Charles McGrath, in The NYT:
This is the theme, though, that comes increasingly to dominate the Glass chronicles: the unsolvable problem of ego and self-consciousness, of how to lead a spiritual life in a vulgar, material society. The very thing that makes the Glasses, and Seymour especially, so appealing to Mr. Salinger — that they’re too sensitive and exceptional for this world — is also what came to make them irritating to so many readers.
Another way to pose the Glass problem is: How do you make art for an audience, or a critical establishment, too crass to understand it? This is the issue that caused Seymour to give up, presumably, and one is tempted to say it’s what soured Mr. Salinger on wanting to see anything else in print.
Maybe. Or perhaps he just got all selfish and egotistical on us—that is, the wrong kind of egotistical.
I mean, what is this craze about being understood? I seem to remember reading somewhere that the artist simply produces, and detaches himself or herself from ill-informed feedback. And that the crassest of all readers, listeners, audience members were, in a sense, stand-ins for . . . “Christ himself.”
You just don’t like people, Mr. Salinger. “Watch out; they’re everywhere.”
(Two quotes in this post; who wants to place them? Please do not ask where I want them placed; I haven’t decided that yet.)
I don’t get Seymour’s attachment to Dickens, even at the age of seven. I was never that fond of Dickens, with perhaps 2-3 exceptions. Reading about the Glasses is like toggling back-and-forth forever between “yes!—that’s exactly what it’s like!” and “no, no; that isn’t it at all.”
(Make that three.)
Via Althouse, who gets the pleasure of the circular post, via Reynolds, who labors on behalf of the world’s ungrateful insomniacs.
Althouse:
In Althousian theory, the blogger is not here to help you with your boredom, but to delight at serendipitous juxtapositions.
Yes. I re-read Franny and Zooey last spring in a cluttered house that was in the process of being painted. And it wasn’t on-purpose at all; I’d forgotten about the painters in the book. I’d like to see anyone beat that.
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{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
“Christ himself” is who the Fat Lady is in Zooey.
“Watch out — they’re everywhere:” A Perfect Day for Bananafish?
Ah, I wasn’t clear. You got the first one right, but the other two aren’t from the Salinger canon.