Catcher In The Rye

[jameswba]

I read Catcher in the Rye when I was 19 and remember wishing I'd read it when I was 16. I've a feeling I might not have heard of it at 16 though.

The book that was still resonating with me at 16 was Golding's Lord of the Flies, which I'd have read two years earlier. I was at an all boys school, not dissimilar to the one Golding taught at by all accounts, and it wasn't a stretch to believe that what happens on his imaginary island could have happened among our group, given circumstances.

[Patrick Thistle]

. At 41 now, is there any point in me visiting it for the first time, given all that's commonly said about it needing to be a book you read for the first (or only) time as a teenager?

]

I first read it when I was in my late 30s so I'd say yeah, why not.

[Patrick Thistle]

I agree with Ursus about the short stories. The documentary shows that he submitted a much larger number than were ever published so what you get in 'Nine Stories'* is the peak of a very laborious process.

*aka. 'For Esme With Love and Squalor' in the edition I read in 1985.

He had loads published in the New Yorker, I think, before the Nine Stories. A few years back it was discovered that someone had gone through back issues of the New Yorker in one of the big public libraries and cut out all his stories with a sharp knife. Salinger blocked attempts to publish those stories although a bootleg book was available for a while. The Nine Stories were written during or after his wartime service. The story of For Esme With Love and Squalor is internally dated to just after Slapton Sands and features a soldier's encounter with an innocent child that redeems him - a feature that crops up regularly in his output.

The short biography I've read about him shows he was incredibly controlling about his output, even letters that he wrote to people. My Salinger Year, written by someone working at his agents, showed how reluctant he was to publish things.

I have two other biographies on the shelf waiting to be read.