Re: delicacy
WILL HOCHMAN (hochman@uscolo.edu)
Sun, 06 Sep 1998 14:12:14 -0600 (MDT)
First of all dear Scottie, "Mr. Salinger" is something used by a few of
the earliest bananafish and it's a manner of address I associate both with
this list and a simple and repectful way to address writers somewhat
similar to the way the NYTimes does in it's reviews.
Second of all, I loved your subject title. If you read me as religious
sounding, then hopefully in the context of Mr. Salinger's wide religious
senses, but not intended so chill on the chill.
Unless fairness is a religion. I think Mr. Salinger does deserve the
respect and appreciation of a delicacy. I think a lot of readers might
enjoy new stories by Mr. Salinger. And I think many of the folks on this
list know that it's possible to treat Mr. Salinger with respect and
interest. To think he deserves Ms. Maynard's version of their
relationship because he's a writer is perhaps where we divide.
I don't think writers are merely hucksters and the joke
is on rubes who buy their pitches or on the writers who don't enjoy
the price of their own fame. Yes, I do understand illusion and
reality in fiction (particularly with the help of Wayne C. Booth in _the
Rhetoric of Fiction_ and _Critical Understanding_), but I think some
writers create aspects of life in their work that are worthy of being
nurtured (apparently, that's what William Shawn thought as well) and worth
giving heightened attention, love, respect, critical thinking, and a whole
range of feelings and memories and futures to...and you already know I
think Mr. Salinger's words make him most worthy...
How each of us chooses to nurture, create or ignore art is individual.
It's funny--when I think of religion for myself, I do enjoy some of Mr.
Salinger's sensibilities but I did come to them before Mr. Salinger's
fiction arrived on my brother's bookshelf. I also enjoy Mr. Wallace
Steven's take on religion in "Sunday Morning" more than any I've read in
so called religous texts (with the possible exceptions of _Job_ and
selected _I Ching_ passages). I guess in a way Scottie I am trying to
admit that I find literature an interesting and provocative way to think
about religion, and as a poet if I denied spirituality I'd have to hang up
the pen so maybe you are right...
As much as I enjoy temples and churches and mosques (I recently visited
the sanctuary at Chamayo, M.M. and Georgia O'keefe's home in Abiquiu, N.M.
and felt they were both pretty holy places), I have to admit the places
where my faith and love flourish are mostly text spaces. Again Scottie,
maybe you are right to criticize my sense of Mr. Salinger as too precious.
I admit I might read more widely and review his work less frequently, but
I'm lucky to be able to make my own choice and at least still try and read
abundantly...
As if I could call on Buddy Glass on to help get me out of this post, I'm
going to admit that I'm about to march right into a syllabus for English
101 online for my Distance Ed dept and throughout today's work you can bet
I've got my doubts and only my bloodlines to Honore' Daumier to work
on...I really am not sure how to teach a course entirely online but one
thing I'm certain of is that if I can create a sense of respect and regard
in our screens that you sense as religous, I may still be creating some
worthy learning space. Of course (pun and farewell quote intended) in
Buddy's words from SAI:
"You've only my word for it so far, but I must tell you that I know as
well as I know anything that if our positions were switched around and
Seymour were in my seat, he would be so affected--so stricken, in fact,
--by his gross seniority as narrator and official shot-caller that he'd
abandon this project. I'll say no more about, of course, but I'm glad it
came up. It's the truth. Please don't simply see it; feel it."
will