A perfect day for a bananafish (cult fiction at cut prices) (For Esme With Love and Splendour and Other Stories - J.D. Salinger)

Member Name: hulahoop

Product:	For Esme With Love and Splendour and Other Stories - J.D. Salinger
Date:	01/03/01 (2035 review reads)
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The short stories by J.D Salinger give a different view of the strange period after the Second World War - a time that seems to pale into insignificance next to the war and
events that came later.

Having read the cult ‘The Catcher in the Rye’ I was advised to read ‘For Esme With Love and Squalor’ because I was intrigued by Salinger as a person and as a writer. His style in ‘For Esme’ is never quite as stylised as it is in narrating the few days of wilderness of the young Holden Caulfield in ‘Catcher in the Rye’, but maintains a kind of coldness and mystery, as well as perfectly, and uneasily, depicting the life
surrounding his characters. Each character seems real, and carries a sense of the irony of life on his or her shoulders.

‘A Perfect Day for Bananafish’ and ‘Down at the Dinghy’ show early glimpses of people connected to Seymour, a character whom Salinger develops and writes about in ‘Seymour: an Introduction’. Each story dips in and out of a person’s life, depicting
narrative in real time, thus showing one day or a night in total. In some cases this adds mystery and intrigue to the characters - I have yet to read ‘Seymour: An Introduction’, but can’t wait after the tension that surrounds him in ‘For Esme’ - but in others it gives a very cold feeling. Just as you want to get to know a character you are not allowed to, and this occasionally made me feel deprived, and sometimes dislike the story for not allowing itself to be unfurled. However, each one is well written, and the dipping in and out seems perfectly timed, when one considers what Holden Caulfield says in ‘The Catcher in the Rye’ about not telling anyone about yourself.

Salinger was said to be a recluse and an eccentric, which perhaps shows in the way that he portrays his characters. His depictions are often quite scathing. For ins
tance, in ‘Uncle Wiggily in Connecticut’ he portrays two women as being quite pathetic and ignorant, and in ‘Pretty Mouth and Green My Eyes’ a man who chases after his
wife,and feels paranoid about her behaviour, looks weak and stupid. However, ‘For Esme - With Love and Squalor’ is a warm depiction of an English girl the American G.I. narrator met during the war. ‘De Daumier- Smith’s Blue Period’ shows an obsessional, rather frightening artist whose behaviour becomes intolerable to the people he is interested in. ‘Teddy’ is also quite frightening with Salinger’s portrayal of a bizarre 10 year old genius who predicts his own death, possibly raising questions about fate and religion.

These stories are great if you want something light and interesting to read, but
Salinger’s style of writing might be slightly off-putting for some, and the lack of warmth may affect sensitive types!!!

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