>
8) Re: How much of this list deals with JD Salinger?
by TonyMyers1@aol.com
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Sat, 05 Dec 1998 12:22:42 +0000
From: Scottie Bowman <rbowman@indigo.ie>
To: Bananafish <bananafish@lists.nyu.edu>
Subject: a poor old guesser
Message-ID: <000001be207b$c0056d80$ea927dc2@elite-customer>
I can see that I must indeed be - as Will & Jim would
have me - a degenerating dinosaur. Certainly the latter
is quite right in his portrayal of me as a pathetic old git
reduced to the game of trying to guess what Salinger
might have intended us to take from his words.
It can't be wholly a question of age, though. Acquaintances
in Eng Lit departments on this side of the Atlantic assure
me that the 'community' approach to reading is a
Frog fashion that the Americans have embraced as eagerly
(& gullibly ?) as they once did the teaching of Julia Childs.
The poor things, they say, find irresistible anything which
combines the impressively verbose with an implicit flattery
of the Common Man & his contribution to western culture.
The fashion will pass no doubt - just as like the hula hoop
& chrome Niagaras on the front of motor cars.
Scottie B.
------------------------------
Date: Sat, 05 Dec 1998 17:53:55 -0500 (EST)
From: jrovira@juno.com (J J R)
To: bananafish@lists.nyu.edu
Subject: Re: a poor old guesser
Message-ID: <19981204.185344.16199.0.JRovira@juno.com>
heh, Scottie, you misread me. I don't think I ever made a reference to
your age--though I think Will made a passing reference to that type of
approach to a text being long out of vogue.
I see authorial intent as being the place just about everyone starts in
literary theory. When people first try to describe the relationship
between readers, authors, and text that's usually where they start.
That's been my personal experience, and my perception of the experience
of many others I've spoken to, at any rate. It's not so much a matter
of
age, then--being old or of young. Notice that both yourself and Mattis,
being widely different in age, hold to roughly the same ideas. I see
holding to authorial intent as a sign of "newness," rather, to the
discussion of the reading process.
BUT, the rest of your post REALLY demonstrates a misunderstanding of my
beliefs here. I don't know if it's my fault--I haven't been clear
enough--or if you haven't been reading closely enough. I really have
little respect for egalitarianism or the ideas of "equality" being
passed
around American society--especially the intelligentsia. Differences
between people are real and substantial, and some people are indeed
better, smarter, or at least more interesting than most of the rest of
us. My belief in reading as a "community" effort has nothing to do with
this impulse.
See, I think you're taking me to mean that if a group of people all
agree
that a book means a certain thing, well, that's what it means regardless
of what the author thinks. Of course I don't think that. Groups can be
just as stupid as individuals, and sometimes more so. I'm just trying
to
point out that language is bigger than any one of us, and that authors
and readers own it equally.
And that the distinction is really, in the end, false. The best readers
I know are writers themselves.
Jim
On Sat, 05 Dec 1998 12:22:42 +0000 Scottie Bowman <rbowman@indigo.ie>
writes:
> I can see that I must indeed be - as Will & Jim would
> have me - a degenerating dinosaur. Certainly the latter
> is quite right in his portrayal of me as a pathetic old git
> reduced to the game of trying to guess what Salinger
> might have intended us to take from his words.
>
> It can't be wholly a question of age, though. Acquaintances
> in Eng Lit departments on this side of the Atlantic assure
> me that the 'community' approach to reading is a
> Frog fashion that the Americans have embraced as eagerly
> (& gullibly ?) as they once did the teaching of Julia Childs.
> The poor things, they say, find irresistible anything which
> combines the impressively verbose with an implicit flattery
> of the Common Man & his contribution to western culture.
> The fashion will pass no doubt - just as like the hula hoop
> & chrome Niagaras on the front of motor cars.
>
> Scottie B.
>
>
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------------------------------
Date: Sat, 05 Dec 1998 18:02:10 -0500
From: Paul Janse <PJanse@compuserve.com>
To: "INTERNET:bananafish@lists.nyu.edu" <bananafish@lists.nyu.edu>
Subject: Re: what, exactly...?
Message-ID: <199812051802_MC2-6295-832A@compuserve.com>
The question of who Holden is addressing seems to me very uninteresting.
The fact that he *is* addressing *someone is*. To me it is just Holden
Caulfield's and Salinger's variant of the very old literary device:
"List=
en
to this, I am telling you a tale", which gives the story a special kind
o=
f
truthfullness, well, I don't know whether this is the right word, in any
case it gives the story a special tone. Did anyone ever read Tolstoy's
'Kreutzer Sonate'? This story is told in a train by a man to his
accident=
al
fellow passenger. Same effect. The question who this other man is, is
beside the point.
Paul J.
------------------------------
Date: Sat, 05 Dec 1998 19:59:08 -0500
From: Matt Kozusko <mkozusko@parallel.park.uga.edu>
To: bananafish@lists.nyu.edu
Subject: cross-country posting, or "did you think I meant country
matters?"
Message-ID
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