J. D. Salinger_ A Life - Kenneth Slawenski [156]
Conceding the new reality, Salinger tried his best to work with White, an effort that would prove futile. White first approached Salinger shortly after Lobrano’s death with a letter of condolence plainly aimed at solidifying her position with the magazine’s premier contributors. Salinger responded on March 29 with an expansive reply. He admitted having a difficult time accepting Lobrano’s passing but told White that her support had made things easier for him and he was grateful. “To leave much unsaid,” he abruptly injected, “I do have a story going, and I expect to submit it very soon.”11
Just as Salinger was settling into his routine at Cornish and trying to keep abreast of events at The New Yorker, he received word that Cosmopolitan had chosen to republish his story “The Inverted Forest” in its Diamond Jubilee issue. Although he was without legal recourse, Salinger objected to the reprint and pleaded with the magazine to reconsider, but to no avail. The possession of Salinger’s first novella was simply too much of a temptation for Cosmopolitan’s editors, who were anxious to capitalize on the author’s recent fame.* Accompanying the story, they inserted a short profile of the author (Salinger naturally refused to supply even the most evasive autobiographical note) and reminded readers that they possessed two Salinger works, “The Inverted Forest” and “Blue Melody,” both written before the publication of The Catcher in the Rye. Salinger was incensed that, aside from this minor disclaimer concealed at the bottom of the story’s opening page, Cosmopolitan allowed the illusion that “The Inverted Forest” was a new work.
This was the first instance in which Salinger sought to prohibit the republication of his earlier, pre–New Yorker stories. Previously, he had allowed them to be rereleased without complaint. He had even put aside personal animosity and agreed to Whit Burnett’s use of “The Long Debut of Lois Taggett” six years before. However, Salinger had been embarrassed by “The Inverted Forest” when it had first appeared in 1947 and had not warmed to it since. Now engrossed in crafting the Glass family series, the last thing he wanted was the reappearance of older works that might confuse readers by colliding with the structure and messages of his new project.
As justified as Salinger may have been in protesting the republication of “The Inverted Forest,” the incident foreshadowed a tendency that would soon become a fixation. It signified his growing reluctance to allow his less polished stories to be scrutinized by the reading public. As early as 1940, he had expressed his discomfort with rewitnessing the imperfections of past attempts. “When I’m finished with a piece,” he had said, “I’m embarrassed to look at it again, as though I were afraid I hadn’t wiped its nose clean.”12 In truth, Salinger often missed the simplicity of his earlier stories.13 Yet, with each installment of the Glass family series, he felt compelled to strive for a greater measure of perfection. Beginning in 1956, with the popularity of Nine Stories and the advent of the Glass family promising a body of future works, Salinger increasingly began to call his uncollected stories, with all their glaring imperfections, back from the gaze of readers and into obscurity.
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No story reveals Salinger’s quest for perfection better than the novella “Zooey.” Salinger worked on the piece for a year and a half, agonizing over each word and punctuation mark. The construction of “Zooey” is in itself a saga that involved the politics of The New Yorker and influenced Salinger’s personal life immeasurably. Its reception at the magazine’s editorial offices, under the new regime of Katharine White, nearly ended his association with it. And the single-minded devotion with which he wrote