The Catcher in the Rye
discussion
The Most Overrated Books
Edward wrote: "/i>Peace and love to you and all the kind people who have made life worth living. But, to hell with those who hate."See Edward, when you're nice and charming you aren't ignored.
Palmyrah wrote: "Are you suggesting I have sock puppets on Goodreads?"Scroll through. It will be like a house of mirrors for you. There's only 5,000 entries in this thread. You can do 300/day with ease.
"It's a brave fool who psychoanalyzes people on the internet."
Why should the Internet be any different than in person? Its where many people let down their defenses and become more real. Most of the fakes are easy to spot, when you've been at it for a while.
"Rolling Stone magazine once called Eric Clapton 'the master of the cliche'. I hadn't realized till now that there was a contest for that laurel."
The cliche is proof of refinement in communication. If it could be said better, it wouldn't be a cliche.
"...old lad."
Hah! I'll challenge anyone here to a decathalon any day you like. I made it up Yosemite's Half Dome and back in a day. How many mountains did you climb last year? (Old lad, humpf!)
"Is this a forlon regret I see before me, the handle towards my hand?"
I've confessed already to being a puer aeternus, a designation dearly earned. Life can be a fun ride when viewed through the unspoiled eyes of a child guided by a lifetime of experience. The view is uncommonly beautiful and exciting.
Mark wrote: "Palmyrah wrote: (way back in one of his earlier posts "Why should a hill of sententious tripe amassed largely by people who don't know anything about literature (but know what they like, haw-haw) i..."Everybody? Really?
Edward wrote: "you state that any teenager could write this book; strongly implying that you could have. That's your fatal mistake.And do you know what, Edward, you're right. What I should have written was 'anybody can write like a teenager'. Point taken. Although the continuing popularity of this awful apology for a novel merely confirms to me that it is overrated.
Could I have written The Catcher in the Rye? Probably not, since I cannot imagine myself wanting to.
Edward wrote: "I've written more books than your lack of creativity could ever imagine."Good on yer, Ed. Published them too, I hope. Have any of them made this list?
Scroll through. It will be like a house of mirrors for you. There's only 5,000 entries in this thread. You can do 300/day with ease.Sorry. I have better uses for the average of ten minutes I spend on Goodreads every day.
Why should the Internet be any different than in person? Its where many people let down their defenses and become more real. Most of the fakes are easy to spot, when you've been at it for a while.
Since you've been 100% wrong in all your guesses about me so far, I'd say you're on a hiding to nothing.
The cliche is proof of refinement in communication.
Yes, refinement that was undertaken and accomplished by other people. The employer of clichés is a habitual plagiarist.
'Old lad'? Hah! I'll challenge anyone here to a decathalon any day you like. I made it up Yosemite's Half Dome and back in a day. How many mountains did you climb last year? (Old lad, humpf!)
Was this in an internet game?
Well, at least we've established that you're not a Yorkshireman.
I've confessed already to being a puer aeternus, a designation dearly earned.
More like puerilius aeternus, to judge by this little exchange. Anyway, I've had enough of you lot, especially that fellow whose mastery of language is so extreme he can't seem to post a coherent sentence. So 'bye now. Enjoy your 300 posts a day or whatever it is.
Cemre wrote: "Palmyrah , if you don't like the people here and if you hate this novel, why do you stay in this thread ? I never spend my time on a thing that ı hate , especially if it's as trivial as a novel, ı ..."Because we are all (it's hard to resist, I've done it too) giving him attention. He craves attention. As not everbody here does, but largely.
It's just that some people like the attention of positive exchange of ideas (along with a fair share of tooting one's own horn, let me be the first to admit) and some people dig on being the villain.
Essay question: is Palmyrah a sadist or masochist in his presence on this thread? Does he take masochistic joy in coming in here and whipping us all with his witticisms (such that they are) because this makes powerful desire surge within him or does he taunt and insult because then, he knows, we will largely whip back?
Boycott anyone? Just to see what happens...
The outcome, MarkHe will become the echo in cyberspace, the distant fading star of narcissism, the mole that got lost in the hole.
Geoffrey wrote: "The outcome, MarkHe will become the echo in cyberspace, the distant fading star of narcissism, the mole that got lost in the hole."
Ah, but can all of us resist the temptation to respond to him? That's the more interesting part of the equation.
...respond to who? ;)
Mark wrote: "Because we are all (it's hard to resist, I've done it too) giving him attention. He craves attention. As not everbody here does, but largely."Of course. We have seen it here a dozen times or more.
Why do vandals deface sculptures?
Why do taggers tag?
Why do people wear piercings that make us wince.
Why the tattoo craze?
(To be clear, by listing these items I am neither equating or judging them. My point is that messages are being conveyed. What matters is the content, or intent, behind the message.)
Some kind of message is being conveyed publicly. People feel helpless or angry or wounded or whatever and want to express their feelings, have their message heard or seen. A one-person demonstration against some secret injustice? An honoring of something revered?
Desecrating a cherished work of art can be a form of rebellion. It could be a lashing out against an imagined threat or some inconvenient truth, like Nazis burning books or American conservatives denouncing global warming.
(But here I go, psychoanalyzing again.)
One difference is, we could attribute some reason to this cockatoo's diatribe:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mALNy...
Monty J wrote: "Why the tattoo craze?"I don't know if I'm part of a craze, but I have a tattoo. My son (soon to be 23 years of age) and my daughter (just turned 21), have a lot of tattoos. My son has more. I don't think it's quite accurate to equate a person deciding to decorate their own body with a person who lashes out in a deliberately anti-social way. In some cultures, tattoos are as reverential an expression of faith as cathedrals and stain glassed window art were/are for Western Europe. Forgive me for being overly sensitive or overly analytical, but there's often this hint of ethnocentric prescriptivism when you go big in your comparisons and metaphors. My writing ... well, my professional writing, has for years been copy writing and marketing language. It's second nature for me to think about how what I'm saying/writing is going to come off inside the head of someone else. And not just a single someone else, but the many varied people that make up our society. Taggers are defacing public or private property. Vandals defacing sculptures are destroying the artistic expression one of their fellow human beings created and that other fellow human beings enjoyed and were inspired by. People who pierce their nose, ears and whatever or people who tattoo themselves are deciding to do something to their own bodies. In the end, that's all any of us as individuals have. Why shouldn't we be able to do whatever we want with it and to it as long as it doesn't do another person any real harm?
I don't think even the most outlandish or emotional rather than intellectual criticism of a book can or should be compared with burning a book. Anybody can say anything they want about a book. Regardless of how whacko and without basis I find it to be, it hasn't diminished anyone's ability to enjoy that book on their own and it doesn't strike out against the idea of books in general. Burning a book does both of those things.
Sorry if I sound like a scold here.
And despite Palmyrah's assertions to the contrary, I think the tone he (he?) struck that incited so many people's ire was not "I think CitR sucks." To have those conversations is what we're all here for. And as hard as it is to sometimes adjust to, not everyone is going to like the same things I do and not everyone is going to agree with me.
It was instead his (his?) tone of "you people largely suck" that rubbed me the wrong way. I would imagine others too.
Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to start thinking about what I want my next tattoo to be (I've been thinking about the yin yang symbol) and where I want it put.
Have a good day, Monty. Your passion always impresses me.
Mark, are you comparing yourself with a cathedral?:-)
Paul Martin wrote: "Mark, are you comparing yourself with a cathedral?:-)"No. I know you're joking, obviously. My single tattoo hardly qualifies me for cathedral status. My son, on the other hand, is getting there. Actually, I was thinking of a segment from the Bill Moyers' series Joseph Campbell and the Power of Myth. He (Campbell) refers to some aboriginal shaman or spiritual member of that particular tribe (who for that reason is tattooed from head to toe) and says "he's in the cathedral all the time."
That's how "cathedral" cropped up in my rant.
Check out John Irving's "Until I Find You" which explores the tattoo culture in depth.
Check out John Irving's "Until I Find You" which explores the tattoo culture in depth.
Mark wrote: "Monty J wrote: "Why the tattoo craze?"I don't know if I'm part of a craze, but I have a tattoo. My son (soon to be 23 years of age) and my daughter (just turned 21), have a lot of tattoos. My son..."
I apologize if the word "craze" was offensive. I'll try and come up with a better word. "Rage" isn't good either. "Fad"? maybe fad is better. The point is that massive tattoos are so much more common than when I was growing up. It must mean something, but I haven't figured it out.
I've even thought about getting one. Everyone else has. Where would I put it? What would it say/be? "Verbs" on one arm, "Nouns" on the the other? A pen through a bleeding heart? When I'm a cadaver will it matter?
By way of clarification I amended the following: "(To be clear, by listing these items I am neither equating or judging them. My point is that, consciously or otherwise, messages are being conveyed, communication is happening. What matters is the content, or intent, behind the message.)"
We may think of our bodies as something private, but we are all walking billboards and involuntary role models every time we step out the door (or post on the Net.)
Exposing ourselves to the public sends messages--the way we dress, the cut of our hair, the cars we drive and how we drive them. Jewelry: the Christian cross, Star of David, "Omm" in Sanskrit, may convey a personal sense of identity but inflame in the wrong setting.
The way we walk down the street, how and where and what time of day, can have lethal consequences, as Ferguson, MO, recently experienced.
In parts of the Bay Area (I have seen this repeatedly in Oakland and San Francisco) it is not uncommon to see a black person stroll slowly across a busy street, even outside a crosswalk, as if daring someone to complain. I've seen a couple of altercations over this behavior, one across from the Civic Center.
Something similar happened outside my apartment one night. A black man on bicycle rode casually down the middle of the lane, blocking traffic. A following car got too close, and he dropped the bicycle and started yelling. Police were called.
My point is we can't just walk down the street or stand in the checkout line without being aware that messages are being beamed at and by us. If something stands out, it behooves us to notice and evaluate.
Sometimes it feels like this nation is a powder keg waiting for a spark, like Ferguson.
Returning from a run at dusk yesterday, I slowed to a walk in the middle of the bridge as I passed a tall thin hooded figure going the other way. "Hi-i!" called a muffled female voice. It took a moment to register--she was talking to me. I turned and caught sight of the tip of her nose as she continued trudging down the sloping metal span.
Apparently she had money in mind. There are homeless camps below both ends of the Fruitvale Bridge now. Their junk piles up and then disappears, piles up and disappears--probably on an outgoing tide.
Did I look like a giver of money or was I grubby enough to mistaken for a friend? How do they decide whom to hit up? Did she have to live that way?
I don't know what to think. No woman has ever tried to stop me on the street except to ask directions, or that streetwalker in LA when I was wearing a Marine Corps uniform and had a severe haircut.
Silent messages are everywhere.
Monty J wrote: "we are all walking billboards and involuntary role models every time we step out the door"Wow. That's a lot to digest, Monty. And no offense taken about word choice or anything you said. I just disagree with it, that's all.
And I respectfully disagree with the idea that we are all "involuntary role models." If a person allows everyone they encounter to be a potential role model, it means they don't have confidence in their own convictions.
Mark wrote: "If a person allows everyone they encounter to be a potential role model, it means they don't have confidence in their own convictions."Unfortunately, I don't think there's a particular shortage of folks who fit that description.... We may not hold ourselves up as role models, but there are plenty of folks who will take a cue whether intended to be one or not.
Monty wrote; "No woman has ever tried to stop me on the street except to ask directions, or that streetwalker in LA when I was wearing a Marine Corps uniform and had a very severe haircut."Tell us more.
Gary wrote: "Unfortunately, I don't think there's a particul...""Well, I rapped upon a house
With the U.S. flag upon display
I said, 'Could you help me out
I got some friends down the way.'
The man says, 'Get out of here
I’ll tear you limb from limb'
I said, 'You know they refused Jesus, too.'
He said, 'You’re not Him.'"
Bob Dylan's 115th Dream
I think there's something in there about the limitations of using role models as our moral compasses ... but I'm not sure. I'm in a very random association mode today (I'm sure some of you are rolling your eyes and saying "Today!?!").
You're right, of course. And our ids sprouted our super-egos through ongoing interactions with other people, so it's not like anyone's convictions manifested themselves out of thin air. But somewhere along the line a person should pick up a little resilience to influence from every single person they encounter on TV or walking down the street.
Mark wrote: "And I respectfully disagree with the idea that we are all "involuntary role models." If a person allows everyone they encounter to be a potential role model, it means they don't have confidence in their own convictions. "It's primarily kids I'm thinking about. (It's the CiTR in me.)
They're everywhere when we least expect it. A guy can't even hang himself without a kid learning about it on the news on in the papers and it sticks in their mind and the next thing you know they're out in the garage with a rope, experimenting.
Or what about those pro football players on "roids" who beat their kids or fiancees? Or Michael Vick, getting busted for raising dogs to fight? No one apparently told them they were role models.
And don't get me started on Bill Cosby.
Monty J wrote: "It's primarily kids I'm thinking about. (It's the CiTR in me.) ..."Aren't they just as likely to NOT want to be like us?
Kallie wrote: "Aren't they just as likely to NOT want to be like us?"With kids I think it depends on the kind and amount of parenting they're getting. In the absence of a strong parental presence, they're bound to experiment.
If 70% of black children are born out of wedlock, it means there's a lot of them without an ideal amount of quality parental presence. Nothing against mothers, but there are limits to what a single parent can accomplish.
Even in college, kids make really stupid choices, like that lacross team that gangbanged the stripper. Even the stripper (wasn't she, too, a student?) was engaging in risky behavior.
I haven't read all these but one book I definitely think deserves to be on the list is The Great Gatsby .
Monty J wrote: "A guy can't even hang himself ..."Call me morbid, but this line cracked me up. "Gee whiz, a guy can't even hang himself without ." All we can know for sure is that the guy who has hung himself, presumably successfully, isn't worried all that much about any effects it may have.
Football players, Michael Vick, any athlete, any comedians, entertainers, musicians, captains of industry are not role models just because they are wealthy, beloved, in receipt of public acclaim, famous--whatever.
And we should disabuse children and adults alike of the notion that they are and that they should be. We should refuse to give in to the temptation to allow such celebrities assume the mantle of role models when we can be damned sure they've got some creepy demons of their own under their carefully controlled surface (Bill Cosby).
That's bullshit. A role model should be someone who models virtuous and human hearted behavior whether they are famous or rich or in the public eye. I think kids should learn more about how they might best conduct their lives at the dinner table (or the equivalent) than they do from pronouncements of some billionaire athlete or rockstar. I tried to impart that kind of outlook to my own kids. I hope I was successful.
Karen wrote: "Monty wrote; "No woman has ever tried to stop me on the street except to ask directions, or that streetwalker in LA when I was wearing a Marine Corps uniform and had a very severe haircut."Tell us more..."
Let's just say I wasn't made of stone, but it was more of a learning/Xaviera Hollander experience than a Pretty Woman kind. She was grateful. I was grateful. No remorse. It would make a good Bukowski kind of story though. Jeese, now I have to write the darned thing. What will my daughters say?
Mark wrote: "A role model should be someone who models virtuous and human hearted behavior whether they are famous or rich or in the public eye. I think kids should learn more about how they might best conduct their lives at the dinner table (or the equivalent) than they do from pronouncements of some billionaire athlete or rockstar."You're helping to make my point. No matter what we as parents say and do it can't erase the messages a kid is receiving from other sources, negative and positive. Besides, many if not most kids aren't getting good parenting, so we can't let our guard down when our kids aren't around. Other kids can see too.
Need I mention Beavis and Butthead, Renn and Stempy, Southpark, Cinderella? Sesame Street must be regarded by the Extreme Right as subversive to their fascist philosophy, as it was so famously singled out by Mitt Romney as a target for elimination.
Negative role models are everywhere. Kids are going to explore and experiment and we can't be there every waking moment, especially during the teenage years.
If adults are conscious of the messages we are conveying (walking our talk) and vigilant, we will give children fewer reasons to reject what we are trying to teach them.
(This falls under the category of protecting chidren, in terms of relevance to CiTR.)
"Football players, Michael Vick, any athlete, any comedians, entertainers, musicians, captains of industry are not role models just because they are wealthy, beloved, in receipt of public acclaim, famous--whatever."
By definition, they are role models because they are on TV and in the public eye. There are both negative and positive models.
Monty J wrote: "Karen wrote: "Monty wrote; "No woman has ever tried to stop me on the street except to ask directions, or that streetwalker in LA when I was wearing a Marine Corps uniform and had a very severe ha..."Haha!! Love it Monty! Your daughters will think you were a guy, that's all.
Renee wrote: "This is the kind of person who should be a role model: http://www.heifer.org/join-the-conver...""geek glitterati" would be a definite improvement.
In my experience most people (of whatever age, gender or ethnicity) are content to be led most of the time, and that's not necessarily a bad thing. Everybody leads, follows or avoids situationally, and not always intentionally. Leadership influences organization, and organization influences productivity (in raw terms.) Even in the absence of formal leadership, though, somebody is the first to cast a stone, sit down to get to work, or fuck off for the rest of the day, and people take that as tacit permission. Again, not necessarily bad, but part of the human pack mentality kind of thing.So, we're "role-models" of some stripe whether we like it or not. Even those of us who are not parents, presidents or poets. At a certain point it becomes incidental and ubiquitous.
However, that's probably not the traditional use of the term "role-model" so I think there's some wiggle room when it comes to terms....
Kallie wrote: "Renee wrote: "This is the kind of person who should be a role model: http://www.heifer.org/join-the-conver...""geek glitterati" would be a definite imp..."
I loved the fact that it was more important to him to keep his word than to keep his money.
Gary wrote: "So, we're "role-models" of some stripe whether we like it or not. Even those of us who are not parents, presidents or poets. At a certain point it becomes incidental and ubiquitous."This is what I am driving at. Kids don't look for people with signs on their heads saying "ROLE MODEL." They see and ear what they see and hear. You can't sneeze without some kid seeing/hearing; it's just nature.
This is why drug dealers target school kids. They recruit the ones most vulnerable and turn them into dealers, and the cancer spreads.
Drug dealers and fast food chains. Get 'em while they're young, and you have them for life.
Since Karen was particularly interested in Monty´s non interlude(or wasn´t it) with the lady of the streets, I have my own to tell from my repertoire of personal anecdotes. I have lived here in southern Mexico for the past 9 years and my first year in Merida, capital of Yucatan, I was leaving the central park when a smallish, thin woman, almost anorexic, walked towards me on the sidewalk. I gazed at her and she held my gazein a blatantly sexual manner as we walked past each other. I knew immediately what her profession was and what she would want to offer, and seeing not only the open invitation but perhaps the desperation for a client in her eyes, anticipated what happened next. I became nervous and walked a bit faster.
Two blocks later she caught up with me when I stopped to station myself at the bus stop for my return home. She suggested her giving me a massage at my hotel room for $50, mistaking me for a tourist. I declined. Again, the desperation for a good night´s wages pressed on. Thinking that I had misunderstood her she repeated the proposal, 5 more times in fact as she still did not get it that I was not interested.
Finally to make clear what she had to offer, she motioned as if she were eating a submarine sandwich, slowly and repeatedly as pedestrians passed by. I was getting desperate by that point and still reluctant to insult her. Finally after much exasperation, she gave up. I was relieved.
A year later I was sitting in the same park with a good friend and she walked by. I pointed her out, telling him that was the woman of my anecdote. He couldn´t stop laughing and explained that hers was having balls in both respect, again to my embarrassment.
A horse is a horse, of course of course...... :}
Monty J wrote: "Nothing against mothers, but there are limits to what a single parent can accomplish."I suppose there are studies that back up that line of thinking. But that's only because there are decades if not centuries of data available for mom/dad/kid families and not nearly as much data about single parent families. Although there's something telling (gawd, I sound so politically correct even to myself right now) about your statement "nothing against mothers," as if a dad needs to be added to the equation for optimal rearing of children.
Don't some dad and dad duos do a more than OK job (not much data on that yet either)? Don't some mom and mom duos do a more than OK job? Maybe that's over reach on my part. And honestly, Monty, I think you know me well enough to know I'm not picking on you, just thinking aloud.
David Brooks at times goes on and on about the fact that a two parent family has been statistically proven to rear more ... I don't know ... well-balanced, civically engaged and morally grounded children, but I think the other (or at least, another) variable here is that in many cases we are talking about children, raised by single parents, who are in abject fucking poverty! I think the poverty might have something to do with how they navigate life, you think?
Mark wrote; "Don't some dad and dad duos do a more than OK job (not much data on that yet either)? Don't some mom and mom duos do a more than OK job?"Well yes, we have seen this. I have middle school kids who have two Moms, or more infrequently, two Dads. They are as well adjusted as any kid with a traditional Mom and Dad home. I work with someone who, at 25, is quite mature and successful- she never had a Dad.
I think parental abandonment is where the problems arise- a kid who has a parent that left them, permanently.
Parents can abandon children without physically leaving. In some ways, I wonder if that's not worse — constant, ongoing, rejection, revisited on a daily basis with new twists.
Renee wrote: "Parents can abandon children without physically leaving. In some ways, I wonder if that's not worse — constant, ongoing, rejection, revisited on a daily basis with new twists."It would seem worse. A definitive study would be interesting to read.
Karen: "I work with someone who, at 25, is quite mature and successful- she never had a Dad."
But, is she happy?
Mark wrote: "there's something telling (gawd, I sound so politically correct even to myself right now) about your statement "nothing against mothers," as if a dad needs to be added to the equation for optimal rearing of children.My context was the black community, where 70% of the children are born out of wedlock. I think the violence and crime statistics within this community are at least some indication that single parenting isn't working well.
Although there could be some long term Darwinian benefits that will take time to emerge. Adversity breeds strength. (Darwin had a better way of saying it, though.)
"I think the poverty might have something to do with how they navigate life, you think? "
Poverty is undoubtedly a major factor. Education as well.
Someone should do a definitive study. Anecdotal evidence only carries so much weight.
Monty J wrote: "Karen: "I work with someone who, at 25, is quite mature and successful- she never had a Dad."Monty wrote; "But, is she happy?"
She certainly is, she's a special person with a great boyfriend and job- she loves both. And she has a wonderful mother, grandparents. While this is just anecdotal evidence, single parenting can be successful.
And yes, Dad's are extremely important, I could not have raised my son without his.
Monty J wrote: "Mark wrote: "there's something telling (gawd, I sound so politically correct even to myself right now) about your statement "nothing against mothers," as if a dad needs to be added to the equation ...Poverty is undoubtedly a major factor. Education as well.Someone should do a definitive study. Anecdotal evidence only carries so much weight. "
While probably encouraging the tangent this thread has taken, there are a pair (coincidental and not as far as I can tell directly related) of web articles that have appeared recently:
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/making-se...
http://sacramento.cbslocal.com/2014/1...
The first is from PBS regarding why the middle class can't get ahead. The second link is a CBS story about a University California at Davis economics professor that, my words, says the Myth of the American Dream is a Myth. Or there is no American Dream.
Money alone is not going to solve the problems but we do, according to these writers, have a nearly intractable class problem underlying many of social problems. Duh!
My next post will return to the original programming unless someone ones to chew on either or both of these items!
A few thousand posts ago, I commented in this thread about another of those 'overrated' books. As a result, I've more or less kept up with this thread from notifications. That previous set of comments led me to read again a number of books and the latest is Catcher in the Rye. I am reading it for the 'umpteenth' time, but the first in probably this century.Currently being nearly a third of the way through CITR, there are three things from the discussions I've noticed.
The first is the lack of overall discussion about the importance of Salinger creating in American literature the teenager as a character type. From the angst driven motivations to the evolving maturity - world viewpoint of the growing mind Salinger offers, it is being quickly skipped to look at psychoanalytic text analysis, to metaphoric meaning, to alternative and comparative literature analysis. Holden is our first teenager. That is overwhelming important and I feel it needs to not be skipped, minimized, or assumed as a part of the other discussions. Much of what makes CITR important is simply that the author invents the realm of the teenager as being unique and definable. See also the review I mention below.
Secondly a technique that I now recall being part of CITR discussions I've participated in 'once long ago' is the specific use of profanity in the book. Not just vulgarity, obscenity, or crude euphemism, but the invoking of the profane. I know, of course, that this is the basis of much of the one form of parsing of the book by critics and academics alike to get to the 'true meaning' of CITR. It remains an interesting and overlooked topic in this day and age of everyone using any old term they want interchangeably. Holden chooses his words carefully and discards the rest. His knowledge and ability in writing along with his brother's skill tells us that Holden really means to invoke the dismissal of the deity and that social role when he goddamn's the world.
A third topic that popped up a few hundred comments back was the search for a negative review of Catcher. While the one I'm going to link is not an entirely negative review, the author does capture well much of the criticism that CITR deserves and it falls fairly well in line with my concern as I read that Catcher has become dated. More on this later/future posts.
Jason Pettus review link:
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
Finally, I'll leave this entry in The Catcher in the Rye discussion with a thought:
A character in the movie "Risky Business" says that we every so often need to just say W-T-F. I am of the considered opinion that settling down and watching either that movie or "Ferris Bueller's Day Off" one may learn far more about CITR than by any other expedient method.
Now I'm off to Never, Never Land to finish my Styxian journey through the 48 hours of Holden.
Oh my god guys! Why don't you add every book in the world to this post of overrated books! Seriously, whatever books you added to that list, ALMOST EVERY BOOK had some profound change in the way i think and simply i enjoyed reading them for pleasure! It differs for every person, but books doesnt need to b overrated..jus coz they are popular and read by many.. There is a reason why dey are soo popular.. U need to grow up and stop bitching abt books vch u think are overrated. Seeriously.
CD wrote: "Jason Pettus review link:"Not a bad review, except I don't see it so much a young adult novel as an adult novel about the teenager living within us all, a lament on the necessary loss of innocence on the way to becoming an adult. Maybe it's 50:50. You can't read it as an adult without getting personality insights than were impossible as a teen because teens are by definition living within the transitional state being described. They can't see it as transitional because it's the only reality they know; they're living it.
Caterpillar, pupa and butterfly are different states of being. Teens, the vast majority of them, are emerging from pupae-ville, just starting to sample the sights and smells of a limited portion of the world. Death--James Castle's mangled body--is an abstract notion, something in a video or book or some stage or screen rendition of Romeo and Juliet. The vast majority of teens have never been in the presence of a lifeless body and smelled the pungent vapors of death--well, maybe a frog in biology class--or lost a beloved sibling.
It's true the book's major literary significance is that Holden was America's first literary teenager, but only by a few months. East of Eden's Cal Trask came screaming onto the scene in '52 after Holden cursed his way here in '51. Effectively, it was a tie, but Cal is imbeded in a much larger novel and rarely thought of independently unless you've seen the film with James Dean playing Cal.
Dean's Jim Stark, in Rebel Without a Cause, roared onto the scene in '55. In '61 came West Side Story, The Outsiders' in '67, American Graffiti in '73. Maybe we are due for an updated classic rendition of the American teen experience. (Sorry, vampires need not apply.)
The comparison with Huckleberry Finn is good. I felt it instantly the first time I read CiTR at 19. In each book, the authenticity of the distinctive rambling flawed first-person narrator's voice transported me into the intimate world of the protagonist. The authenticity of the narrator's voice in The Outsiders was to me the strongest feature of that book as well.
CD wrote: "Monty J wrote: "Mark wrote: "there's something telling (gawd, I sound so politically correct even to myself right now) about your statement "nothing against mothers," as if a dad needs to be added ..."Perhaps nothing drives the stake through the heart of innocence deeper than the reality of class warfare. For those on top, and at the bottom.
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And we must be his GR minions.