Do you think I'm exaggerating? Just read the book. Salinger is not only dictating how he thinks the reader should hear the characters' voices, but he makes them sound like duffers in the process, because nobody really adds that much emphasis so con sistently. First, Salinger way overdoes the i talics! Man, oh man! They just get in the way and become so annoying, It got to the point I couldn't stand the sight of them.

There were hurdles to get over on the way to finding out. She's attempting to resolve her crisis by reciting the Jesus Prayer (Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me), which she's read about in a book entitled 'The Way of a Pilgrim.' But her mental turmoil continues, and I found myself looking forward to whatever pearls of wisdom her 25-year-old brother might drop to help her out (and us, by extension). I'm sick of myself and everybody that wants to make some kind of a splash.' I'm sick of not having the courage to be an absolute nobody. Just because I'm so horribly conditioned to accept everybody else's values, and just because I like applause and people to rave about me doesn't make it right. Everyone wants to get somewhere, distinguish themselves and be interesting. Couldn't get more basic, but the interesting nature of the dialogue kept me reading on.įranny is a 20-year-old college student with an issue that's easy to understand. Finally, he gets out, dries himself off and talks to Franny, where she lies on a couch in the living room. Such a lot of the book takes place from behind the bath curtain, I'd recommend this as a tub read. In the next scene, Zooey is having a bath when his mother Bessie bursts in, and tries to convince him to have a word with his troubled sister. Franny is at a restaurant with her boyfriend, Lane, trying to explain her disillusionment with their ego-driven society, which he doesn't understand. Franny and Zooey is set around New York, which I'd love to visit just once.

I chose this book for my 2017 Back to the Classics challenge, for the category of a classic set in a place you'd like to visit. As his younger sister, Franny, suffers a spiritual and existential breakdown in her parents' Manhattan living room - leaving Bessie, her mother, deeply concerned - Zooey comes to her aid, offering what he thinks is brotherly love, understanding, and words of sage advice. The novella, Zooey, is named for Zooey Glass, the second-youngest member of the Glass family. The short story, Franny, takes place in an unnamed college town and tells the tale of an undergraduate who is becoming disenchanted with the selfishness and inauthenticity she perceives all around her.

Franny and zooey review