OurColony.net

Brilliant ...

Customer Rating:
A third reading leaves me more impressed than the first two (must be my age) ... I will forever describe myself as a "chiropodist."

"Raise High ..." is brilliant writing.

I really wanted to like this, but...

Customer Rating:
Probably like many others I sought out Salinger's other books after enjoying Catcher In The Rye. Disappointed with Nine Stories, and totally let down by Franny & Zooey, I continued on to this book. I found the first story - Raise High The Roof Beam, Carpenters - an enjoyable read. There was hope yet, and Seymour seemed to be the most (only?) interesting character from the Glass family stories; so Seymour: An Introduction would probably be the best story of them all. It turned out to be a kind of pretentious ranting by the author and all the philosophy books that he had apparently read. I was really hoping to find some of the magic that was in Catcher. The first of the two stories in this book came close to offering that, but the second one was impossibly frustrating.

BUDDY GLASS AT HIS BEST

Customer Rating:
After re-reading Franny & Zooey, I tackled Raise High the Roofbeam, Carpenters and Seymour: An Introduction. The former is a really great story, narrated by and starring Buddy Glass. It's near the end of World War II and the Glass family is scattered all over the world, but their oldest brother Seymour is getting married in New York City and Buddy is the only one in the family who is able to attend. So Buddy is sitting there in his uniform (it's a sweltering day in the summer of '45) and after a long wait it is announced that the groom is a no-show and the bride has been stood-up at the alter.

So all the guests leave the hall and get into a series of waiting town cars which are to take them to the bride's house for the reception, and Buddy gets into one of these cars with a bunch of people who are furious at Seymour, and the angriest of the women manages to eventually figure out that Buddy is his brother. It's very claustrophobic and funny - I recommend it. Seymour: An Introduction - not so much.

Advanced Readings in Salinger's Glass family.

Customer Rating:
When I was in college, I read this book like it was the Bible. Published after his better-known novels, The Catcher in the Rye (1951) and Franny and Zooey (1961), Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters and Seymour: An Introduction (1963) is a study in Salinger's fictional Glass family, of which Franny and Zooey are siblings. (The Glass family also appear in the short stories "Uncle Wiggily in Connecticut," "A Perfect Day for Bananafish," and "Down at the Dinghy," collected in Nine Stories.)

Narrated by Franny and Zooey's older brother, Buddy Glass, Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters tells the story of his older brother, Seymour's 1942 wedding, an event which foreshadows his 1948 suicide while vacationing with his wife (which is the subject of "A Perfect Day for Bananafish"). Seymour, who no-shows at his own Tom-Collins-fueled wedding, is described through the eyes of Buddy. Seymour, as his name suggests ("see-more"), is the spiritual center of the Glass family. In his a stream-of-consciousness narrative, Seymour: An Introduction, Buddy struggles with the death of his spiritually enlightened brother and confidante. Whereas Catcher should be read as introductory Salinger, Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters and Seymour: An Introduction should be read as advanced studies in Salinger's Glass family.

G. Merritt

Roof Beams A Little Gem: Seymour 'the End of Salinger'

Customer Rating:
Raise High the Roof Beams is the last great work of fiction from the hand of Salinger. Pungent, alive, full of closely observed detail and a touch of believable mysticism. Seymour: An Introduction is the first undeniable symptom of whatever incurable author's disease destroyed Salinger. Though it is shot through with flashes of wit, wisdom and intelligence the overall effect is cringe-worthy.

Salinger comes up against a fundamental and insurmountable problem portraying Seymour. He tells us he is this great true poet but of course not being a great poet himself, Salinger can't produce the poems for which inability he gives various coy reasons. Salinger can't really SHOW us Seymour because not being 'a ring-ding holy man' himself he can't know WHAT to show us. He creates Seymour indirectly going on about his nose or a haircut and all the while we are aware of what is being withheld.

Salinger's obsession is suicide and it is constantly an undercurrent in Catcher in the Rye and of course throughout the Glass family saga. The other subject is the innocence and the natural 'Zen' of children vs. the ugly hypocrisies of the 'adult' world. I personally believe Seymour kills himself because of HIS great secret which is his sexual attraction to little girls. This is 'there' in Bananafish and please don't tell me its not. Also, in Raise High the Roofbeams... Seymour's bride Muriel has an uncanny resemblance to a beautiful child Seymour loved when they were young. Buddy himself says 'he can't begin to handle the implications of that..." Holden's sister Phoebe is another Salinger pre-adolescent shown to us with the eyes of a lover.

Salinger's last published piece Hapworth, is THE literary disaster of all time. Not only does Salinger make the terrible mistake of BEING Seymour but a seven year old precocious Seymour who is the most insufferable and far-fetched character in all modern fiction. A real horror. A little savant preacher that reminds me of Edward Gorey's The Pious Child. He even uses the opportunity to load us down with spiritual enlightening 'reading lists' that go on to unintentionally humorous lengths.

Seymour's flaws are what should interest us. We should have had one little novella from Salinger or at the very least a short story fromthe mind and perspective of Seymour - full of unspeakable pain, of course, after all the man killed himself. Something doesn't add up and Salinger refused to do the addition starting with Seymour: An Introduction.

Hapworth shows that Seymour: An Introduction is the end of the line. It is inconceivable that the writer of Hapworth has been piling up unpublished masterpieces in the woods of New Hampshire.