Having just pored over three hundred and some odd messages which had the = sad fate of being left behind on the web server during my vacation, I = feel winded and a little concerned. =20 Not about who's gay, who's a music major. What I'm fascinated with is = Teddy. I think only a few points really came close to my own feeling = about "what really happened". I think it's really important for us, as = readers, to investigate the details, see what we can figure out. At the = same time, though, if Salinger didn't tell us explicitly, maybe he's = trying to tell us something other than how Teddy died. I think he's = showing us something about how we read. No, really. The story itself = leads us to his death, speech, the tone of the language (as I remember = it), his reference to the particularity of that day; the story = indicates that something is going to happen. So we look around for = clues, the story gives us Teddy's death as a possibility, his sister = might push him, etc? I feel like the story is playing with the idea of = fate. Was Teddy's(/the story's) innuendo of his death at the hands of = his sister/the empty pool/his own hand his own prediction of his own = death? A literary technique of fate/prediction? Maybe, if we read this = from a quirky angle, we could say that the story itself pushed him in. = What does that mean? (MEAN?) Well, maybe it means that Teddy is not a = character separate from the story, neither of which is separate from the = telling of the story-the tone. These characters are not full and = well-rounded, though Salinger does spend extraordinary effort as a = writer to specify the relationships between his characters. No, I say = that all of the characters and events in the story, like any story = (think of Shakespeare's tragedies and that kind of fate/story/character = downfall) are only defined in terms of each other. The characters = depend on each other and the language and the events which develop them = within the text to exist-they are not independent entities with = independent psychologies. =20 So, for Teddy, this means that the story could push him in, the = prediction could be heavy enough. Maybe. At least I think it's worth = looking at. Salinger didn't tell us the "truth", exactly. As a reader, = that makes me look at the story as all about the predicament, the = situation itself, of being perched on the edge of the pool, a gifted but = maybe very empty-feeling boy, maybe really powerful-wondering if he's so = powerful he could will his sister to push him in and have it happen (and = if this did happen, was it fate or did he will it. Just a lonely spot = at the end of the board above the circling sharks wondering if he can = get away from how much bigger he is than everything else (because he has = power over things, they can't hold him safe) (I think this is why the = story is on a boat) but forcing fate to intercede. Just an idea. I love thinking about form and content in literature, I = think that's half the battle of reading and writing. oeuf