The Catcher in the Rye

In my opinion, I think that my favorite author out of Ernest Hemingway, author of Old Man and the Sea, John Steinbeck and Robert DeMott, authors of Grapes of Wrath, and J.D Salinger, author of The Catcher in the Rye, I would pick J.D Salinger over all of them. The Catcher in the Rye was not my favorite book by a long shot, but when I think about it, J.D was the best author. I have never read a book like The Catcher in the Rye before, and I think the thing that set it apart from other novels is the way it was written. It is written in first person from the point of view of a sixteen year old boy named Holden Caulfield. The story takes place in the nineteen-fifties in New York City. This is not your average kind of first person story telling, though. J.D Salinger made his character come alive and makes the reader feel like they are actually being spoken to by a teenage boy. J.D Salinger does this by using certain words, phrases, language, thoughts and ideas. Teenage boys, and teenagers in general, do not always use the best grammar. By not writing formally like other authors do, J.D Salinger wrote Holden Caulfield’s story in the exact way it would have been spoken. He also did not filter any of Holden’s thoughts. I think that during the time that this was written, it must have been absolutely scandalous. Nothing J.D Salinger is completely inappropriate, or would not be thought of as inappropriate today, but I can see where it could be seen as offensive in the nineteen-fifties. The times then were so much different than they are now. I think that the story would not have been the same at all if J.D Salinger had filtered or altered what a sixteen year old boy thought or said. It would not have the same impact on readers. I can see where J.D Salinger might have taken a risk by writing and publishing it during his time, and I always appreciate courage.