J D Salinger

Well, I went to jury duty today. Had ample time to finish Franny and Zooey. Way I see it, the author knew each character intimately and it is well written. The fly in the ointment for me was, these people are not relatable to me. I never knew people like them and I have not lived a life remotely that way. I found it somewhat of a chore to read the last pages. Age has naught to do with it. I think I might have felt the same if I were 18 or twenty four.

Yeah. I really can't stand the Glass family.

I think I'll add one more of my pieces on Salinger before going to bed.-Ron
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Some superior writers have been very careful caretakers of their careers. In a letter to one of his philosophy professors at Harvard, T.S. Eliot wrote that there were two ways to achieve literary celebrity in London: One was to appear often in a variety of publications; the other was to appear seldom but always to make certain to dazzle when one did. Eliot, of course, chose the latter, and it worked smashingly. But he was still counting on gaining his reputation through his actual writing.

Now good work alone doesn't quite seem to make it; the publicity catapults need to be hauled into place, the walls of indifference stormed. Some writers have decided to steer shy from publicity altogether: Thomas Pynchon for one, J.D. Salinger for another. But actively seeking publicity was thought for a writer, somehow, vulgar--at least it was until the last few decades. Salinger died on 29/1/’10, gave his last interview in 1980 at the age of 60 and eschewed the public gaze for half a century: 1960 to 2010.