Published in 1998 and translated into French this year, "And to me, the world" is the autobiography of Joyce Maynard, American journalist and novelist whose credits include the novels "Ready to everything "and" Long Weekend ".
Born into a family formed by a sister who distinguished himself in several literary competitions, an intrusive mother who deprives her of her privacy and a father whose alcoholism remains a taboo subject, Joyce Maynard tries to find its place within the tribe for whom welfare is secondary to education and success.
student at Yale University, she is a young woman collapsed on itself which avoids mingling with his friends and cultivates several obsessions: to stay thin, give up her virginity and find success.
At 18, she wrote an article for The New York Times Magazine.
This evidence suggests that the disenchantment of a generation raised strong reactions and earned the young woman to receive hundreds of letters.
One of them, from a JD Salinger, marks the beginning of a long correspondence between the young student and writer confirmed. He speaks
editing, homeopathy, cinema of the 30s and her children who are so dear to him as she recalls her during her daily life and on campus.
sycophants and benevolent, the writer shows the most enthusiastic about his talent and does not hesitate to advise him to divert people might undermine his writing.
Fallen in love with the man before the work (it not discovered until later), despite an age difference of 35 years, the young Joyce sees in him the only person able to understand, just as it was he who lives in seclusion.
She does not hesitate to rapidly abandon his scholarship to live fully this new passion fusion in Cornish, the property of Salinger.
But over the days, the man appears more and more critical and authoritative for it, isolating it from publishers and his family and demanding to waive the trivial pursuits of his age to concentrate on the essentials : writing and meditation.
Subjected to a regime Drastic food and prey to many physical and psychological obstacles, the young woman proves anything to merit the attention of his "mentor" who sees fit to reject it without further explanation.
Although short, this destructive relationship continue to haunt many years later ...
Divided into twenty chapters, this autobiography tells three interrelated periods in the life of Joyce Maynard: the before, during and post-Salinger.
If the subject in the center of this autobiography - the narcissistic perversion-interested me more than his appearance celebrities, I must admit I am no longer able reread Salinger (if it ever happens, "The Catcher in the Rye" do not like at all like me) without thinking of the infected man portrayed here.
And yet we can not say that Joyce Maynard is lost in insulting this man she does not diffuse besides letters.
The author who has suffered all his life the weight of unspoken began to break free from its past as the most elegant, leaving aside your revenge for not sticking to the facts (in fact more than sufficient to deduce that the appropriate conclusions).
How can we claim to love someone for what he passionately is then the break in his being to the point that remains affected during the years? It is terrible to see as the shortcomings of this naive girl and emotional dependence have been exploited by an older man eager to transform it and, not succeeding enough to taste the fires of the day next day, leaving it endorse any guilt for this failure.
" One day Jerry Salinger is the only man that exist in my universe. I defer to him to tell me what to write, what to think, what to wear, what to read, what to eat.
He told me who I am, that I should be. And the next day he's gone.
He had described the path to enlightenment. He would have had to have a kind of discipline and dedication that I did not, an ability to forget oneself and to renounce material pleasures. On this path, I continually stumbled, however, never doubted that it was good. Without Jerry to guide me, I feel abandoned, lost, not only physically but mentally just blocked.
All my life I knew what the feeling of loneliness. But never to this point. "p.267
Even though Joyce Maynard has rebuilt a life after his ouster from "Salinger cult", she never quite managed to leave despite his moves to O, her marriage, the birth of her 3 children but continued to lead his boat "despite himself" still with the vain hope that they can one day get back in touch.
But in undertaking to write this autobiography, the results of his research annihilate his last illusion. There were other letters sent to young women equally.
And now 20 years after the break, she came upon one of them when she came to say farewell and ask one question to the man she so loved and continues to despise her for her lifestyle choice, however, very brave.
" The problem with you, Joyce, is that ... you love the world .
- Yes, I said, smiling. Yes, true, I love the world. And I have raised three children who also love the world.
- I knew you'd come to this. A nothing.
He, the man who told me that he knew one thing was that, whatever happens, I'd be a real writer. Nobody, ever, could I remove it, he told me one day. Never forget that. Do not let anyone tell you what to do. Do not trust that the strength of your voice.
"I wanted to say goodbye to you, Jerry.
- I can not hear well." He spoke these words with less force. I can no longer smile. I do feel a burst of grief. This man was someone wonderful. I loved him more than anything else. I have no desire to hurt him. Just to finally let go.
"You look to exploit your story with me I guess?
- There is no certainly true that someone not on this door has exploited someone else in front of him. I'll let you ponder which is which. "
While I walk away, he throws me one more thing, the last words I hear probably the first man I loved.
" I have not exploited! he cried. I do not even know you . "" p.423
I was really disgusted by this woman's journey so violently marked by manipulation of one man as I have been touched by writing and while modest dignity of Joyce Maynard who manages to leave the field limited privacy to encompass a powerful testimony on psychological abuse and its ravages.
" One day, Joyce, there will be a story you will want to tell just because it matters more to you than any other. You drop the habit of doing what everyone tells you to do. You stop looking behind your shoulder to make sure you make everyone happy, and you write just what is real and true. Writing sincere always irritates people, and they find all sorts of ways to transform your life into hell. One day, in a very long time, you cease to worry about you know who you like it or what they say about you.
At this time you finally produce the work you are capable. "p.185
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