JDSalinger’s son announced that he is working on editing an unpublished text by the writer

70 years after its original publication, an updated reissue of “Nine stories”the first book written by the elusive American storyteller JD Salingerwhose edition was supervised by his son Matt, who on tour in Spain to accompany the launch announced that progresses in the edition of an unpublished text by his fatherand which according to their estimates could reach publishers within a maximum period of two years.

American actor and producer, Matt Salinger He is in charge, together with his father’s widow, of managing his literary legacy. That task took him to Madrid this week to present a commemorative edition made by the Alianza publishing house 70 years after the appearance of “Nine Tales” (1953), the first volume of the writer’s stories.

Salinger’s son held a meeting with the press today where he said that the narrator of spy novels left a hidden work and that before dying he asked him to publish it, even with the “warts”, the imperfections and notes in the margins.

The legendary author of “The Catcher in the Rye” He died in 2010 with those thousands of unpublished pages that could now see the light of day, at least that is what his son promises, who maintained that he is making progress in the work of transcribing that material. “I hope it’s ready before I die,” he joked. The executor also explained that these notes are complicated, notes by hand and typewritten, which is why he estimates “a year and a half or more to finish.”

Although his published work is brief – it is made up of “Catcher in the Rye”, “Nine Tales”, “Franny and Zooey” and “Stand Up, Carpenters, Roof Life and Seymour, An Introduction”– it is known that he never stopped writing during the 45 years of silence that followed his last published title. Only when the documentary filmmakers Shane Salerno and David Shields They released the diptych three years after his disappearance “Salinger” -an unauthorized biography in book and documentary format- it was learned that there was material from which his widow Colleen O’Neill and his son Matt would be executors. Not so his other daughter, Margaret Salingerwith whom he did not have a good relationship after publishing in 2000 “The Guardian of Dreams”a harsh editorial portrait where he drew his father as an enlightened egoist dedicated to his work.

“A shame,” Matt described today the work of the duo Salerno and Shields, according to the newspaper El País. Harvey Weinstein, the producer, wanted to confront, he wanted to create a controversy. We all already know Harvey Weinstein, “he said in reference to the Well-known film producer recently convicted of several cases of sexual abuse. The authors of the work, he added, did not speak with the only two people who know the author’s unpublished work, who are himself and his widow. “And whoever they spoke to gave them incorrect information and they set about publishing it.”

The legend of Salinger

With his elusive exposure, Salinger became one of the most intriguing literary legends, that of the writer who decided to renounce publication, fame, interviews and public appearances, and go into seclusion for the rest of his life. At a press conference, Matt said that his father retired from literary life seeking retirement beyond fame: he liked silence and wanted to dedicate himself to his family.. However, there was never silence with him, a privileged witness of his writing rituals.

According to the executor, the Salinger that the reader will find in his unpublished works is the same as the rest of his work, since “he always continued in the line of searching for the values ​​of art, beauty, kindness, with a sense of humor particular, although he warned that “there are going to be surprises. But nobody expects a ‘best seller’ to lie on the beach.”

He also recalled how his participation in the Second World War and the liberation of Nazi concentration camps influenced his writing and how it made him value even more what he valued before, beauty and love and the ephemerality of nature.

Matt also referred to the controversy that caused the murderer of John Lennon carried a copy of his father’s most famous novel at the time of the crime: he said he could not feel guilty for what a “crazy” person does.