Subject: Enlightenment through re-reading!
From: Scott Wachtler (sfvat@scfn.thpl.lib.fl.us)
Date: Mon May 19 1997 - 15:08:36 GMT
Bananafishers!
I hardly ever write to the list eventhough I've talked to a number of you
privatly before. I guess it's manily due to shyness or some neurotic
insecurity on my part, but nevertheless I had to share with the list some
of the joy I've currently experienced re-reading some of JD's work. Once
a year (or week) I figure it won't kill me to re-read some choice Salinger
stories in my collection. (Anyone catch my intended pun?) All the Hapworth
news made me first grab for my hermetically sealed photocopy, but I put it
down because I want to read it freash when Orcsheis(sp) publishes it.
Instead I read the Gladwaller trilogy from the uncollected 22 and I was
struck by The Last Day of The Last Furlough. I had never noticed how
Salinger drops these not so subtle clues to the fact that Babe feels so
out of place. Everything is cold to Babe. His milk. The Snow. The
conversation he has with his father when Vincent comes to dinner.
Everything is cold except Matty who is such a bright spot and such and
angel that she won't even disobey her parents by sleding down the
dangerous street. I don't know, the story just touched me like it never
has before. I guess for that reason, it felt like it was a brand new
story. Another story that I recently re- read was S-AI. I have to admit
that this was never one of my favorites. I went about re-reading it with
trepidation, but I'm so glad that I did. The first thing I noticed about
it that escaped me upon frist reading was that even though it's suposed to
be about Seymour, you learn more about Buddy than ever before. In parts
he comes off as a very funny, scarcastic, almost lonely man. You can tell
how much he loves Seymour and how writing about him is almost therapy for
him. Towards the end Buddy writes about playing curb marbles with Ira
Yankauer.
"One late afternoon, at the faintly soupy quarter of an hour in New York
when the street lights have just been turned on and the parking lights of
cars are just getting turned on-some on, some still off. . . " (Pg. 201)
Upon reading this passage, I, who also grew up in NYC and knows exactly
the time of day he's talking about, was transported back there. It was so
lovingly written that I could have been playing marbles with Buddy and Ira
when Seymour came out and told Buddy to, " . . .try not aiming so much?"
The description was just beautiful and flored me (as it seems to do to
Buddy.) I finished S-AI with a new love for it and a feeling that Buddy
sort of writes it in order to help him come to terms with Seymour's death.
I'm sure any one of you can re-read the story and get any number of
interpretations from it. For instance, and I can almost invision someone
on this list writing this so I'll put quotes around it. "The fact that
Buddy mentions Miss Valdemar's incredibly snug pedal pushers on page 171
of S-AI just proves that Salinger has a foot fetish. This is also shown
in APDFBF when he kisses the arch of Sybil's foot or when he yells at the
lady in the elevator for making fun of his feet. How can you need more
proof than this!"
All that minutiae may very well be true, but on a whole this story moved
me to tears because of how much Buddy seems to love Seymour, and that made
all the difference!
BTW: I highly recommend re-reading to anyone who hasn't read any of JD's
work in awhile!
Scott Wachtler
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