Re: Salinger
helena kim (helena@apollo.netsoc.tcd.ie)
Wed, 11 Nov 1998 17:45:49 +0000 (GMT)
On Wed, 11 Nov 1998, Pasha Paterson wrote:
> treating it as a work of literature and not grouping it with so-called
> "young-adult novels" as some [bad] classes seem to treat it.
my local library sticks little red dots on the spines of all the 'teen'
books. most of them are babysitters club, sweet valley high, judy
blume, and those epic boys football (i mean soccer) books.
i believe this is a way to get young teenagers to read more, by letting
them think 'hey, i'm not in the kids section anymore!', but avoiding them
coming home with dostoyevsky (sp?) or something that will bore them and
put them off books.
interestingly, catcher has a red dot on its spine.
the style of writing in catcher
is hugely different from anything else that i've read by salinger. was
this tone used in the early short stories about the caulfields? what made
him choose it for his novel? [ie why not write a glass novel?] did he stop
using it altogether after catcher's runaway success?
what makes me think of this is that the style of catcher is very, very
easy to read. would this be a major factor contributing to why catcher is
percieved as a 'teen' book? its lack of big words and flowery
descriptive passages?
it seems that catcher is much more ghettoised that other hs books, such as
the pearl, or lord of the flies. so, obviously the actual narrative has a
major role in this, but which is the more off-putting feature to Serious
Literary Types, the style or the content? or is it a 50/50 mix? and what
other factors come into play?
excuse the manic fit of curiosity.
:helena kim
helena at netsoc dot tcd dot ie
'the church is near, but the road is icy.
the bar is far, but i will walk carefully.'
- russian proverb