Subject: Re: drag artist
From: LR Pearson, Arts 99 (lp9616@bristol.ac.uk)
Date: Wed Oct 18 2000 - 14:54:08 GMT
How interesting that it should be men who reject "Uncle Wiggily" on
these grounds. I have no time now to really think about how much
Salinger's depiction of women not in the company of men really is, but
this story has always rung particularly truly for me. I remember when I
was about 12 or 13, tearfully copying out the ending ("I was a nice
girl...")into my diary with an overwhelming sense of its significance.
Which, given the self-obsession of an average 13 year old girl (and
especially me!!) does suggest that I saw in it something I recognised
(a bit worrying, really!)
I would love to write more on this matter as I've just started to get
really interested but alas, dinner calls me.
Love, Lucy-Ruth
On Wed, 18 Oct 2000 09:41:50 -0600 Josh Stott <jstott@bigplanet.net>
wrote:
> I had never analyzed my distaste for this story, but it is probably the
> only of the 9 that I skip every time I read straight through the book.
>
> I think that Scottie has hit it right on the nose -- make-uped or not.
>
> Josh
>
> Scottie Bowman wrote:
>
> > Well. The more I return to the stories - in most cases
> > after long intervals - the higher Holden & Esme rise in my
> > appreciation & the lower the others sink.
> >
> > This here Uncle Wiggily in Connecticut - does no one share
> > my misgivings at the sight of Salinger trying to experience
> > & recreate an all-female encounter & conversation? I don't
> > doubt all the ladies will rally round & reassure me this is how
> > girls behave & talk when they're alone together. But to me it
> > doesn't READ that way . No matter how convincing the makeup
> > & authentic the dresses, I'm still left with the embarassing
> > feeling of being in the presence of a fairly gifted transvestist.
> >
> > The cute-tough little girl with the imaginary companion,
> > the taciturn resentment of the black maid, the drunken ex-college
> > girls reminiscing about chaps .... I have an awful picture of
> > a cissy who collects women's magazines & attends chick-flicks
> > in the hope of gaining access to the mysterious & envied female
> > world.
> >
> > They say for example that Jane Austen, an undoubted genius
> > of the literary imagination, never attempted to create a situation
> > where men confronted each other in the absence of women.
> > She had no experience of such & sensed, probably rightly, she
> > would get it subtly wrong. I can't think of any of her successors
> > who managed to get it right.
> >
> > Tolstoy's equivalents SOUND convincing - but I have no way
> > of knowing if he actually did pull it off. And, anyway, Lev is
> > the exception. I don't think Salinger is.
> >
> > Scottie B.
> >
> > -
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----------------------
LR Pearson, Arts 99
lp9616@bristol.ac.uk
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