J.D. Salinger

...What gets me about D.B., though, he hated the war so much, and yet he got me to read this book A Farewell to Arms last summer. He said it was so terrific. That's what I can't understand. It had this guy in it named Lieutenant Henry that was supposed to be a nice guy and all. I don't see how D.B. could hate the Army and war and all so much and still like a phony like that. I mean, for instance, I don't see how he could like a phony like that and still like that one by Ring Lardner, or that other one he's so crazy about, The Great Gatsby. D.B. got sore when I said that, and said I was too young and all to appreciate it, but I don't think so. I told him I liked Ring Lardner and The Great Gatsby and all. I did, too. I was crazy about The Great Gatsby. Old Gatsby. Old sport. That killed me. Anyway, I'm sort of glad they've got the atomic bomb invented. If there's ever another war, I'm going to sit right the hell on top of it. I'll volunteer for it, I swear to God I will.

(The Catcher in the Rye)

Jerome David Salinger, b. New York City, Jan. 1, 1919, established his reputation on the basis of a single novel, The Catcher in the Rye (1951), whose principal character, Holden Caulfield, epitomized the growing pains of a generation of high school and college students. The public attention that followed the success of the book led Salinger to move from New York to the remote hills of Cornish, N.H. Before that he had published only a few short stories; one of them, "A Perfect Day for Bananafish," which appeared in The New Yorker in 1949, introduced readers to Seymour Glass, a character who subsequently figured in Franny and Zooey (1961) and Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenter and Seymour: An Introduction (1963), Salinger's only other published books. Of his 35 published short stories, those which Salinger wishes to preserve are collected in Nine Stories (1953).

Bibliography

• French, Warren, J. D. Salinger, rev. ed. (1976)
• Grunwald, Henry A., ed., Salinger: A Critical and Personal Portrait (1962)
• Hamilton, Ian, In Search of J. D. Salinger (1988)
• Lundquist, James, J. D. Salinger (1978)
• Miller, James E., Jr., J. D. Salinger (1965)

Text Copyright © 1993 Grolier Incorporated

Homepages, Biographies, Bibliographies

• A Salinger homepage with bibliographies
• "Salinger on the Web" page
• J.D. Salinger Archives

Online Text

• The Holden Server (every reload produces a quote from Catcher in the Rye)
• The Keats poem from Seymour, An Introduction

Articles, Essays, Reviews

• The Praises and Criticisms of J.D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye by Eric Lomazoff
• Synopsis of The Catcher in the Rye
• "A Novel to Lose Sleep Over" by Erin Cece
• Review of In Search of J.D. Salinger by Ian Hamilton
• Review of "A Perfect Day for Bananafish"

Other Links

• Salinger at the Internet Movie Database
• Info on "Franny" and "Zooey"
• Info on "For Esme - with Love and Squalor" and Other Stories

Related to or Inspired by JDS

• "Exercise in writing in the style of J.D. Salinger" by Tyler Jones
• The Letters to J.D. Salinger Home Page: The Official Web Site of the (Inevitably) Soon to be Published Book, Letters to J.D. Salinger