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Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters and Seymour: An Introduction
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Manufacturer: Back Bay Books
Author: J.D. Salinger
Publisher: Back Bay Books
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Our Price: $10.35
You Save: $ 3.64 ( 26% )
Usually ships in 24 hours
Manufacturer: Back Bay Books
Author: J.D. Salinger
Publisher: Back Bay Books
Average Customer Rating:
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Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters and Seymour: An Introduction Description
Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.54
EAN: 9780316766944
ISBN: 0316766941
Label: Back Bay Books
Manufacturer: Back Bay Books
Number Of Items: 1
Book Pages: 256
Publication Date: 2001-01-30
Publisher: Back Bay Books
Studio: Back Bay Books
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.54
EAN: 9780316766944
ISBN: 0316766941
Label: Back Bay Books
Manufacturer: Back Bay Books
Number Of Items: 1
Book Pages: 256
Publication Date: 2001-01-30
Publisher: Back Bay Books
Studio: Back Bay Books
Editorial Review of Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters and Seymour: An Introduction
Customer Reviews of Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters and Seymour: An Introduction
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Advanced Readings in Salinger.
Review: 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
G. Merritt
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Roof Beams A Little Gem: Seymour 'the End of Salinger'
Review: 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.
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Hidden treat!
Review: Although J.D. Salinger is best known for "The Catcher in the Rye" and "Franny and Zooey" (and "Nine Stories"), many forget about his other book. This book is two short works put together. The first half, "Raise High the Roofbeam, Carpenters" takes place over the course of an afternoon. It tells of a bridal party, broken up after the groom fails to arrive. It is another story of the Glass family (the family in "Franny and Zooey") and is told from Buddy's (second oldest brother)point of view. It is extremely funny, hilarious at some parts, especially in a scene in which the bridal party gets stuck in a traffic jam due to a marching band. Salinger's writing is very articulate in observing human body language and mannerisms. The characters truly come to life. The second half of the book is an essay about Seymour Glass (the groom who never arrived at the wedding). It's pretty apparent that J.D. Salinger is writing about his real life in this essay. It's told in a stream of consciousness style that may seem off-putting, but if you stay with it, you'll realize the subtle humour and moving quality of the writing, especially in the childhood flashbacks. I like the first half the best, but both are well worth the read!
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Salinger's Best
Review: I did not think anyone could beat Catcher in the Rye in its quirky yet real humor. But I was wrong. Salinger's Raise High is even better. The characters are so well sketched out that you feel like you are sitting with them and the madness of Catcher lingers in them. A MUST buy for Salinger lovers.
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Crease By Crease
Review: J.D. Salinger's last published work is more than 43 years old now, and still stirs many in the same absent way Seymour Glass animates his brother Buddy in this pair of stories first published in 1963. Are both cases of delusional devotion?
In the first story, "Raise High The Roof Beam, Carpenters," originally published in The New Yorker in 1955, we get what amounts to Salinger's first deep-dish treatment of the Glass family saga ("Zooey" saw print later, and previous stories featuring the Glasses were far less insular) as Buddy shows up for Seymour's wedding, only to find Seymour stood up his bride. In the second piece, 1959's "Seymour: An Introduction," Buddy foregoes any semblance of plot to explain who Seymour was.
Like a lot of other people, I am put off by the convoluted nature of "Seymour," as well as the explanations of those who defend it. Actually, there could be something to the idea of writing a plotless story, using characters like the Glasses people know from other works, but this is assuredly not it. Salinger too obviously indulges himself, spouting contempt at his generation and his critics, throwing up lame jokes and referencing obscure Japanese poets as a smokescreen to conceal his literary, intellectual, and metaphysical nakedness.
"What a marvelous convenience it would be if writers could let themselves describe their characters' clothes, article by article, crease by crease," Salinger writes in the role of Buddy, pretty much summing up the approach of "Seymour" as well as its underlying failure. His interest in his subject is not only all-consuming, it is not all that deep.
"Raise High" is a better story, though that's not saying much. "Franny And Zooey," the previously published Salinger book, also combined a better story with a weaker one, but there at least you got one terrific story in "Franny," a bold, empathetic tale of power and focus. "Raise High" doesn't know where it's going, and is in no hurry to get there. You get nice asides, like when Buddy sees an old chair and remembers a beloved bulldog, long dead, who slept there and left his chewmarks. There's also some arresting ambiguity, as when Buddy reads Seymour's journal and we get maybe a suggestion of unease at some apparent insanity.
But "Roof Beam" doesn't end so much as fizzle away, with Buddy snoozing in an empty apartment after the mystery of Seymour's absence has been resolved via an unseen phone call. Emptyness is a recurrent theme in Salinger's Glass writings, here as in "Franny & Zooey," where various Glasses are often seen in isolation thinking or writing about absent kin. For such a happy family, there's an overwhelming sadness about the Glasses that suggests Salinger found himself in a bit of a dead end with them, one from which he never emerged. Further evidence of this can be found in the web-available "Hapsworth 16, 1924," Salinger's last public blast, published in The New Yorker in 1965.
Salinger was one of the most important American writers of our lifetime, not to mention a seminal figure of our culture, but his greatness lies elsewhere, not here. Read this only if you are a Salinger completist, or else interested in the price genius can extract from its recipients.
Review Summary: Advanced Readings in Salinger.
Review: 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
G. Merritt
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Roof Beams A Little Gem: Seymour 'the End of Salinger'
Review: 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.
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Hidden treat!
Review: Although J.D. Salinger is best known for "The Catcher in the Rye" and "Franny and Zooey" (and "Nine Stories"), many forget about his other book. This book is two short works put together. The first half, "Raise High the Roofbeam, Carpenters" takes place over the course of an afternoon. It tells of a bridal party, broken up after the groom fails to arrive. It is another story of the Glass family (the family in "Franny and Zooey") and is told from Buddy's (second oldest brother)point of view. It is extremely funny, hilarious at some parts, especially in a scene in which the bridal party gets stuck in a traffic jam due to a marching band. Salinger's writing is very articulate in observing human body language and mannerisms. The characters truly come to life. The second half of the book is an essay about Seymour Glass (the groom who never arrived at the wedding). It's pretty apparent that J.D. Salinger is writing about his real life in this essay. It's told in a stream of consciousness style that may seem off-putting, but if you stay with it, you'll realize the subtle humour and moving quality of the writing, especially in the childhood flashbacks. I like the first half the best, but both are well worth the read!
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Salinger's Best
Review: I did not think anyone could beat Catcher in the Rye in its quirky yet real humor. But I was wrong. Salinger's Raise High is even better. The characters are so well sketched out that you feel like you are sitting with them and the madness of Catcher lingers in them. A MUST buy for Salinger lovers.
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Crease By Crease
Review: J.D. Salinger's last published work is more than 43 years old now, and still stirs many in the same absent way Seymour Glass animates his brother Buddy in this pair of stories first published in 1963. Are both cases of delusional devotion?
In the first story, "Raise High The Roof Beam, Carpenters," originally published in The New Yorker in 1955, we get what amounts to Salinger's first deep-dish treatment of the Glass family saga ("Zooey" saw print later, and previous stories featuring the Glasses were far less insular) as Buddy shows up for Seymour's wedding, only to find Seymour stood up his bride. In the second piece, 1959's "Seymour: An Introduction," Buddy foregoes any semblance of plot to explain who Seymour was.
Like a lot of other people, I am put off by the convoluted nature of "Seymour," as well as the explanations of those who defend it. Actually, there could be something to the idea of writing a plotless story, using characters like the Glasses people know from other works, but this is assuredly not it. Salinger too obviously indulges himself, spouting contempt at his generation and his critics, throwing up lame jokes and referencing obscure Japanese poets as a smokescreen to conceal his literary, intellectual, and metaphysical nakedness.
"What a marvelous convenience it would be if writers could let themselves describe their characters' clothes, article by article, crease by crease," Salinger writes in the role of Buddy, pretty much summing up the approach of "Seymour" as well as its underlying failure. His interest in his subject is not only all-consuming, it is not all that deep.
"Raise High" is a better story, though that's not saying much. "Franny And Zooey," the previously published Salinger book, also combined a better story with a weaker one, but there at least you got one terrific story in "Franny," a bold, empathetic tale of power and focus. "Raise High" doesn't know where it's going, and is in no hurry to get there. You get nice asides, like when Buddy sees an old chair and remembers a beloved bulldog, long dead, who slept there and left his chewmarks. There's also some arresting ambiguity, as when Buddy reads Seymour's journal and we get maybe a suggestion of unease at some apparent insanity.
But "Roof Beam" doesn't end so much as fizzle away, with Buddy snoozing in an empty apartment after the mystery of Seymour's absence has been resolved via an unseen phone call. Emptyness is a recurrent theme in Salinger's Glass writings, here as in "Franny & Zooey," where various Glasses are often seen in isolation thinking or writing about absent kin. For such a happy family, there's an overwhelming sadness about the Glasses that suggests Salinger found himself in a bit of a dead end with them, one from which he never emerged. Further evidence of this can be found in the web-available "Hapsworth 16, 1924," Salinger's last public blast, published in The New Yorker in 1965.
Salinger was one of the most important American writers of our lifetime, not to mention a seminal figure of our culture, but his greatness lies elsewhere, not here. Read this only if you are a Salinger completist, or else interested in the price genius can extract from its recipients.