salinger in the bay

As soon as we heard the news we knew what today's post would be.

So J.D. Salinger is no longer with us. What to add to the torrent of words being processed about Jerome David Salinger?

We love the name of his town in New Hampshire: Cornish. Most people are reporting that. The consensus seems to be Franny & Zooey was naff. These people don't understand - they don't have a grasp of the big things.

A random par (from the L.A. Times) plucked from the oodles of obits: "His silence provoked a range of reactions from literary critics, some characterizing it as a form of cowardice and others as a cunning strategy that, despite its outward intentions, helped preserve his mythical status in American culture. Still others interpreted his withdrawal as the deliberate spiritual stance of a man immersed in Eastern religions, particularly Zen Buddhism and Hindu Vedantic philosophy."

Some people are as dumb as a sack of hammers.

Through the Glasses darkly.

Rick Moody is warmer: "It's an even more perfect silence now that he is gone, one that is unvarying, but one that is consistent nonetheless with the complete output of this singular American genius."

The Rottnest link? Of course, we thought back to Dave Franklin's novel Manic Streets of Perth, where Kim lies in bed remembering the trip from Freo to Rottnest on the yacht of her former fiance's dad.

The yacht was called Salinger.