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Summary: -
Review: Carpenters is beautiful. For anyone with a brother that you've had to answer for or walks a different line than your own, you'll feel this one.
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Summary: Seymour an Introduction
Review: I think Seymour an Introduction has been misunderstood by many readers because they approach it as a short story. Buddy Glass, Seymour's brother and narrator of this Introduction has this to say: "I'm anything but a short-story writer where my brother is concerned. What I am, I think, is a thesaurus of undetached prefatory remarks about him." Salinger is writing outside literary convention and I don't feel literary criticism as we know it is appropriate here, of course fire away if you must. I don't know it kind of strikes me as a personal note to his readers from J D Salinger.
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Summary: the 2010 of J.D. Salinger
Review: I've never met anyone who feels the way I do about this book (well I've only met two people who have even read it), but I wasn't as entranced by it as I was hoping to be. It was too explicative. Although I certainly didn't hate this book and think it was meritless, it is down there with "Zooey" as my least favorite Salinger stories.
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Summary: Seymour shouldn't have been touched after "Perfect day...."
Review: The character of Seymour Glass shouldn't have been touched by Salinger after "Perfect day for a Bananafish" We didn't need to know all this extraneous stuff about Seymour. When I read "Perfect Day for a Bananafish" I just imagined Seymour as an older Holden... these two "stories" (if they can be called that!) demonstrate the descent that Salinger had after Catcher in the Rye. Since he hasn't been published since 1965 (and 1959 before that), I'm hoping Salinger sometime during that period pulled it together and wrote another cohesive novel like Catcher in the Rye that will be published posthumously. But these later writings by Salinger do not suggest that will happen. People have said that Holden rambles- wait until you read "Seymour" or "Hapsworth"! Even the title of this book (two short story titles that are joined by an "and" suggest that this is going to be uncohesive) Salinger is (was? I mean we haven't heard from him in 35 years!) a great writer and Catcher is definitely one of my favorite books but this book I'm reviewing and the other entitled Franny and Zooey are just not that good.
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Summary: A gem -- small but beautiful
Review: Raise High the Roofbeam is my favorite book, one of the few I read over and over. The characters are drawn with typical laser focus by Salinger, and I become completely absorbed in this story of Buddy -- who attends his brother's wedding, which his brother skips -- and then gets stuck in the car with some of the bride's relatives. The little deaf uncle might be my favorite character in literature.I've never been able to get through Seymour, the second novella in this book.
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Summary: An insight into the character of Buddy
Review: Although Seymour is the main theme in this set of stories, he is not the central character. Rather these two stories show the development of Seymour's brother Buddy. The first of the two offers a thrid-person narration of Buddy as a young man still in the army. The other is an insight into the mind of a middle-aged Buddy dealing with his love for his brother. Recommend for all Salinger fans.
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Summary: Fabulous
Review: Just what it is about Salinger I don't know, but I was captivated from the first time I read Franny and Zooey. Maybe it's the down to earthness of the dialogue, the kookiness of the characters. Maybe it's the way he says things worth saying without being too lofty or literary, or maybe it's the way that you feel part of his world, get into the heads of the characters. Whatever it is it's good, and too complicated to define easily, which makes it better. Buy this book and all the books. The Glass family can be your friends too.
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Summary: Half Beauty, Half Trite junk
Review: The first story Raise High the Roofbeams, Carpenters, has our hero trying to make excuses for his brother Seymour (who would later kill himself in Perfect Day for Bananafish) to the family of the bride that he just stood up. Seymour is a very haunting and intriguing individual, both wise and foolish at once. You just wonder about the rest of your friends who seem intelligent in many ways and complete idiots in other ways. Through hints and small things, you have a picture of a deeply disturbed man that his brother can barely grasp. The second story is horrible. it wants to be about Seymour but its about that damn brother more than anything. "I just got sick so I couldn't write...", "I'm sitting in my room thinking about Seymour" and the portrayal we get of Seymour is superficial. Maybe that's the point, in that no one really knows anyone else. (although the hint that Seymour is the basis for Holden Caulfield is extremely intriguing) but how much do we have to hear about chic trends like Buddhism and ethnicity (our grandfather was Jewish, it says in a Zen Koan, etc.)that just aren't so cool anymore (he even takes potshots at Kerouac and folks, maybe because they were having fun with Zen.) So the breakdown is five stars for the first story, 2 stars for the second story. If this is the story that sent Salinger into retirement because the critics were hurting his feelings, good riddance.
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Summary: Sublime and beautiful
Review: Both stories are incredible, in different ways. "Raise High..." is a beautiful glimpse into both Buddy and Seymour (the diary entry about his scars was incredible). And "Seymour"...wow. It is so original, funny, but poignant at the same time ("John Keats, please put you scarf on"). I don't dare compare these to any of his other works because I wouldn't discourage anyone form reading other Salinger works. They are all wonderful. He is by far the best writer of our time.
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Summary: Dear Old Tyger That Sleeps
Review: "Raise High the Roofbeam Carpenters" is a perfect delight. "Seymour, An Introduction" gives me the spins it's so good. Every time I read it, i find myself walking around, spinning around, not able to keep still.
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