Franny and Zooey - J.D Salinger

Unlike filmmakers, writers often cannot reproduce the brilliance they exhibit in their masterpieces that give them a demigod-like stature in the literary world. A perfect case in point would be J.D Salinger, who went though an unenviable phase after his most famous creation became a worldwide phenomenon. After a book as revolutionary as Catcher in the rye , he probably tried too hard with his novella Franny and Zooey , but failed on most accounts – there is no real plot (which is okay if a book is more preachy, which is what Franny and Zooey only strives to be), neither are there profound messages or revelations for the reader to ruminate over. But all’s not lost. There are pleasant reminders for those of us who believe we have come too far too soon, to see the glass half full no matter how out of place we feel with the people around us.

In the first part of the book titled Franny , the reader gets introduced to a young girl by the name of, you guessed it, Franny, who is going through a bit of spiritual crisis. Showing signs of a possible admission into a mental asylum in the near future, ostensibly whacked out Franny tries to explain things to her clueless and self-absorbed boyfriend Lane that are far beyond his intellect. Not to say that she is very coherent herself – she is just ranting about how “sick she is of pedants and conceited little tearer-downs, ” getting all judgmental about the fake poets, professors and the pretentious idiots all around her. Clutching a small book called the The way of a pilgrim like a child would a new toy, Franny has sought refuge in a prayer called the Jesus Prayer which she recites to attain spiritual exaltation, and freedom from the triteness of the world around her. Except for long philosophical balderdash on ego, fakeness, and religion coming from a disturbed soul who is spiritually anguished and is looking for the pacifying enlightenment, there isn’t much in this rather succinct first half of the book.

In the second part, Zooey, Franny’s rather blasé brother and an actor par excellence , is having a conversation with his silly but concerned mother, Bessie, about Franny’s breakdown. Upon insistence from his clueless mother, Zooey explains the significance about the book which Bessie attributes as the reason to Franny’s breakdown.

In a nutshell - The way of the pilgrim essentially talks about a Russian pilgrim’s message to “pray without ceasing” the Jesus Prayer in order to attain enlightenment (which happens when the prayer becomes one with the heartbeat and the being). The rather simple and mundane Bessie doesn’t make much of it, and insists on calling the doctor to fix the loony daughter. However, the magnanimous Zooey takes it upon himself to do the needful.

In the course of the second part, Salinger divulges more details about the family – seven siblings (of which Franny and Zooey are the youngest), all precocious children who hosted a show called “it’s a wise child” in their younger heydays. Brought up with a very ecumenical perspective on religion and existence, Franny and Zooey are way ahead of their peers – a result of rather philosophical upbringing by their eldest siblings and religious mentors, Buddy and (now deceased) Seymour. Both have a cynical (and condescending) view of the world around them, which they consider to be decadent and spiritually corrupt. And perhaps it is this premature recognition at such a tender age that has Franny peeping over the edge of sanity.

Eventually, Zooey and Franny have a long and candid brother-sister talk – mainly Zooey explaining how it’s them who have the superior airs about themselves (“we don’t speak, we expound”), considering everyone around themselves as inferior (“I sit in judgment on every poor, ulcerous bastard” ) and how they are “egotistical” and “self-centred”. He emphasizes that she cannot mutter the Jesus Prayer without letting go of her own erroneous perceptions about the world around her (much like him).

Failing to make her see things clearly in the beginning, he calls up Franny disguising himself as righteous Buddy (an act she sees thru immediately) and finally gets through to her to let go of all prejudices, and embrace life, urging her to do it for the “fat lady” (the connotation of which can only be delivered upon familiarizing oneself with the book). Seeing the light after a long dark night, our beautiful Franny is finally good again (or so it seems)

Salinger has become the messiah of bourgeois of sorts. His works elevate the anomaly among the routine – the idiosyncratic, eccentric prodigies, amidst the crowds who are bestowed with the gift of genius (and even looks for that matter), but ultimately become victims of their own developments. Almost all the characters concocted by him – Franny, Zooey, Holden Caulfield – exhibit a certain outlaw-ish, anomalous deviance. (Here, it is interesting to note that even surname “glass” alludes to the ability of the Glasses to see more lucidly the elusive details of the human character or it could be a mere indicator of their ability to reflect on philosophies and ideologies). As John Updike states, “But with the possible exception of the older daughter, Boo Boo, who grew up to become a suburban wife and mother, none of the Glass children is able to live comfortably in the world. They are out of place. They might as well be large insects. The critics' aversion points us toward their underlying freakishness, and toward Salinger's own literary deviance and irony. ”

Perhaps wise freaks would be the apt description.

His characters may be larger than life, despite being starkly real (the language they speak is almost crude and colloquial), but they do make one think of the very conflicts that inevitably most of us go through – the disconnect with the world and our own spiritual side, the constant encounters with the conceited, the fake and the mundane, the pursuit of enlightenment and our own paradoxes. All the same, Salinger also expects us to revere his characters for their charismatic ingenuity, which can be a tad too much to expect. It’s almost as if he expects his reader to revere his subjects without question or reason – they are almost perfect in some inexplicable ways.

“Zooey had this somewhat preposterous ability to quote, instantaneously and, usually verbatim, almost anything he had ever read, or even listened to… ”

“Her skin was lovely, and her features were delicate and most distinctive… ”

Yes they are deep, yes they are different, yes they are almost prophetic, but they are not gods, or for that matter even angels. Some even struggle to be human. Yet, Salinger adores them so much that he built the story around characters, than around plots, usually spanning days or hours, instead of eons that most contemporary authors stretch their tales over (which is actually endearing to me as a reader for some reason). The stories are dominated by long speeches by one or more central characters as if they are entrusted with the job of a messenger.

Salinger does many of these beautifully, but he somehow doesn’t deliver as is bound to be expected from him. In the literary world exist two camps, one complete Salinger-obsessed, and the other almost as obsessively anti-Salinger. I, however, belong to none. I do admit that this is not the best book I have read (or even close to it) but then no qualms about it – after all it is harder to live up to the expectations as a writer as one has only oneself to compete with. Salinger fails, but not without grace.