Subject: Salinger's Fire
From: William Hochman (wh14@is9.nyu.edu)
Date: Thu Jun 08 2000 - 09:28:26 GMT
Recently I received two querries--one from a Brazilian student and one
from Bulgaria about Salinger. What I enjoyed most was that both
researchers seemed acutely aware that studying Salinger as a section man
or woman might is paradoxical to the point of his fiction. I wonder
though...there seem to be too many "literature" levels for the casual
reader to read and run. For example, Salinger's use of ambiguity has been
getting to me...I think the 9 stories work so well because readers must
bounce between possiblities in the story that seem paradoxical and very
possible. I love the ending of Teddy for this reason, since it's not
clear who, if anyone, fell in the empty pool. Recently, a bananafish
(Matt I think) caught a brilliant nuance in the ending of APDFB--I've been
thinking about that "aiming moment" and love the way the story became more
complex. I never thought about the possibility of shooting Muriel as part
of the story until then.
Here's my q--shouldn't Muriel have found the gun in the luggage
before Seymour uses it in the story? Isn't she (or her mother) going to
snoop into every bit of Seymour's hidden life they can?
Please aim your answers gently--I'm on vacation, moving, and too happy to
do anything but swim with bananafish until my new home by shore is
livable...will
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