Product Description

The Catcher in Rye is the ultimate novel for disaffected youth, but it's relevant to all ages. The story is told by Holden Caulfield, a seventeen- year-old dropout who has just been kicked out of his fourth school. Throughout, Holden dissects the 'phony' aspects of society, and the 'phonies' themselves: the headmaster whose affability depends on the wealth of the parents, his roommate who scores with girls using sickly-sweet affection. Lazy in style, full of slang and swear words, it's a novel whose interest and appeal comes from its observations rather than its plot intrigues (in conventional terms, there is hardly any plot at all). Salinger's style creates an effect of conversation, it is as though Holden is speaking to you personally, as though you too have seen through the pretences of the American Dream and are growing up unable to see the point of living in, or contributing to, the society around you. Written with the clarity of a boy leaving childhood, it deals with society, love, loss, and expectations without ever falling into the clutch of a cliche.

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Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #337 in Books
• Published on: 1994-08-04
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 192 pages

From Amazon.co.uk
Since his debut in 1951 as The Catcher in the Rye, Holden Caulfield has been synonymous with "cynical adolescent". Holden narrates the story of a couple of days in his 16-year-old life, just after he's been expelled from prep school, in a slang that sounds edgy even today and keeps this novel on banned book lists. It begins:

If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you'll probably want to know is where I was born and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don't feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth. In the first place, that stuff bores me, and in the second place, my parents would have about two haemorrhages apiece if I told anything pretty personal about them.

His constant wry observations about what he encounters, from teachers to phonies (the two of course are not mutually exclusive), capture the essence of the eternal teenage experience of alienation. --Amazon.com

Amazon.co.uk Review
Since his debut in 1951 as The Catcher in the Rye, Holden Caulfield has been synonymous with "cynical adolescent". Holden narrates the story of a couple of days in his 16-year-old life, just after he's been expelled from prep school, in a slang that sounds edgy even today and keeps this novel on banned book lists. It begins:

If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you'll probably want to know is where I was born and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don't feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth. In the first place, that stuff bores me, and in the second place, my parents would have about two haemorrhages apiece if I told anything pretty personal about them.

His constant wry observations about what he encounters, from teachers to phonies (the two of course are not mutually exclusive), capture the essence of the eternal teenage experience of alienation. --Amazon.com

About the Author
J D Salinger was born in 1919. He grew up in New York City, and wrote short stories from an early age, but his breakthrough came in 1948 with the publication in The New Yorker of 'A Perfect Day for Bananafish'. The Catcher in the Rye was his first and only novel, published in 1951. It remains one of the most translated, taught and reprinted texts, and has sold some 65 million copies. It was followed by three other books of short stories and novellas, the most recent of which was published in 1963. He lives in Cornish, New Hampshire.

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Customer Reviews

A Matter of Love and Hate
Twelve years ago, my history teacher in High School sang the praises of a book that, in his own words, every adolescent should read at some point.Three days ago, and twelve years later,Santa finally did what I hadn't in all those years,and brought me a copy of The Catcher in the Rye.

I read it in a couple of nights. The first night I felt like someone I had thought my friend had let me down in some way. I started to suspect that it might be the typical overrated classic.The boy starts a story from some place he's confined in, but he doesn't elaborate. He then starts the telling of what happened last Christmas, which eventually led to his being where he is. As much as I tried, I could find nothing especial there, just the boy and his school mates and troubles and the crazy decision of flee to avoid parental confrotation and an immature teen with a lot ot maturing to do. He most probably would end up doing something stupid and being caught and all. Perhaps it was too late. Perhaps I was too late, and should have read it just when Mr. Montejo told me to.

Yesterday night, I picked the book again. Sadly, more out of the respect I had been brewing for the last years than out of real interest, but I picked it anyway. And then IT happened.

At some point of Holden's account,everything just clicks. Where he was, why he was there, what was going on with him. So I had to read other's thoughts about this amazing character.

I wasn't really surprised at the bunch of negative reviews, and neither I was at the bunch which considered it a masterpiece. What really surprised me is that many of them, good or bad, seemed to miss something that to me was crucial to the story: that Holden is not the teenager boy going through the difficult task of coming of age and doing stupid things and leaving the innocence of childhood behind, as I had previously suspected and feared. But that his problem, his real problem, is deeper and more dangerous than that. That he is tired of everything and everyone, in serious need of help, immersed in a serious depression, inestable and anguished to a dangerous extreme.

When he first mentions his brother Allie's death of leukemia when he was 13, or how he broke all the widow glasses of their garage afterwards,he does it in an almost eerily casual manner. But later you realise that perhaps that day was the day Holden Caulfield started his race toward the very same precipice he wants to save those children of his dreams from. Unfortunately, as he says, there's no one big around to catch him.

It's not that this book leads to violent acts or has the power of perturbing minds. More like perturbed minds recognise what's really going on with Holden. That he's not only coming-of-age, but he's coming of age immersed in a depression no one seems to see or care about. When his sister confronts him, he ends up crying and clinging on to her like she's the only thing that can save him. Perhaps she is, and she literally saved him without knowing it.

Perhaps I'm in the minority, but as caustic and sad Holden's thoughts are, I don't feel his story is pessimist, but rather the tale of a catharsis that was both necessary AND urgent for him. He is conscious of many things about the world, but also about himself, contrary to many opinions I've read. And he has a good heart, and not an agressive nature. It can end well.

I wholeheartedly recommend this book, but with some warnings. If you need things happening all the time to feel there's something going on, this is not your book. If you expect a coming-of-age narrative, you won't like it either. If you are looking for different tones in the voice, you'll be dissapointed and find it lineal. And if you are an adolescent, I can't tell. You might or might not like it; you might or might not feel it.

As for me, I'm truly thankful for not having read this book when I was Holden's age. I wouldn't have liked it, and so I would have missed this amazing feeling I'm having today. The feeling of having been touched by something. It doesn't happens often, nowadays.

My apologies for the rant! :D

- BeLa

Love it or hate it, you should still read it
This is, without doubt, easily my favourite book of all-time, and yet I cannot generally fathom why. It's just my perfect book, in every concievable way, from style to form and characterisation, and absolutely nothing anyone could say against it would ever make me think otherwise.

I can't say exactly in plain and reasonably simple words what makes this novel so fantastic, for I feel that it is really a personal experience for each reader, to make an emotional connection with it. All I can say is that I feel that I connected with Holden, and that is it. I firmly believe that those who dislike (or hate) this novel are simply missing the entire point of it. You have to have experienced emotions similar to what Holden is going through to get a full grasp of this novel, and for those who find Holden moronic and egotistical, this is impossible to do as they cannot empathize through him.

This is the only book that has often made me laugh and cry, often both at the same time. It has no other political or social meaning, and is viable for every generation. I hope they never make a film of it, because, as J.D. Salinger put it: "it wouldn't be what Holden wanted".

Overall then, it seems that "The Catcher in the Rye" is truely a book of literary Marmite: you either love it or hate it. But whatever your view, you should still read it, simply because of the widely varied opinions of the novel.

Five Stars Because I can
For anyone interested in the 1950s New York that no longer exists, along with the youth of that era, the angst, the coming-of-age story, and the totaly uniqueness of a novel that has captivated an audience for decades, might I recommend this small but powerful and still somewhat new novel. New in the respect that it touches on the fragility of youth, the uncertainity of the world, and how lost a young man can feel, especially in a large city such as New York. This is not a complicated book, but underlying the "facility" is a deeper meaning to life; a searching for something, and ultimately this is what Salinger put into print and the reason it has stood the test of time. Few now are not familiar with Holden Caulfield and his journey through the land of teenage angst, but most will want to re-read this book at a later point in life. It is easy to label Holden now--manic depressive, bi-polar, depressed, or just messed-up teenager, but who at that age does not already have baggage? What I think most will find interesting is that, when reading this book as a teenager, you will obviously see things through Holden's eyes. Reading the book as an adult you will seen both sides of the story and this makes for an even more powerful read. Read it on any level you want, but just read it. Along with "Catch 22," "Me Talk Pretty One Day," and "Barring Some Unforeseen Accident," this is a keeper that you'll want to revisit over and over. A knock-out American classic for all ages.