Re: franny & zooey

First off, Robbie, good to see you back...nice to see you're life has
slowed down enough to be able to respond to the list (even if it means
just a breather).

L. Manning Vines wrote:

>I think that I agree with a lot of what you're saying, but it's not at all
>clear to me how "Zooey" can have changed "Franny." Salinger did create a
>memorable character. It is very reasonable to ask just who she is. We can
>even think of the second story, I suppose, as a sequel to the first, and we
>can say that it gives new details and information. But the substance of
>the first story isn't changed. Nothing that wasn't IN the first story
>before is IN it now.
>
Seems like according to the Updike article there are some changes of
facts, such as "where did Franny get the book she was reading?", etc.
 The answer to this question changes when the story is attached to
"Zooey" -- in "Franny," she says she got it from the library, and we
have no reason to doubt her. In "Zooey," we're told she got it from
Seymour's room.

What happens in the presence of the second story is that you're required
to accomodate the contradiction -- one list member suggested she just
wasn't being honest with Lane. That's fine, and actually pretty
consistent with the situation and her feelings about Lane, but it's not
anything we would have ever considered apart from the second story. The
meaning of this particular detail changes completely because of the
second story.

Now I think you're ignoring, probably not deliberately, a distinction
I'm making between "broad statements" about a piece and specific
questions and details about a piece. The broad statements -- that
Franny was a memorable character, a disillusioned youth, etc., still
don't change. I agree, of course -- I've been saying this all along.
 But the harder you press the story for details, the more trouble you have.

You asserted earlier that, since a piece of literature is constructed,
consciously -- crafted by the author -- every word is in place for a
reason, every detail counts, and is giving conscious, deliberate meaning
by its author. But this detail clearly changes from one story to the
next. You need to account for this level of detail if you want to argue
that every word, and every possible meaning, in a piece of literature is
the result of deliberate crafting by the author.

Jim

PS your post was very long and I'm going to break it up into different
responses.

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Received on Mon Dec 2 10:59:46 2002