J.D. Salinger in Purgatory (Political Cartoon)

The San Diego Union-Tribune ^ | 01-29-2010 | Steve Breen

[Zman516]

Pretty much my assessment of it also.

I think the main reason liberals were so orgasmic about it is because it had the F-word in it a couple of times which was apparently a big deal when it was published.

[Borges]

It’s popped on lists of all time favorite conservative novels.

[Zman516]

Well, it ain’t on my list.

I just couldn’t empathize with HC.

[Borges]

He’s not a likable character.

[STONEWALLS]

..back in college we read CITR in American lit class...along with Melville,Faulkner,Steinbeck,Hemingway and Fitzgerald....I’m GLAD they had us read those great writers...guys like Steven King and John Grisham couldn’t carry their jockstrap...on their best day!

[Ronin]

Not that I remember. Unless, of course, the brat grew up to be a rock star.

[Pharmboy]

Well, your comment is ironic. Holden Caulfield was, to a large degree, Salinger. Salinger was at Utah Beach on D-Day and fought in the Battle of the Bulge. He spoke German and interrogated Germans for our CIC...but don't misunderstand me: the guy was a major a-hole, crazier than a sh*thouse rat, and had a really bad self-involved attitude.

But, he WAS in the army.

[Colonel_Flagg]

As you wish.

[Borges]

How do you know he was an a-hole? His son claims he was a good guy and a great grandfather to his kids.

[liberty or death]

That is why he became a recluse. He wrote something from his heart and a bunch of nutjobs tried to turn a normal private man into an icon of the SF 60’s spoiled left.

The guy was just a quiet writer wanting to be left alone.

[Ronin]

Interesting. I didn’t know that.

The book still stinks.

[Pharmboy]

A misanthrope who went from cult to cult (drank his own urine, Scientology, veganism, etc. etc.) seduced women 40 years younger than he, looked down his nose at everyone not as clever as he...yeah, sounds like a great guy.

Yet, I believe Catcher was the greatest American novel since Huck Finn. He was a dreadful person...brilliant but dreadful. Hey...I love Beethoven's piano sonatas and string quartets, but he was no day at the beach either.

[yefragetuwrabrumuy]

Anything made mandatory in school will be disliked. In Germany, all students are required to read Book 1 of Goethe’s Faust. On my own, in the US, I had voluntarily read Book 1, and without missing a beat, read Book 2 as well.

When I mentioned this to some recent graduates of a German gymnasium, or high school, they looked at me with a most unique combination of amazement, derision, confusion, and puzzlement.

[clintonh8r]

I must be one of the few Boomers who managed to avoid reaing C.i.t.R.

[Jack Hydrazine]

"Reader Worryo1 says it better than I do: A radical is dead. I do not regret this person’s passing. “The Catcher in the Rye” and its main character, Holden Caufield, were used as templates for the youth culture of the 60’s. The idea that you could not trust anyone over 30 came directly out of “Catcher’s” depiction of phony and corrupt adults. A now cliched theme about bad adults versus good young people came out of that novel, and was reproduced time and again for decades after 1951. You had a template for the antics of a Jerry Rubin or Tom Hayden, or even the terror of the Weather Underground in the character of Holden Caufield. Also, high schools fed into this by having “The Catcher in the Rye” as required reading in literature classes. It was a very mediocre novel, but its impact was huge. Even the Christian Science Monitor’s reviewer back in1951 predicted that novel’s nasty fallout." From Debbie Schlussel. http://www.debbieschlussel.com/16216/2-bird-w-one-stone-buh-bye-zinn-salinger/#more-16216

[Ghost of Philip Marlowe]

I tend to think you’re right. Unless some biography comes out strongly making some bizarre point, I think he just liked the story he wrote, wanted to write others, but didn’t want everything he wrote to be compared to everything else he wrote.

[Borges]

Whoever wrote that has no idea what they’re talking about. Salinger was critiquing the behavior of the character. His other fiction has an overt conservative and Christian outlook.

[Ruy Dias de Bivar]

***Not that I remember. Unless, of course, the brat grew up to be a rock star.***

I’m just wondering what in the book caused a certain young punk to shoot John Lennon.

[Borges]

John Hinckley was obssesed with it as well. As was the guy who killed actress Rebecca Schaeffer.

[wardaddy]

I’m with you. I view it as important.

Did not realize he just died.

I confess I have an extensive library but it’s 95% non fiction and reference..so I am no expert