My review of The Catcher in the Rye, by J.D. Salinger

The Catcher in the Rye

by J.D. Salinger

My rating: 4 out of 5 stars

This was the first book I read as a young adult. An inexperienced reader, I had been too busy living and suddenly felt I was missing out on books, so had asked around for something to help get me into reading.

I glanced casually through the pages on a two-month coach trip around Australia's red centre. Then I reread it more closely, then again intensely, and a breakthrough occurred for me. It was the perfect beginning of a long and winding reading road for me.

I related closely to narrator Holden Caulfield, empathising with his internal frictions and dilemmas as I gazed from my coach window at the wilderness rush by. This book deals with those complex yet universal issues of personal identity, belonging, connection and alienation.

Providing a journey within my journey, J. D. Salinger became a close, early travel buddy I'll never forget and will remain ever thankful to.

An instant hit when published in 1951, The Catcher in the Rye has been translated into almost every language and still sells around 250,000 annually, totalling around 65 million books, its protagonist becoming an icon for teenage rebellion and attracting extremist Conservative criticism.

Through the 1960s & '70s it was the most censored book in American high schools and libraries. By 1978 it was banned in Issaquah, Washington, high schools, as being part of an 'overall communist plot.' As late as 1981 it was America's most censored yet most taught book in public schools. The American Library Association called it the 1990s' tenth most frequently challenged book.

Those alarmist challenges, by hysterical right-wing zealots, surrounded Holden's characteristic teenage vulgar language, sexual references, blasphemy, alleged undermining of family values and moral codes, being a poor role model, encouragement of rebellion, and promotion of drinking, smoking, lying and promiscuity. Typically, the challengers have been unfamiliar with the plot.

Numerous shootings have even been associated with the novel, including an assassination attempt on Ronald Reagan. John Lennon's assassin was arrested with a copy of the book he had purchased that day.

As its critics have expired, however, the book has survived, becoming a timeless, fondly preserved classic. Stale, overblown controversies aside, I can't imagine anyone not adoring this gorgeous ride.

Read it and tell me I'm wrong.