Re: Water and the Glasses
Mattis Fishman (mattis@argos.argoscomp.com)
Thu, 22 Jan 1998 17:13:53 -0500 (EST)
"Diego Dell'Era" <dellerad@sinectis.com.ar> escribio:
>another instance of water as a sign of obscurity is (i think) the diving
>goggles that the boy throws away to the sea. they belonged to the elder
>Glass brothers, Webb and Seymour, who were engaged as we know in a
>spiritual quest: is that what the goggles simbolize, the research of the
>(spiritual) depths?. however, the boy pays no attention to them, and
>discards them with a spontaneous fling. i took this as an example of
>what you wrote somewhere else:
>)
>In this case Salinger makes good use of this device, allowing a
>perfectly literal act of childish imagination to also have a more adult
>meaning.
>)
Thank you for calling attention to Lionel's throwing the goggles
into the water. I will have to leave the symbols to you and Bethany;
I must have a block against symbolism.
On a more patent level, I was struck by Lionel's oblivion to the fact
that the goggles happened to have belonged to the sainted Seymour.
Boo Boo (who, as you say, handles the situation lovingly and creatively)
ssems to think that the very fact that they are associated with the elder
Glasses makes them somehow more important, almost relics. Whether she feels
that this might make some impact on Lionel, or just because even at this
poignant moment of attempted consolation she cannot help betraying her own
attachment to the past, to someone holy and detached who might have been
able to smoothe things out, just as he mediated the issue of Waker's bicycle
(or was it Walt's?). But Lionel is in the here and now, is unmoved
by the relic and not bound by sentiment. Perhaps even, we are meant to
feel the impotency of Seymour's legacy in the face of the immediate distress
of a young boy.
All the best,
Mattis