Description:

Salinger J. D.

J.D. Salinger ALS: "I'm the bearer of two shady-sounding messages, not to mention the fact that it would be fine to see you --"

 

2p ALS inscribed and signed by American author J.D. Salinger as "Jerry Salinger" at the bottom of the second page. Composed on bifold stationery from the Sherry-Netherland hotel in the Upper East side of Manhattan on "Sunday, Nov. 6" [1966. Accompanied by two Sherry-Netherland envelopes, the larger one addressed to "Miss Joyce Miller, c/o The New Yorker, 25 West 43rd Street, New York, N.Y. 10036". Postmarked November 7, 1966 and bearing a 5 cent George Washington stamp. The letter, with its oblong pages measuring 5.25" x 3.25, is in near fine condition, while the letter-opened envelopes are a little weathered.

 

"Sunday Nov. 6

 

Dear old Jerce --

 

If this reaches you by the latest Thursday morning (if at all!), would you phone or leave word for me here? I'm  the bearer of two shady-sounding messages, not to mention the fact that it would be fine to see you -- I missed you by inches, once, at the magazine, when you were visiting friends.

 

Many greetings, Joyce.

 

Jerry Salinger."

 

Devotees of The Catcher and the Rye will recognize the voice of its protagonist Holden Caulfield in Salinger's note. A snarky teenager, Caulfield was just as morbidly self-aware as his creator, Salinger. One wonders about the content of Salinger's "shady-sounding messages." Were the messages really shady, or was this just a lure?

 

Joyce Miller was a staff writer at The New Yorker, where Salinger had published most of his short stories since 1942. It's likely that Salinger met Miller through his ties to the magazine.  Although most believe that their relationship was never romantic, Salinger's biographer Kenneth Slawenski speculates that Salinger may have been interested. Salinger, a serial monogamist of considerably younger women, had separated from his second wife Claire Douglas in September 1966; their divorce was not finalized until almost a year later.

 

American writer J.D. Salinger reached cult status after the publication of his 1951 novel The Catcher in the Rye, which captured the jaded zeitgeist of a postwar adolescent generation. Salinger profiled members of the zany Glass Family in a string of short stories and novels including Franny and Zooey (1961).

 

Salinger moved to Cornish, New Hampshire in 1953. During this trip to New York City, however, his home was the Sherry-Netherland, a Neo-Gothic style 38-storey apartment/hotel building built in 1926.

 

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