Nancy’s Reviews > Nine Stories > Status Update

" The Laughing Man" (New Yorker 19.03.1949) ...such wonderful sense of humor with Salinger's strongest point: ...showing the reader and not telling him! Can you imagine what the NY’er editor was thinking back in 1941:
“…he started submitting short stories to the magazine.
The magazine initially rejected seven of his submissions that year.
But JD…never have up!

"Just Before the War with the Eskimos" (2/9) Well, there is depth in the story that I did not realise. Shock/twist ending, hùh?? Still trying to digest it. The dialogue with its trite retorts "Now you know", "Goddam if I know", "Nobody YOU know", "Big deal"...vernacular dialogue makes for easy reading. But the best is Salinger's descriptions of gestures of the characters when proper etiquette silences words.

2/9 "Uncle Wiggliy in Connecticut" - (New Yorker 20.03.1948). Could not shake the John Updike vibe in the story: sophisticated characters, Protestant WASP realism, boredom, Excess alcohol..."highballs" fueled nostalgia and escapism Title: Uncle Wiggily Longears, a gentle anthropomorphic rabbit from early 20th-century symbolizing wholesome family values....which are clearly missing in the Wengler family!

"A Perfect Day for Bananafish" - This story will linger for its subtle building of tension that leads to a shock ending! Slowly Salinger lulls the reader into a simple story: young couple vacationing in Florida after the husband returns from WW II. First published inThe New Yorker 31.01.1948 started J.D. Salinger's climb to success.