Re: pynchon/salinger letters in nytimes article
Tim O'Connor (tim@roughdraft.org)
Tue, 24 Mar 1998 01:38:33 -0500
> Tim, you haven't read the scatalogical letters then, eh? :) There was a lot
> of very passionate, readable stuff exchanged between Nora and James--didn't
> mean to characterize it ALL as prurient or inappropriate. I think the
> original volume of Letters included some of this. But there were also some
> pretty, well, embarrassing exchanges as well. At least to my thinking.
>James
> was a Freaking Odd Bird, in my opinion, and I tend to pity Nora more than
> anything else (and I know, it takes one to know one :) ).
Oh, I've read them all, including the scatological ones. The thing is that
I love J.J., in a kind of personal way, the way I love some of my eccentric
relatives in Ireland and elsewhere. Some of Joyce *is* embarrassing -- I
would not be keen on marching up to a microphone and reading some
selections in front of an audience -- but I adore seeing someone express
love and desire genuinely. And I'd rather read Joyce at his most
"objectionable" than hear about old Prince Charlie and his, ah,
affectionate tamponic feelings about his lady love.
Joyce at his epistolary "worst" (the letters in question do not bother me)
still breathes a kind of life into the page in a way few writers could hope
to do. I guess I don't observe a lot of passion in life, or live passion
either, and to see *his* is just lovely and basic and human and endearing.
Or maybe I'm an odd bird myself. <another grin>
> good job avoiding the mines :)
Many thanks. I nearly wore out the DELETE key.
--tim