J. D. Salinger_ A Life - Kenneth Slawenski [92]
Salinger had better luck with The New Yorker. “Bananafish” was a success, and the magazine’s readers were intrigued by its elusive meaning and powerful ending. Suddenly anxious to retain Salinger’s talents after years of snubs, The New Yorker offered him the most coveted of contracts, one that kept him on retainer and paid him an annual salary for the privilege of being the first to review his works.* Called a “first reading agreement,” it essentially freed him from being forced to write for the slicks in order to support himself. From this point on, all of Salinger’s stories would be written solely for The New Yorker, and he was obliged to find publishers elsewhere only if rejected by it. In exchange Salinger was bound to his new editor, Gus Lobrano, who had selected him to receive the rare honor.
It can be argued that no other editor—Salinger’s future mentor William Shawn included—ever dealt with J. D. Salinger as deftly as Gus Lobrano. He had a gift for dealing with people, especially the sensitive, egoistic types employed by The New Yorker, who were largely a collection of touchy artists, all jealous of their positions at the magazine, which they viewed as a kind of literary Mount Olympus.
Lobrano had been a college roommate of E. B. White, whose wife, Katharine, was the magazine’s powerful fiction editor. The Whites had decided to move to Maine in 1938, and they had brought Gus Lobrano on board the magazine before they left, throwing him a selection of contributors whom Katharine was not quite comfortable handling, for the most part Jewish authors. During his apprenticeship, it was William Maxwell, himself hired by Katharine White years before, who had innocently showed him the ropes. Maxwell did not consider Lobrano a threat, confident that he himself would succeed White as head of the fiction department. Just as the Whites were preparing to leave, Maxwell’s uncle died suddenly, and when Maxwell returned from the funeral, he was shocked to discover Gus Lobrano installed in Katharine White’s office. Maxwell promptly quit the magazine, but Lobrano lured him back and the two eventually became close friends.14
The resolution was an amazing feat that displayed the crux of Lobrano’s brilliance. He had a gift for collecting around him a cadre of talent through an easy familiarity that was foreign to the sanctified halls of The New Yorker. From the day he took over from Katharine White, Gus Lobrano determined the direction of The New Yorker’s corporate culture—through the uniqueness of his personality, and always to his benefit. To advance this culture, as well as his personal following, Lobrano pioneered the idea of a “first reading agreement.” The idea transformed major contributors into employees, bound authors to him personally, and created a kind of New Yorker “family.” Just as the magazine’s founder, Harold Ross, had wooed talent by stroking their egos at cocktail parties, Gus Lobrano molded his own array of artists during lunches, fishing trips, and games of tennis by making each feel part of a select group of insiders.
Salinger too felt chosen. Still bruised over his “betrayal” by Whit Burnett, he embraced the comfort Lobrano offered and basked in the satisfaction of being accepted among the elite of The New Yorker. Salinger and Gus would always be close, but they never established the kind of relationship that Salinger achieved with Maxwell, who was more bookish, sensitive, and kinder than Lobrano, all attributes that Salinger cherished. Salinger may have