an odd little blue book

April 25, 2012 12:43 PM

Does anyone know anything about Twenty-Two stories by J.D. Salinger, or more specifically this edition?

I came across this in a bargin bin and picked it up - except it has no ISBN and I can only find passing references to it on the internet. There's no mention on Ebay or other places I can usually glean information from. Anyone know what this is?

posted by elwoodwiles to writing & language (13 answers total)

It's an unofficial anthology of his twenty-two published stories that have never been collected into book form.
posted by jeudi at 12:48 PM on April 25, 2012 [1 favorite]

Could it be this? ISBN number on webpage. It's also listed on Amazon.

Apparently it's an unauthorized, privately printed, and subsequently suppressed edition of Salinger's early stories.
posted by Specklet at 12:49 PM on April 25, 2012

I read most of these online, last year I think? But I could not find the site.
posted by Glinn at 12:56 PM on April 25, 2012

The edition I have has no ISBN, or at least it isn't printed on the book, but there is a mark on the last page that reads "train bridge recluse ninety-eight". It has a white sleeve with "Twenty-Two Stories by J.D. Salinger" printed on the front as pictured. On the back of the sleeve is a list of the stories and a short paragraph about them.
posted by elwoodwiles at 12:57 PM on April 25, 2012

Glinn, there was once a site that collected all the unpublished stories, as seen here on the blue. It seems to have been taken down since that post (although I seem to recall it still being extant at least two years ago), presumably for copyright reasons.
posted by jeudi at 12:58 PM on April 25, 2012

One of the oldest digital texts on my harddisks is exactly that -- those 22 Salinger stories never republished in a book. Not that people never tried to publish them officially. Not that people have nor tried to sell them to me.

But, as I once wrote in a review of Salinger's Nine Stories, that collection could never have been called Eleven Stories, or even Ten Stories. Not one story in the Samizdat collections equals those that were officially published.
posted by ijsbrand at 1:00 PM on April 25, 2012

Aaaand... this blogger seems to have also found the book you have. They write, About a year later, after searching interlibrary loan (which is an incredible tool), I found 22 Stories, a bootleg volume of Salinger's work published in 1998 in a run of 1,000 copies by Train Bridge Recluse.
posted by jeudi at 1:00 PM on April 25, 2012

Ah! I should have googled "train bridge recluse." Thanks!
posted by elwoodwiles at 1:01 PM on April 25, 2012

Here's a copy for sale at a book dealer for $525, with a little more info.
posted by beagle at 1:03 PM on April 25, 2012

Huh. Whoa. Okay. Let's put that somewhere other than the kitchen table for now...
posted by elwoodwiles at 1:09 PM on April 25, 2012 [2 favorites]

I have a copy of the/a train bridge recluse edition, and it has a plain green cover with no markings. There are semi-transparent illustrated pages bound between the chapters with images of (iirc) trees, possibly in different seasons.

This is a fairly accurate image of the cover. The paper which says "train bridge recluse" and has an image of train tracks is not attached to the cover, it was included as a card/bookmark.
posted by pullayup at 2:17 PM on April 25, 2012

ijsbrand, they WERE officially published, in places lake Harber's and the Atlantic.
posted by TheTingTangTong at 3:37 PM on April 25, 2012

According to The Bananafish / Salinger.org list of unofficial publishings, the blue cover is the first edition, while the green cover is the second. That site also states:

This book began appearing all over the US in 1998, from garage sales and flea markets to book stores and mail-order outlets. Everyone I've asked said they "got a case of them from a guy traveling through town".

If you look around enough, you'll find a variety of prices listed. The lowest I've seen so far is $99 from an Amazon.com reseller, but elsewhere from $200 to $400 USD.
posted by filthy light thief at 4:40 PM on April 25, 2012