I think

one has to be careful with Salinger... there's almost no happy adult stuff, just stuff about how great it is to be a child and all that drivel...

Criticism on Franny and Zooey

Critical Reception Information from eNotes

The New York Review of Books - Justice to JD Salinger

Updike and Salinger: A Literary incident

An MLA IB Search for "Zooey" (in English, and peer-reviewed) yielded fewer results than expected though additional items were attainable on the web and if looking through Dissertation Abstracts.

One article by Alfred Kazin entitled "JD Salinger: Everybody's Favorite" is cited by 5 others on Google Scholar:

[BOOK] In Search of JD Salinger: A Writing Life
I Hamilton - 1988 - Random House Inc
Cited by 22 - Related articles - All 2 versions

[BOOK] Die Initiationsreise: Studien zum Jugendlichen Helden im modernen amerikanischen Roman, …
P Freese - 1971 - K. Wachholtz
Cited by 1 - Related articles - Library Search - All 2 versions

[CITATION] " Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters
B Glass - A Reader's Guide to JD Salinger, 2002 - Greenwood Press
Related articles

[BOOK] Dong Wu wen shi xue bao
東吳大學 - 1978 - 東吳大學
Related articles - All 2 versions

[BOOK] Kritische Rezeption und stilistische Interpretation von JD Salingers Erzählprosa: Studien …
K Ortseifen - 1979 - Peter Lang Publishing
Related articles

Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters

My initial reaction is that I like this novella nearly as much as I detested The Catcher in the Rye (henceforth, "Catcher"). Perhaps I am already seeing some Tenenbaumian connections too.

Salinger dedicates the book, which also includes, "Seymour An Introduction," as follows:

"If there is an amateur reader still left in the world - or anybody who just reads and runs - I ask him or her, with untellable affection and grattitude, to split the dedication of this book four ways with my wife nad children."

I wonder if I am such an amateur reader. Certainly, I have read Salinger before, and if there is such a thing to be had, as an English major, I have had training in "how to read" critically. Can I put all of this aside and read Salinger fresh, with some form of naissance? I hope so, as I am trying to read Salinger with a new lens and to remove any preconceptions about him and his works.

And so the story begins...

We learn that the Glass family is rather large, seven children in fact, populate the Glass Universe: Seymour, Buddy (the narrator), Beatrice (nicknamed Boo Boo), the twins (Waker and Walter), Franny, and Zooey. Their parents (Les and Bessie) are retired Vaudevillians.

Sidebar: Why do I always think "Les" looks better with a lowercase "l" ("les") than with a capital one? Maybe I have read too much French??

Sidebar: The description of the entire family is a little reminiscient of the description of James Cagney's family in "Yankee Doodle Dandy" which was (co)incidentally released in 1942, the year that Buddy enters the army. Though overall the story reminds me more of William Wyler's accalimed, "The Best Years of Our Lives," released in 1947. I don't know if this is because Salinger lived the experience of these films, or had seen them, or both. Perhaps I should read his letters...?

... to be continued...