Subject: Re: favorite first Salinger lines (and why)
From: Jim Rovira (jrovira@drew.edu)
Date: Thu May 30 2002 - 14:44:05 EDT
There's nothing quite like hearing Scottie complain :). I think it's a
Brit thing. ANYWAY, responses below...
Scottie Bowman wrote:
>
> Arch, arch, arch. Oh God.
>
> Too many, oh-so-droll, self-indulgent words,
> Will.
>
> Does he really mean: '... my old fair-weather friend
> the general reader...'
> A fair-weather friend is normally used in an insulting way:
> someone who will stick with you - but only through the easy
> passages of life.
I think you have a point, but I think there's still more to be said about
this. Seems like Salinger devoted _Raise High_ (was it?) to what "amateur
readers were left in the world," people who just read and run. The point is
that they read for pleasure, they don't take their reading very seriously.
So I think, in this case, a fair weather friend is exactly what Salinger
wants. Someone who reads and enjoys and runs on to the next thing.
>
> And what about: '... deeply contemporary confidant ...'
> DEEPLY contemporary? What the fuck is that meant
> to mean? Profoundly fashionable as opposed to
> superficially archaic?
I agree...you've gotta wonder what "deeply contemporary" means. It could
be that Buddy perceives his reader as reading his thoughts as he has them
and types them on the page. This is a bit inappropriate, since it's
literally months (minimum) from the time a work is written to the time it's
published, and could be extended to years...centuries...given that any
future reader can pick up any given work at any time. Nevertheless, that
is the impression you get reading S:AI, isn't it? That you're reading his
thoughts as he has them. That, I think, is what is meant by "deeply
contemporary."
Really, I think Salinger was enjoying his own voice a bit too much :).
>
> Then we have: '...least fundamentally bumptious public
> craftsman I've ever personally known ...'
> A public craftsman conjures up the village blacksmith,
> maybe, or one of those Murano glassblowers laid on
> by the Venetian Tourist Board.
>
> Did anyone ever say to you: 'You know, fundamentally,
> he's bumptious.'? Bumptiousness doesn't require
> unearthing - it proclaims itself from the battlements.
>
> I thought 'personally' known to me was something
> one only ever read in character references written
> by semiliterate cops or priests.
>
> As darling Truman remarked: that's not writing, that's
> typing.
>
> Scottie B.
I'd say these lines probably to refer to Seymour as a writer...and it's not
unusual for writing to be referred to as a craft. That view of writing is
the basis of your complaints, Scottie :). "Least fundamentally bumptious,"
to me, means "nice guy." That's all :). In some dialects of
Americanglish, "personally" knowing someone denotes a certain level of
intimacy, but it is indeed a poor phrase.
Still, I get the point of your complaints. It's almost like he's trying
too hard to be silly and clever at the same time.
Jim
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