RE: worst behavior
Steven Gabriel (sgabriel@willamette.edu)
Thu, 04 Nov 1999 01:38:32 -0800 (PST)
> Muriel's fatass sister. I'm so glad Buddy went off on her in his own
> roundabout way.
I think it time I actually posted something Salinger related. The matron
of honor in "Raise High" always got on my nerves. She's the kind of
person that pushes all of my wrong buttons. And I consider my buttons
rather hard to find, or push for that matter. I'm more of a watch sort of
guy. The buttons that do anything are those annoying sorts that require a
pin and lots of concentration to get at. Anyhow, I couldn't stand her.
But I was always rather curiously intrigued by the following lines from
"Raise High the Roof Beams Carpenters":
"It had been a genuine apology, but not an embarrassed and, still better,
not an obsequious one, and for a moment I had a feeling that, for all her
stagy indignation and showy grit, there was something bayonetlike about
her, something not altogether unadmirable."
I've tried to pull this off (liking these types of folk), but perhaps I'm
too apologetic myself and simply bitter that there are people for whom
such bayonetlike qualities come naturally.
A related note: my take on assholes. Lots of people are assholes, not
all. And it just happens that some assholes are interesting and some are
not. For some reason we allow wide berth in letting folks like Jim off
the hook, but never take an excuse for uninteresting or ugly assholes.
Thus we forgive Jim, and forever hate Hitler.
s.
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: Steven Gabriel -- sgabriel@willamette.edu :
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