J.D. Salinger passes away

[phej]

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The author's son, in a statement from the author's literary representative, says Salinger died of natural causes at his home. He had lived for decades in self-imposed isolation in the small, remote house in Cornish, N.H.

[Grrr]

:(
His 9 stories are the best short stories I've ever read.

[nowt]

Good. And about God damn time--

Now the posthumous collection of heretofore unpublished crap stat, pls.

[thod]

I thought I was going to be in for a treat when I bought "The Catcher in the Rye". Banal teen angst story, not even well written. Well maybe it was a product of its time which is why it seems so pedestrian now and its intended audience was school kids.

[stasis]

I thought I was going to be in for a treat when I bought "The Catcher in the Rye". Banal teen angst story, not even well written. Well maybe it was a product of its time which is why it seems so pedestrian now and its intended audience was school kids.
I hated that damned book almost as much as being compelled by an elementary English department to read it. May Salinger find the ethereal fires of hell.

[Billy Cox]

This one hurts. Not that I was a huge fan, but the Salinger enigma was very intense. I too wonder what sort of material will come to light now that he's gone. He was still writing, but only for his own entertainment. I do know that his brother and one sister (Margaret) are not on speaking terms and have vastly differing memories of their childhoods. I would venture that the matter of posthumously publishing new manuscript material will be a matter dragged out at length in the courts.

Salinger used to drink his own urine, dontcha know?

*Raises glass of "apple juice" in a farewell toast to Jerry*

[Shauru]

"I thought what I'd do was, I'd pretend I was one of those deaf-mutes"

Catcher in the Rye is on my reading list. I'll have to take a look into it now. Maybe there will be a sale now that he's dead.

Hopefully his desires to leave his work untouched by others will be met despite his demise.

[lambpox]

My friends always swear that I have some crazy precognition skills but today confirmed it. During lunch, my friend (also an INTJ) and I were talking about how much we loved The Catcher in the Rye. I told him I loved it more since I read it four times and he only read it once. We remarked how much we connected with Holden and shared our favorite aspectsof the novel. And I casually mentioned that Salinger was still alive, in which he responded with surprise…:( Baaw!

[paperclip]

I thought I was going to be in for a treat when I bought "The Catcher in the Rye". Banal teen angst story, not even well written.

Agreed! I never understood why people fawned over this book. I found Holden Caulfield so annoying that I actually had to skip every other paragraph when reading it for a school assignment. His personality was bratty and self-indulgent. To this day when I see "Catcher in the Rye" listed as a person's ''favorite book'' on Facebook... I can't help but associate that person with Holden's character: unappealing.

[Rohsiph]

I'm curious: those responding with dislike for Salinger's work, what do you tend to enjoy?

[Billy Cox]

I'm curious: those responding with dislike for Salinger's work, what do you tend to enjoy?

I enjoyed Catcher, but it's not on my list of favorites. What I came to appreciate was that Salinger, although physically a grown man, never came to peace with his adolescent self. This juvenile honesty shines through in all of his published work. No, he was not the best writer, but that's not what makes his style so intriguing. I argue that Salinger, not Dick Clark, was the "World's Oldest Teenager".

[stasis]

I'm curious: those responding with dislike for Salinger's work, what do you tend to enjoy?
Solzhenitsyn.

/gangsigns

[Hobbesrevenge]

A Perfect Day for BananaFish

One of my favorite short stories by him!

[Seducer]

I didn't know he was still alive. He must've been an introvert. Does anyone know what type he was? I read Catcher In the Rye for school like everyone else. I don't know what's the big deal about that book. Lord of the Flies is another dumb book they make everyone read. They should make Brian Tracy, Harv Eker, and Napoleon Hill required reading in school.

[paperclip]

I'm curious: those responding with dislike for Salinger's work, what do you tend to enjoy?

I tend to like non-fiction work, popular science and history stuff. As far as fiction I love Kundera's "Unbearable Lightness of Being". I also really liked "Tale of Two Cities" in high school. Salinger's writing was fine, it was Holden Caulfield's character and the subsequent popularization of that attitude within my peer group I find abhorrent.

[Morto Che Parla]

To be fair to him, he didn't ask for Catcher in the Rye to be so overrated, and shied away from any publicity about it.

[Causa Mortis]

To be fair to him, he didn't ask for Catcher in the Rye to be so overrated, and shied away from any publicity about it.

It only really gained so much fame because it was banal enough for teachers to require in high school english classes...I think most would like to read Roth but know they can't get away with it.

[JRant]

I hated the stupid book, thought Holden was a whiny brat
like Vonnegut, Orwell, Frank Herbert to name a few

[Antares]

Catcher in the Rye was something special to me. Not because I liked it, never. I hated it. I hated Holden Caulfield. I wished he would jump off a bridge and drown himself. But it struck a nerve. It occurred to me that I hate him (thus this book) because I used to think like Caulfield (the fact that he's a whiny bitch, and I'm using this in a gender neutral way, didn't help any). His characterization of Caulfield was masterful, that I'll admit, and to answer your question, Seducer, a lot of people say Caulfield is just a manifestation of his own personality. Everyone I talked to who was familiar with type (including two INFPs. Funnily enough, neither of them like him very much. One of them hates him with passion.) says he's INFP, and I myself tend to think so. Catcher is not something I would read again in a hurry, or if ever. It made me critically assess myself, and there's absolutely nothing in that book to go back for, unless I want to read the same rambling again, and I don't have the time for that.

It's quite a frank insider view of a troubled teenage mind, but it's not unique in that aspect, and it's not well executed at all. For the Bildungsroman genre, I liked Candide and Spring Awakening a lot more.

[nowt]

I have Salinger to thank for all of you.

[Rohsiph]

Solzhenitsyn.

I've been meaning to dip into some Russian literature pretty soon. I've yet to read any Nabokov or Tolstoy; I'll add Solzhenitsyn to my list :)

I tend to like non-fiction work, popular science and history stuff. As far as fiction I love Kundera's "Unbearable Lightness of Being". I also really liked "Tale of Two Cities" in high school. Salinger's writing was fine, it was Holden Caulfield's character and the subsequent popularization of that attitude within my peer group I find abhorrent.

That's fair. As are the other responses, which I appreciate.

I read Catcher twice, once in high school and once in college. In high school I couldn't help but identify with Holden's unrequited feelings for Jane, which struck a bit closer than it ever should have because I was working through my own unrequited feelings for a girl named Jane. In college I focused less on Holden and more on everything else going on in the book. I wrote a paper about Holden's character as exemplified through his relationships with women and my professor said it was graduate-level work. Both times I enjoyed the reading, but about the only reading I've actively had trouble working through has been Toni Morrison and Faulkner.

[Billy Cox]

Ugh. Faulkner. What a bore. Hemingway, too. I never understood the popularity factor with those two. Steinbeck has always been the writer for me.

To those of you who have expressed a love for Russian lit, what are your feelings on Steinbeck? He was much loved in the Soviet Union. I wonder if it was the fact that he could so elequently unearth the hidden beauty and comedy within the bleakest of scenarios.

[DewFuel]

Catcher was one of the better books I read during highschool. I re-read it a while ago as well, and it still stands out as a favorite of mine. Goddamn shame Salinger died, but he wasn't really producing anything after the 1950's, so meh.

Agreed! I never understood why people fawned over this book. I found Holden Caulfield so annoying that I actually had to skip every other paragraph when reading it for a school assignment. His personality was bratty and self-indulgent. To this day when I see "Catcher in the Rye" listed as a person's ''favorite book'' on Facebook... I can't help but associate that person with Holden's character: unappealing.

perhaps it is difficult to appreciate a work of literature when you are only reading half of the novel.

[Morto Che Parla]

I hated the stupid book, thought Holden was a whiny brat
like Vonnegut, Orwell, Frank Herbert to name a few

Yeah, the traitor Orwell has something of the Holden Cauldfield about him. Maybe it's the whiny self-righteousness and pseudo-intellectualism.

[rara avis]

I thought Catcher in the Rye was interesting as a little snapshot of a certain period of time. I don't see where it really hits the marks for great or challenging literature. I do see why it's used to teach literary analysis in high schools. Not a bad book, not a great one. I haven't read anything else by Salinger.

I heard a storycorps (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.) recording on NPR last week where a guy was talking about his pilgrimage from Wisconsin to New England to intrude on his hero, JD Salinger, a few decades ago.

He stopped in the town and just kept asking strangers until he located the house, and then he just showed up on the doorstep as if of course it was his right- everyone knows this guy hates being published and goes to extremes to avoid communicating with the public, he even moved to a remote and isolated location, but gosh, that just doesn't make any sense, he can't really mean it, so I'm just going to go visit him at his home anyway and tell him about how I like his books. Why would he mind?

It was presented as if it were kind of a sweet moment, and while Salinger was apparently cordial, no it was not sweet, it was an example of an intrusive extroverted moron too stupid to think enough outside the box to prevent himself from being a pain in the ass. It really annoyed me.

[HackerX]

I never minded it back when it was required reading in high school. I wasn't expecting much given our english teachers previous history when it comes to selecting books but it wasn't overly bad. I think it's humourous how many people hate it because of the way they relate to the character.

Compared to Lord of the Flies and Brave New World, at least it was interesting and not some psuedo-intellectual tripe.

[hulloworld]

Craig Ferguson paid a smart homage to him on Thursday, it was nice.