Sunday, June 14, 2009

The Catcher in the Rye - J.D. Salinger


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That's how cold I am. This book is too thin to be a suitable hat.

I don't feel much need to rabbit on about this book, since it's a classic and there's nothing I can say that hasn't been said a hundred million times before. It's a dreary, miserable book. The unacknowledged despair, the pointlessness of it, the farce he bounces of, the destruction he follows, it all felt a bit too familiar.

Excellent use of voice. Phenomenal use of voice, actually. I found myself wanting to red pen, but nothing I wanted to put a red pen through was actually surplus. It all served a purpose.

And what I took from it, the one thing that stays with me, is the guy with 'mossy teeth'. Augh. My skin crawls just thinking on it again. Mossy teeth. Mossy teeth. AUGH.

Should you read it, just because it is a classic? Should you read it for any reason whatsoever? It's an interesting study, still says something about modern western society today, but I can already feel this book fading away from me. Maybe because I'm actively shedding it. Maybe because I don't need to keep it, I already contain it.

Verdict: Mossy teeth. Mossy teeth. Mossy teeth.

4 comments:

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  2. Nothing like the banana fish, first story of nine stories, I cry every time I read it. TCitR is excellent for a teenager, but the other 3 books excel everything. I love the 9 brothers of its a wise child, the haiku witter, the smoking mother, and the lovely young brothers F and Z

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  3. The mossy teeth must be the single biggest reason I hated Catcher as a teen and still hate it now.

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  4. On thinking on it, I agree with you, Mariana. I suspect TCitR would have had a much deeper impact on me had I read it as a teenager. Reading it now, it felt like old news. They were realisations and revelations I'm already acquainted with.

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