americandignity

JEROME DAVID SALINGER'S Franny and Zooey*
As a Way of an Introduction

This is JD Salinger's New York City; and this is the Glass family. The Glass family is JD Salinger's family. Not the family he hid from the world, and not the family he grew up with. This is the family he proudly showed off to the world though the one thing he did just about as well as anybody in America over the 20th century. His own families, each in their own way, proved too conventional to be mined for literature. Each proved a bit too middle class, a bit too cheerful. Each was too void of tragedy to prove literary for Mr. Salinger. But, on the other hand, the Glass family was the family that truly belonged to him, and this family could be rocked and wracked and beaten and bruised with no consequential counterpunching. They could pretty much survive anything Salinger tossed at them; and, with a few exceptions, the family pretty much survived, almost wholly in tact.

It was through these kids - - all five of them in total; and all of them over twenty years of age - - save for youngest, Franny, the only girl of the bunch - - that Salinger exercised his ability to write down what generally turned out to be a great, and swiftly told, short story. Much of what he wrote was written while he was in his twenties, so nearly all of what he wrote sounded spot on perfect to any ear trained to wince at b u l l s h i t. He sometimes changed his style, but every style that Salinger tried successfully was a stylized version of himself. Salinger could detect a phony better than, and before, anyone else could; if JD Salinger had a trademark - - if anything was JD Salinger's trademark, that was it.

Salinger cut through affectation and hypocrisy a time when writers made substance the very bitch of inauthenticity and style. There was very little chance of a prettied-up Jerome David making it all the way to a final pressing. Salinger held a tight grasp on to the distribution of his work. He edited furiously, and disallowed the publication of anything he thought beneath the initial standard he had set for himself when young. The result was an oeuvre that was small in number, but highly prized by fans and fellow-writers alike.

That which he could polish into ostensible perfection was sent to publication house; that which he could not twist into shape remains lost to us to this day. The right choice could send a story off in a million different directions; the right revision could make a bad story great, or kill the greatest story ever told. Read Franny and Zooey and judge Salinger's choice for yourself.


The following is a synopsis of JD Salinger's 1961 double novella, Franny and Zooey. Read, if you don't mind knowing where the story takes, and thereby leaves you.

ONE
une
-01-
The Glass Family. First, Franny Glass, the Daughter and Sister.

Out on a date, Franny's boyfriend, Lane Coutell, monopolizes conversation over lunch at a fashionable restaurant on the lower west side of Manhattan regarding the possible publication of his paper on Gustave Flaubert. Meanwhile, Franny questions the notion of college itself, and the nature of Lane's friends. She takes nil by mouth at the lunch inspired by what she has recently been reading. Suddenly Franny feels faint, and increasingly uncomfortable in her surroundings. She goes to the ladies room and, there, cries for a spell. Eventually composing herself, Franny returns to the table. Lane questions her about a small book he's discovered in her absence. She tells him that it's titled, The Way of the Pilgrim, and there, explains the story.

It concerns a Russian peasant who wanders about the countryside in search of wisdom, eventually learning of the power of praying without ceasing. She then begins to expound upon the Jesus Prayer; which reads: Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner. This internalized prayer is repeated over and over, to a point where, in a manner similar to a Zen koan, (or a dialogue used in Zen Buddhist practice, to provoke great doubt over a precept, in order to test a student's progress in Zen Buddhist philosophy), it becomes unconscious, almost like one's heartbeat. Lane is less interested in the story than in keeping their timetable for the party and football game scheduled for that evening. Without warning, Franny faints, and goes limp. Lane tends to his girlfriend, and consequently postpones their planned weekend activities. After she wakes, he goes outside the restaurant to hail a taxi. As Franny is left alone at the table, she begins to practice the act of praying without ceasing.

( and )

TWO
deux
-02-
The Glass Family. Next, Zooey Glass, the Son and Brother.

Zooey is smoking and soaking in the tub. He is also reading a four-year-old letter from his brother, Buddy. His mother, Bessie, enters the bathroom. The two have a long discussion centering upon Bessie's worries about his sister, Franny, who is in a state of emotional collapse. During the conversation, Zooey verbally spars with his mother, repeatedly requesting that she leave. Bessie tolerates Zooey's behavior, and simply states that he's becoming more and more like his brother Buddy. She is also wondering what has happened to her children. Children that were once so sweet and loving, and now, quite the opposite. Bessie leaves, and Zooey retires from his bath and gets dressed. He goes to the living room, where he finds his sister Franny on the sofa with the family cat, Bloomberg. Zooey upsets Franny by questioning her motives for reciting the Jesus Prayer. He then retreats into the former bedroom of his two older brothers, Seymour and Buddy. There, he reads the back of their door, still covered in philosophical quotations. After some contemplation, Zooey telephones Franny from upstairs, pretending to be his elder brother, Buddy. Franny eventually discovers the ruse, but she and Zooey continue to talk over the telephone, now seriously, and in a friendly manner. A few years earlier Seymour, the eldest sibling of the Glass family, committed suicide. As a successful psychologist, he was the spiritual leader of the family, and each member's personal confidant. Franny knows that his sister once greatly re-veered their eldest brother, and therefore shares with Franny her some words of wisdom Seymour once gave him. By the end of the telephoned conversation, one in which distance may have offered a greater opportunity for intimacy and honesty, the fundamental secret of Seymour's advice is revealed. Franny seems to find illumination in what Zooey has told her. This is what Zooey has told her: (put on your sentience/stertorous listening machines, Sectors 17 through 22): there isn't anyone out there who isn't Seymour's fat lady, and that the Fat Lady is Jesus Christ, Himself.


* The name is pronounced (zoo . ee), and not (zoe . ee)
For confirmation, ask Zooey Deschanel, whose name was taken from the aforementioned work.


Pacemore Coldfall

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