Re: Seymour's Suicide
Laura Boyce (laboyce@nervm.nerdc.ufl.edu)
Fri, 18 Jul 1997 17:29:48 -0400
My books are in storage over the summer at school so I am going to a
bookstore now to pick up Nine Stories and the others and read them
again. I need to get an idea of the timeline of his stories and what
philosophy and interests he had at the time, etc.
So you don't think Hinduism plays a part in this story at all?
I will re-read over the weekend.
Get back with you all on Monday.
Thanks for the response Sundeep Dougal.
ttfn,
Laura
Sundeep Dougal wrote:
>
> Yeah, sure, war or more precisely the way it affects a sensitive
> individual in particular is a recurring motif in many of the JDS stories
> (apart from the Uncollected many, JBTWWTE in Nine Stories comes to mind,
> offhand) but it would seem to me atleast that APDFBF is not even remotely
> inspired by Hinduism or anything. (Life is suffering -- one has to suffer!
> -- and the cycle is not completed unless one's suffered enough! Good for
> the soul? Moot point. Moksha is not attained by opting out. No short cuts
> in the karmic cycle --else you've gotta do it all over again.)
>
> Indeed, all the biographical detail, sparse and sketchy as it is, tends to
> indicate that JDS's interest in Hinduism (and a particular branch,
> Advaitaism, is a much later development from the time of bananafish... If
> atall any Hinduism connection exists, then it is that of Tat Tvam Asi --
> That Thou Art -- not much different from -- What is, is.
>
> It is much later when the more successful JDS can affordd to play around
> and dabble in all manner of attributions via Buddy's nostalgic trip on
> Seymour that the Hindu/Zen connections are worked in -- but a development
> much later in time. Despite all the scholarly research and stuff about
> reading the Nine Stories as a cycle etc., IMHO, is a mere examiner's
> bias. Retrospective crowning, if you will...
>
> ---------------------------------------------------------------------
> Sundeep Dougal (Sonny, to friends) Holden Caulfield, New Delhi, INDIA
>
> On Fri, 18 Jul 1997, Laura Boyce wrote:
>
> > Or how about Seymour's Liberation? (moksha)
> > is phony. She is superficial. She is illusion. (maya) To put it
> > modern, she has no clue.
>
> > timing is good. He comes full circle, has completed the cycle, back to
> > their honeymoon place. It started and ended there. Very symbolic.
> > Very cyclical, like the Hindu's conception of time not linear.)
> >
> > the Jews (being part Jewish). Yet his philosophy of life, his world
> > view, was Eastern (Indian to be precise I don't think he had gone Zen
> > yet). So he was wrestling with the questions of life from his Eastern
>
> >
> > So that's in a nutshell my take on this. The war played a big part. It
> > was in reaction to the war. And he wrestled with those questions (like
> > Job did) but in his Eastern frame of mind. And to be precise, I don't
> > think there is anything Zen about this. I think this is all pure Indian
> > and Hindu philosophy. As "Teddy" will further explain.
> >
> >