Seek and you may find. Knock, and the door will be opened to you.

I just finished reading Franny and Zooey, a book written by JD Salinger and one of his masterpiece that tells the story of the children of the Glass family whom, when they were kids, performed in a show called "It's a Wise Child." I always love the language of JD Salinger and how he communicated so well through the direct conversationalist sentences. His words are meant to be read one by one, word by word, sentence by sentence.

This book has a heavier, philosophical content as in A Catcher in the Rye. It meant to treat our minds with thoughts that will give us back the freedom of making conclusion, asking questions, or even choosing what to do, in life. I said, that, in life.

Franny, the first book, tells us about Franny or Frances, the youngest and the youngest daughter of the glass family. She is twenty year old (in the fifties), just quit her major in theatre because she thinks that everything in the higher education is fake and everyone is starving to be someone. She's dating Lane, her boyfriend in one year. The story started with their lunch date in a restaurant prior to a football game where she visited Lane who went to a different school. The conversation at the table turned philosophical and ended with Franny fainted out in the restaurant manager's office, and when Lane left her, she started to chant the "Jesus Prayer".

The what so called the Jesus Prayer is a prayer she found in a book called "The Pilgrim's Way" (which I will check out later, too) that tells a story of a Russian peasant who tried to find the meaning of one verse in Tessalonian that tells the congregation to pray incessantly, without faint. This book and the sequel of the book "The Pilgrim Continues His Way" is the main source of why Franny fainted and later on got sick and unwilling to eat, in the Glass' family's house.

That later on lead us into the second story, Zooey.

Zooey, is the second youngest child, is a twenty-five year old actor who is still living in the house. Another philosopher in the house, Zooey was a tool for the author to tell us beautiful, amazing stories about religion, life, and what ever else might be in Salinger's mind. They older brother, Seymour, whom happened to be one of the main character that Salinger communicated through another novel, died ala Heindrich Von Kleist, committed suicide with his wife. His death has given enough pain in the family, since he was the most brilliant one. And Buddy, is their older brother who lives with full privacy in an apartment not nearly far from their house, without means of communication available, which always worries Bessie Glass, the mother in the house. These two characters influenced the development of both Franny and Zooey, who struggled with their own mind while growing up and trying to forgive the brother who left them egocentrically, and missing him terribly at the same time. The conversations between Zooey and his mother are rich, with the conversationalist style of Salinger, which led into the discussion that disturbed Zooey; Franny found the two books in Seymour's old room.

Zooey's way to talk to Franny about her depression in his own way, such as acting as if he was Buddy and called Franny, was brilliant. I don't know if Salinger had plots in his stories, but he has a way to spit all of his thoughts through these characters, the way he talked about religious figures, about Jesus, about Buddha, about life and what it's all about, was fascinating to me. The conclusion that both Zooey and Franny had, that brought Franny from hopelessness into Joy, was, that reason behind our every act is important. That, indeed human beings have their egos in the front list of those reasons that made us do what we do, but ego is part of us, and there's no way we could deny it. Unless. Unless, we're driven by the higher calling, the higher supremacy, who knew everything from the beginning to end, who had the answer that drives the Russian peasant to search for the meaning of "praying incessantly" and performed the Jesus Prayer until it came back to him as an answer. Which, would be, doing what we love for Jesus, which also mean, doing what we love unto others, who ever the others is. It is such a beautiful book, Franny reminded me of the importance of reasons, the importance of motivation, and what the best motivation is.

Seek and you may find. Knock, and the door will be opened to you.