Camille, Yes, it is nice to be able to read Nabokov in the original, though not exactly easy. As for the Tolstoy mentions: Buddy writes to Zooey about the possibility of starring some time in a film of "War and Peace", with "old Tolstoy lovers like Zsa Zsa Gabor" visiting the opening night. Later there is a citation of Anna Karenina on the door of Seymour's room. And, of course, how could someone of good taste read Tolstoy and NOT love him? Matthew, How exactly do S's stories fly in the face of Chekhov's principles? What is "Hapworth" anyway? It seems to me that many stories of Chekhov fly in the face of his own principles. Salinger a literary revolutionary? What I think an at least very exceptional aspect of some of his writings, is the refusal to show us wha t goes on INSIDE the heroes. This is not true for "The cathcher..." of course, but we know hardly anything about Franny's, Zooey's, Seymour's (i n Bananafish), Sergeant X's feelings. We get very detailed descriptions of what goes on on the surface and we can draw our own conclusions about the inside. Salinger's approach is anti-psychological, I think. See also Teddy's opinions on poetry, that there are too many emotions in modern Western poetry. In this respect he has few followers, I think. There is a very remarkable Dutch book which has the same "outside" approach, "Bij Nader Inzien" by J.J. Voskuil, whose work has not been translated into English yet, as far as I know. Regards, Paul