[lit-ideas] Re: Salingeriana
- From: Adriano Palma <Palma@xxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" <lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sun, 24 Sep 2017 12:50:15 +0000
e insiste a far pubblicta'....
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McEvoy <dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Thursday, September 21, 2017 8:12 PM
To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [lit-ideas] Re: Salingeriana
Should have added this.
The Village Voice prints its final edition – with Bob Dylan on the
cover<https://www.theguardian.com/media/2017/sep/21/village-voice-final-edition-new-york-bob-dylan>
<https://www.theguardian.com/media/2017/sep/21/village-voice-final-edition-new-york-bob-dylan>
[https://s.yimg.com/nq/storm/assets/enhancrV2/23/logos/theguardian.png]
The Village Voice prints its final edition – with Bob Dylan on the cover
By Edward Helmore
By mid-morning on Thursday many of the Voice’s famous red distribution boxes
were empty, as New York’s beloved w...
________________________________
From: Donal McEvoy <dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: "lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" <lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Friday, 22 September 2017, 9:10
Subject: [lit-ideas] Re: Salingeriana
“But,” Salinger concludes, “I write just for myself and my own pleasure.”
which has something Griceian and Grecian about it!>
What Salinger concludes might equally be concluded of masturbation. It's hardly
a compelling philosophy of writing. Most bad writers might claim to write just
for themselves and their own pleasure. Admittedly they might alternatively
claim they write for the good of humanity and the effort needed is painful, but
this only tells us such claims have little necessary bearing on literary merit.
Bearing in mind that Nobel Prize Winner Bob Dylan around 1985 summed up the
current era as the "Age of Masturbation" (see liner notes to _Biograph_). He
didn't mean it in a good way. So while Salinger's comment might seem pleasingly
individualistic and modest, it can also be viewed as a reflection of the
Dylan's Age of Masturbation. This is not to decry Salinger's writing but to say
we live in an age where "Catcher in the Rye" is more likely seen as a study of
a heroically free-spirited anti-"phoney" than of an immature adolescent whose
harsh eye on the world obscures from his view his own excessive sense of self.
Just sayin'.
D
L
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From: "dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" <dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Sent: Friday, 22 September 2017, 4:30
Subject: [lit-ideas] Salingeriana
There is something Griceian about Salinger. There is something Popperian,
possibly; but that might be more difficult to falsify. In any case, it may all
connect with L. Helm, and that’s the main reason why I’m sharing it with
Lit-Ideas (also because it might connect with Lionpainter :)).
There is this essay, “Grice without an audience”. It attempts to refute Grice,
but it ends up re-validating him!
In any case, Salinger, of Park Avenue (as some called him!) loved to write
poetry – even if ‘loved’ is a bit of a Griceian hyperbole. Here is a sample:
Hide not thy tears on this last day
Your sorrow has no shame;
To march no more midst lines of gray;
No longer play the game.
Four years have passed in joyful ways
Wouldst stay those old times dear?
Then cherish now these fleeting days,
The few while you are here.
The Griceian connection (“Grice without an audience”) seems to connect with one
of Helm’s interests: an author’s addressee (where ‘author’ is standard for
Griceian ‘utterer’)
Salinger seldom spoke to the press except when, trying to fend off the
unauthorized publication of his uncollected stories, he told a reporter from
The New York Times lines which seem to come straight from Grice’s journal
(“Some people think that I see ‘meaning’ as people-oriented. I don’t. I may
very well write an entry in my journal, and open it with “Dear Diary,”
intending myself to be the intended addressee at a later stage. Or something.”
Grice, The William James Lectures on Logic and Conversation, Harvard, Lecture
V).
“There is a marvelous peace in not publishing,” Salinger told the NYT reporter.
"It is *peaceful*.”
(I realise I shouldn’t be stressing this too much when Helm makes the effort to
SHARE and PUBLISH his poetry et al. with _us_)
“Still.” – Salinger goes on.
“Publishing is a terrible invasion of my privacy.”
“I like to write.”
“I love to write.”
[This is a bit of what Grice would call a ‘scalar implicature’ – Grice would
focus on the illogical literal interpretation of “I do not LIKE to write; I
LOVE it!” – for Grice, ‘to love’ entails ‘to like’ – but Grice would catch
Salinger’s implicature – in the rye or elsewhere).
“But,” Salinger concludes, “I write just for myself and my own pleasure.”
which has something Griceian and Grecian about it!
Cheers,
Speranza
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