PBS has just aired a two-hour documentary on J.D. Salinger,
the best-selling author of
The Catcher in the Rye … originally published in
1951 … and his book sales have once again soared … see:
Twin Cities Link. This documentary revealed many aspects of
this writer’s life I had not known … his military service… his first marriage
to a German agent … his writing for the
New Yorker … his penchant for young girls
… his two children by his second marriage … his egomania. But it really didn’t explain why his first
book,
The Catcher, was his only true mega- success … see
The Daily Beast Story.
As a high-school tutor west of Boston, I have had
to reread this book and discuss it with a few of my students … and, in
my opinion, it doesn’t hold up well in today’s society. Holden Caulfield, the protagonist, spends most of this novel’s verbiage railing against the establishment
and its icons … puritanical morality, honoring one’s parents, good
sportsmanship, hard work, scholastic achievement, and even, believe it or not,
diversity. Good stuff for a kid of the
50’s and early 60’s, but Holden’s targets have now been relegated to the trash
heap of modern society. Most of his
dragons have already been slain.
So Salinger’s obsessive desire for the privacy of rural New
Hampshire … with his occasional sought-out ego burnishing by the literati set …
had it seems some perceptive rationale. Maybe he understood that his ideas would
not really age well. After his passing
last year at age 91, I am still left wondering the fate of his second wife and
children. For more of his life story
see:
IMDB Entry.
