J. D. Salinger passed away last week, and now there is speculation about this unpublished works. In a famous Interview to the New York Times in 1974 Salinger said, “Publishing is a terrible invasion of my privacy. I like to write. I love to write. but I write just for myself and my own pleasure.”
Writers and editors alike are going crazy to find out if Salinger has anything in his vault. I can clear that up right now. Being a writer and knowing writers, I would put money on the fact that Salinger had written a lot more than he published. Who knows why, but if you can judge a writer on past performance (and you usually can) I would guess that at least some of those unpublished works are about the Glass family.
Every writer knows you tend to generate a lot of work that you don’t publish anyway. If you are writing you are usually throwing out a lot of work too. I don’t think they will destroy the work, and I don’t think he did either.
He hated fame, sure, but I’m going to guess we’ll at least some work from JD’s work coming soon, no matter what the publisher or agent says.
If they are out there, they should be published. We’re talking about one of the most important writers of the 20th century, and he only published 1 novel and a handful of short stories. His impact could be so much greater. I hope it will be.
Until we find out it is my geek side that is dying to find out what else is in that house, and how much he wrote.
