For Esme - With Love and Squalor [Paperback]

J D Salinger (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0140237534 | ISBN-13: 978-0140237535 | Publication Date: August 4, 1994 | Edition: Revised

"For Esme With Love and Squalor" includes two of Salinger's most famous and critically acclaimed stories, and helped to establish him as one of the contemporary literary greats. The title story recounts a Sergeant's meeting with a young girl before being sent into combat. When it was first published in "The New Yorker" in 1950 it was an immediate sensation and prompted a flood of readers' fan-letters. 'A Perfect Day for Bananafish' is the first of the author's stories to feature the Glass family, the loveable and idiosyncratic family who would appear in much of Salinger's later fiction. A haunting and unforgettable piece of writing, the story follows the eldest sibling, Seymour Glass, and his wife, Muriel, as they embark on an ill-fated honeymoon in Florida.

--This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

J D Salinger was born in 1919. He grew up in New York City, and wrote short stories from an early age, but his breakthrough came in 1948 with the publication in The New Yorker of 'A Perfect Day for Bananafish'. The Catcher in the Rye was his first and only novel, published in 1951. It remains one of the most translated, taught and reprinted texts, and has sold some 65 million copies. It was followed by three other books of short stories and novellas, the most recent of which was published in 1963. He lives in Cornish, New Hampshire. --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

Product Details

• Paperback: 150 pages
• Publisher: Penguin Books Ltd; Revised edition (August 4, 1994)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0140237534
• ISBN-13: 978-0140237535
• Product Dimensions: 7.6 x 5 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,961,094 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Born in New York in 1919, Jerome David Salinger dropped out of several schools before enrolling in a writing class at Columbia University, publishing his first piece ("The Young Folks") in Story magazine. Soon after, the New Yorker picked up the heralded "A Perfect Day for Bananafish," and more pieces followed, including "Slight Rebellion off Madison" in 1941, an early Holden Caulfield story. Following a stint in Europe for World War II, Salinger returned to New York and began work on his signature novel, 1951's "The Catcher in the Rye," an immediate bestseller for its iconoclastic hero and forthright use of profanity. Following this success, Salinger retreated to his Cornish, New Hampshire, home where he grew increasingly private, eventually erecting a wall around his property and publishing just three more books: "Nine Stories," "Franny and Zooey," "Raise High the Roof Beam, and Carpenters and Seymour: An Introduction." Salinger was married twice and had two children. He died of natural causes on January 27, 2010, in New Hampshire at the age of 91.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

24 of 30 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars 'For Esme with Love and Squalor', March 17, 2006

By 

Shalom Freedman "Shalom Freedman" (Jerusalem,Israel) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: For Esme - With Love and Squalor (Paperback)

For 'Esme with Love and Squalor' is one of Salinger's best stories. It also appears in his first collection of stories called 'Nine Stories.'
It tells the story of an American G.I. who for one part of the story is in Devon England where he is in training. On one lonely day off he goes into a tea-room and meets an English child and her small brother. Her name is 'Esme' and she is a precocious beautiful and sensitive child with whom the G.I. has a friendly, and somewhat from his point- of- view ironic conversation. The language is pure Salingerese. The little brother acts up and is chided by his sister. He recites a riddle , : What did one wall say to another" and hilariously gives the answer "Meet you at the corner" When the soldier returns the answer at his asking another time he gets upset. But at parting the soldier asks him the question and the little boy gets his spirit back by again giving the answer. More important the soldier and the little girl in some way assauge each other's loneliness. She is lonely for her father who has been lost in the war. He is lonely, lonely.
The scene then changes to an Army headquarters in the heart of the European theatre. The same soldier is on the verge of breakdown when he receives a letter from Esme , which somehow brings him back to a sense that there is something beautiful, whole , humane in the world, something worth living for.
The story of course must be read to be felt truly. My summary is poor. It is such a beautiful story.
I truly suggest you read it. "It will make you laugh. It will make you cry. And you will never forget it."

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Same book as Nine Stories..., May 3, 2008

By 

G C Cunningham (Palo Alto, CA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: For Esme - With Love and Squalor (Paperback)

Excellent book of short stories. Here's the deal as I understand it. This title was the English name for the book, "Nine Stories" because of the popularity of the Esme story in England. Either book is the same. Classic Salinger. His last long story published only in the New Yorker, is available on the New Yorker DVD collection which is very cheap online these days. Google it. Ciao.

7 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Same as "Nine Stories"?, August 15, 2007

By 

Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (Narragansett, RI, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: For Esme - With Love and Squalor (Paperback)

As far as I can tell (based on a quick google search), this book has exactly the same contents as "Nine Stories." I highly recommend "Nine Stories," but I'm not sure why the publisher felt the need to re-release it under a different title. I would give it 5 stars, but it loses one for potentially misleading customers. Perhaps they wanted to capitalize on the buzz surrounding the band We Are Scientists, who released an album called "With Love and Squalor"?