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Plot Summary
Franny

Lane Coutell, a seemingly arrogant college-boy, waits at a train station for his girlfriend, Franny Glass, on the weekend of the Yale game. Lane smokes a couple cigarettes and then takes her to a fancy lunch room after she hops off the train. During lunch, Franny seems distant and upset while Lane talks about his paper for college. Franny orders a chicken sandwich, which she does not eat, and then proceeds to feel more and more uncomfortable in her conversation with Lane. She goes into the bathroom when she becomes faint, and then has a short cry.

After she regains her composure, she returns to her table with Lane. Lane asks her about the book she had been carrying around with her, and she brushes it off with a simple answer, and says that the book is called "The Way of the Pilgrim." She then explains the Jesus prayer, a prayer that you repeat constantly until it becomes involuntary. Lane is not very interested, and is more involved in keeping them on time for the football game, until Franny faints, and he cancels the plans and calls a cab.

Zooey

The plot continues with Zooey Glass, a once precocious young boy, siting in a bath tub, reading a four-year-old letter from his brother, Buddy Glass. Zooey's mother, Bessie, walks into the bathroom, where Zooey is taking the bath, and they have a long conversation with him about his younger sister. Franny is currently on the living room couch, having a mental breakdown. During this converesation, Zooey often calls his mother names, and constantly argues with her, as well as tells her to leave multiple times. Following Mrs. Glass' cigarettes, Zooey agrees to talk to Franny in the living room.

Franny and Zooey talk of Franny's emotional and mental struggles with the greediness of people in general, the corruptuion of the acting business,and the Jesus prayer that has turned Franny's life upside down. Zooey rants about how Franny doesn't understand the Jesus prayer because she doesn't understand Jesus. After making Franny cry like a smal child, Zooey leaves the living room and walks into Seymour Glass' room. Ater reading qoutes off the back of the bedroom door, Zooey calls Franny from the phone in Seymour's room. He pretends to be Buddy Glass, and although she realizes who he actually is during the conversation, he explains to her the meaning of Seymour's "fat lady." Zooey explains that the "there isn't anyone who isn't Seymour's fat lady," and that "the fat lady is Christ himself." After this phone call, Franny seems to find personal peace in his words.

Reception
Critics met Salinger's Franny and Zooey with a variety of mixed reviews. Some thought that Salinger shamed himself with this particular piece of work. Janet Malcolm said that it was met with an "unhappy embarrassed silence." She said it's an "appallingly bad story," and she even called it "a piece of shapeless self indulgence." Jay Mcinery critisized the creation of the "self satisfied Glass family," but also said that the story showed Salinger's evolving beliefs." Contrary to those beliefs, some critics felt that Salinger's work was more than adequate. John Updike praised Salinger's characterizaton, saying that they "melt indistinguishably together in an impossible radiance of personal beauty and intelligence." He also said pointed out that Salinger has a "correctly unctuous and apprehensive tone."

Major Themes
Many critics and researchers have identified a variety of major themes and motifs throughout the novel. College students who use "www.shmoop.com" have identified themes such as family, spirituality, dissatisfaction, visions of america, and love. Megan Carey said that "love, especially familial love, is an enduring motif." There are many reoccurring themes in Salinger's novel. And Matt Kanner identified the unhappiness of the Glass children as a motif. He said, "The main characters of these stories (Franny, especially) are preoccupied with concerns over the phoniness and pretensions they observe all around them."