Re: suicide


Subject: Re: suicide
From: LR Pearson, Arts 99 (lp9616@bristol.ac.uk)
Date: Sat Feb 26 2000 - 09:46:17 EST


On Fri, 25 Feb 2000 19:56:41 EST AntiUtopia@aol.com wrote:

>
> My real take on Seymour's suicide is that it's along the lines of Franny's
> nervous breakdown and Holden's plans to run off to a cabin. Franny had Zooey
> screaming at her to grow up (and escape the spectre of Seymour in order to do
> so...and we'd all better think about what that means), Holden had Phoebe
> telling him he wasn't going anywhere alone, and poor Seymour only had Muriel.
> Poor, limited, self absorbed Muriel (and I say this being one who would tend
> to defend her right to be limited and self-absorbed).
>
> Jim
> -
I find it very difficult to imagine exactly why Seymour killed himself,
it's one of those things which has been a "fact" for so long that it
almost doesn't need a reason. However, I was thinking about the
comments about suicide as a duty and, given Seymour's Messiah status in
the Glass family, it could be that he felt that he simply could provide
any more spiritual guidance, it was time for him to move over and make
them get on with it. A bizarre kind of a duty, which inevitably
 backfired, as they were all haunted by his death rather than freed by
it. Having said that, my own contact with suicides suggests that for
anyone to commit suicide they have to be either in deepest despair, or
they have to be sacricing themselves for a cause which they perceive as
more important than anything else (like the Buddhist freedom fighters
who burn themselves to death). I'd like to think it was the latter, but
there's not really very much evidence to support it.

Love, Lucy-Ruth
----------------------
LR Pearson, Arts 99
lp9616@bristol.ac.uk

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