'Blue Melody', originally titled 'Needle on a Scratchy Phonograph Record' is a story of Jazz and segregation. It follows a promising Jazz singer as her career climbs, only to have it end when her appendicitis bursts and no hospital will treat her. 22 Stories is a must read for any J.D. The book has stories that were originally published in magazines. I believe Salinger never wanted all of these stories collected. However, an enterprising young publisher located all of the stories. and published them despite the blatant copyright infringement. The text is extremely small. Originally to be titled Scratchy Needle on a Phonograph Record. A Jazz story fitted into World War II by way of a flashback. It mentions the Varioni Brothers in passing. Lida Louise passed over it. She was looking at Peggy. “You and him sweeties?” she asked her. Salinger, January 1, 1919 – January 27, 2010. A Long-Forgotten J.D. Salinger Short Story Deserves a Fresh Look 'Blue Melody' addressed how the U.S. Failed to live up to the values it fought for in World War II.

In De Daumier-Smith’s Blue Period by J.D. Salinger we have the theme of loneliness, isolation, identity, misrepresentation, reinvention, connection and escape. Taken from his Nine Stories collection the story is narrated in the first person by a young man called Jean De Daumier-Smith, or at least that is the name that the narrator calls himself by. The fact that the reader never knows Jean’s real name may be significant as it suggests the idea of not only escape (from who Jean really is) but it also serves to highlight the possible idea of misrepresentation or reinvention. Jean appears to be uncomfortable with who he is and by changing his name it is possible that Salinger is allowing Jean to reinvent himself. The trigger for Jean wishing to reinvent himself appears to stem from the loneliness and isolation that he feels (possibly due to his mother’s death). By reinventing himself, Jean is able to escape from the painful realities (as he sees them) of the world around him. Jean is not the only person who reinvents himself in the story. His step-father, Bobby, also changed the course of his life after the crash of the stock markets in 1929, leaving behind his job as a ’dead stockbroker and incapacitated bon vivant’, to become a ‘unqualified agent-appraiser for a society of independent art galleries and fine arts museums.’

Salinger further explores the theme of escape. While travelling to Paris in 1930, the reader discovers that Jean spent some of his time, looking into the ‘stateroom mirror to note my (Jean’s) uncanny physical resemblance to El Greco.’ This line may be significant as not only does it highlight the idea of escape but it also suggestive of Jean wishing to reinvent himself as somebody else. Further incidents in the story which suggest the idea or theme of escape include Jean’s assertion in his letter to Monsieur Yoshoto at Les Amis Des Vieux Maîtres that he is a great-nephew of Honoré Daumier (painter). It may also be significant that when Jean is writing to Monsieur Yoshoto he also claims that he is ten years older than he actually is (misrepresenting himself). Not only does Jean claim to be a great-nephew of Daumier and to be twenty-nine but he also implies that he is a friend (oldest and dearest) of Pablo Picasso (not only misrepresenting himself but reinventing his past). The fact that Jean states that it was his wife who died (in his letter to Yoshoto) and not his mother may also be significant as not only does it serve to highlight Jean’s continued misrepresentation of himself but it also suggests that there is a deeper (at least for Jean) connection between Jean and his mother. Some critics have suggested that by claiming that his wife had died, rather than his mother, Salinger is exploring the Oedipus complex.

There are also several occasions in the story in whereby Salinger is making reference to the isolation that Jean feels. The game of musical chairs that Jean plays suggests that he is isolated from society (again possibly because he is yet to come to terms with his mother’s death). Also the Yoshotos speak Japanese to each other when they are communicating, which in turn the reader suspects leaves Jean isolated from the conversation. Salinger may also be using the symbolism of the orthopaedic appliance store to further emphasis Jean’s sense of isolation. On his first encounter of the store Salinger tells the reader that Jean feels as though he will ‘always at best be a visitor in a garden of enamel urinals and bedpans.’ This line is significant as it suggests that Jean is disconnected from the world around him or at least he feels disconnected (if not isolated) from the world around him.

Jean’s epiphany at the end of the story may also be significant. Having previously felt the need to correspond further with Sister Irma and go to the convent to visit her he changes his mind after seeing the young woman fall in the orthopaedic appliance store. It is through this incident that Jean realises that he must let Sister Irma go. Salinger telling the reader that Jean was ‘giving Sister Irma her freedom to follow her own destiny. Everybody is a nun.’ This line is significant as for the first time in the story Jean appears to realise that not only Sister Irma but everybody has the right to follow their own path (without his direction). The fact that Jean, while writing his letters to his students (reinstating them) sits down on a chair in his room for the first time may also be significant. Previously Salinger appeared to be using chairs to symbolise Jean’s isolation from people (and the world) now it would seem that Salinger is using the chair in Jean’s room to symbolise Jean’s reconnecting with the world. No longer does the reader sense that Jean will isolate himself anymore from the world around him, something that is made clearer to the reader by Jean’s re-enrolment in college and his continued correspondence with Bambi Kramer.

Blue Melody J D Salinger Movie

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A.E. Hotchner talks about J.D. Salinger’s last short story in Cosmopolitan magazine. 3 (First Appearance of “Blue Melody” by J. D. Salinger) by ed.) Gordon, Arthur; Salinger, J. D. and a great selection of related books, art and collectibles available. 3 (First Appearance of “Blue Melody” by J. D. Salinger) by ed.) Gordon, Arthur; Salinger, J. D. and a great selection of similar Used, New and Collectible Books.

Please,” Peggy implored, slipping into the jacket her husband was crowding around her shoulders. You Might Also Like Left.

SALINGER BESSIE SMITH FULL TEXT BLUE MELODY

Favourite statesmen were elaborately discussed. It was a swell place to go, in short. His world, in any case. The car finally reached Samaritan Hospital, about a mile and a half away. Finished with “Nobody Good Around. The highest, narrowest, weakest beam in the house was theirs to straddle without annoying interference.

Around nine o’clock, when the place was packed, Black Charles suddenly stood up from his piano and raised a hand.

She had her finger on the little island of nerves set off by the dorsal fork of Charles’s lavender suspenders. Rudford told me a story; he didn’t give me his autobiography. Black Charles stirred slightly, but slept on without even seriously changing his position. Rudford and Miss Mar-gar-reet. For over two years he had been going there me,ody two or three afternoons a week; never at night, for the very good reason that he wasn’t allowed out at night.

Less than an hour after his wife died giving birth to Rudford, he got on a trolley going to the outskirts of Agsberg and bought out a rocky, but reputable, publishing house. Here we go into jazz history just a little bit.

Salinger’s Last Story in Cosmopolitan, “Blue Melody”

An hour later she was packed and ready to go. Right where your hand” “I don’t see a thing.

But as long as Agersburg could hold her, she was adored, deified, by the young people there. The Guest discomfort was over. Rudford and Peggy also climbed in the front. Lida Louise nodded and sat down at the piano herself.

She sang it through once and, so far as Rudford or I know, never again. Salinger isn’t a writer of scenery, he’s a writer of characters who strive for sincerity. Rudford lay on his back in the grass and watched great cotton clouds slip through the sky.

Rudford jumped out of the car without opening the door, and rushed into the hospital. Peggy immediately reported to him, “You said for us not to come today, but Rudford wanted to.

Blue Melody J D Salinger Quotes

Salinger’s Last Story in Cosmopolitan, “Blue Melody”

To be brief, at the age of eleven Rudford knew just about as much, academically, as the average high-school freshman. The attendant looked in at Lida Louise, pale and in agony, lying across the front seat with her head on Black Charles’s head. Unbeknownst to Hotchner, others had made a single edit. Rudford never returned to Agersburg. Also a piano player. He got to his feet, a gentle giant of a man, towing a hook-and-ladder gin hang-over. Get your thumb out of–” “Oh, be quiet,” said Peggy, and let go with a haymaker.

He said it was about an hour’s drive from Memphis. On the afternoon of her return she wrote a note to Rudford and Peggy.

Blue Melody J D Salinger Book

JD Salinger | Salinger’s Last Story in Cosmopolitan, “Blue Melody” | American Masters | PBS

Gimme a green one. Now years later Rudford was making a great point of explaining to me that Lida Louise’s voice cannot be described, until I told him I happened to have most of her records and knew what he meant.

He told me next about a day in November. Without embarrassment, Peggy gave him a warm, if glancing kiss.