Holden

The Catcher in the Rye battles fiercely with The Clearing for the tile of my favorite book. Both are books I read usually annually, and both are books that no matter how many times I have read them (which is over five times for the first and ten times for the second), I am amazed every time with the sheer, well, amazingness of the books.

One thing that The Catcher in the Rye has that The Clearing lacks is Holden Caulfield, easily my favorite character of the literally thousands of books I have read over the course of my literary life. I just... I LOVE Holden. And I love this book. I would actually name a child after Holden if I wanted that kid to read TCITR before he was of an appropriate age (teenage years), but I don't, and considering it's not fair to name a kid after someone but discourage him to read the book until he's a teenager, I wouldn't do that. But that's how much I love Holden.

Lots of books attempt the "coming of age" story, but really only this book succeeds in creating a believable, disillusioned character trying to cope with the "phoniness" of the bourgeois, upper middle-class New England/NYC society. And to accomplish what Salinger accomplishes in writing about only a couple of days... as an self-described "budding" author, I'm not sure I could ever hope to come close to what Salinger has managed to accomplish in this book. Having read parts of Salinger's other books, I think this is really the only time he manages it too. But if the option is to put all of your most amazing writing into one work and writing lots of other mediocre works like Salinger or the guy that wrote "Lord of the Flies" (Golding or something-- all his other books kind of suck in my opinion), I'd definitely pick to write the one amazing work.

Ironically enough, I just finished my ?sixth? reading of TCITR (sorry, too lazy to spell that out) today, and there was also a post secret post card today on the subject which I will paste in here now which duplicates my sentiments exactly (hmm okay well it appeared at the top of the post). But yes, Holden, you've saved us all, generations of disillusioned youth unsure of a phony society of cheerleaders and football players, groping for meaning in hollow places. Thank you, Holden. You brought us hope. And I'm sure that through my life, again and again, as I read this book for the fourtieth and fiftieth time, you will continue to do so.