Growing Pains

Malcolm Lawrence (malcolm@wolfenet.com)
Mon, 20 Jul 1998 23:29:13 -0700

Yeah, really, what is a top 100 list without Fox in Socks?  I think they
were going for most influential. At least that's what strikes me when I
look at the list. Still, if that's the case, then where the hell is
Kafka? I really like that little grouping though: Catcher In The Rye, A
Clockwork Orange, Of Human Bondage and Heart of Darkness. And weren't we
just mentioning Pale Fire? The Magus? What's that all about? Isn't that
a spy thriller?

Anyway, in the August Biblio there's an article about one Bernard
Harlan, a writer who couldn't get published to save his life yet had
this incredible talent for titles and has named most of the truly
significant published pieces of post world war two letters. The story
goes he was getting drunk with his old friend Norman Mailer one night
after he'd just finished his great war book but couldn't think of a
title. After a few frozen boilermakers Harlan blurted out "The Naked and
the Dead." A few weeks later JD Salinger called Mr. Harlan and asked him
if he'd read this book of his called "Growing Pains" which he returned
to JDS with the note "Catcher In The Rye" attached to it.

So Mailer knew/knows Salinger? Does anyone else on the list know this?
Have we gone over this detail before?

Malcs