"Ask her if she still keeps all her kings in the back row." - Holden Caulfield

Okay okay okay. If you've known me for more than fifteen minutes, you know that I want to be a real writer some day and that my favorite book ever published is The Catcher in the Rye, by J.D Salinger. Sincerely, my hands actually can't type quick enough to tell you all of this - I am literally hyperventilating at my desk (fine I'm actually working from bed) and cannot contain nor restrain my delight. At all. 

*Breathes*

I need to do this properly. For Jerry. Not that he'd have liked any of this I'm sure, but here:

 

The Catcher in the Rye is a novel first published in 1951, narrated by an adolescent boy (the protagonist) Holden Caulfield. I'm going to stop you right here and say that Benjamin - your name was very almost Holden. We were stuck between Holden and Harper for you - but now it says "Benjamin Nicholas Clark" on your birth certificate and I think that's pretty damn beautiful. 

We're getting off the subject. I love this book and it changed everything about me at the time I read it. It made me hate society, it made me bitter, angry and ignited an awakening of sorts. Everything he wrote was so completely true; his search and questioning of humanity was tangible. He said everything that I wasn't brave enough to think. Holden Caulfield is incredibly smart, funny, wise and soulful. He's frustrated, confused and angry. He's so angry. I don't know if he ever said that he was angry, but you can feel it in every chamber of your heart.

I have met many people that were not affected by this book at all. I met people in high school and varsity that had written articles, papers and theories on the book and all the conspiracies surrounding it. An easy indication on whether or not we'd get along is what you thought of this book - I was obsessed with it for years in a very real and emotional way. The novel has been banned, unbanned and was linked to the attempted assassination of Ronald Reagan. The man that shot John Lennon: Mark Chapman, had his copy of The Catcher in the Rye on him when he was arrested. Inside it he had written "To Holden Caulfield, from Holden Caulfield. This is my statement." 

I have quoted J.D Salinger in many previous posts and articles, but just a quick recap of the inside of Salinger's mind: Extractions from The Catcher in the Rye:

If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you'll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don't feel like going into it

It was that kind of a crazy afternoon, terrifically cold, and no sun out or anything, and you felt like you were disappearing every time you crossed a road.

It's partly true, too, but it isn't all true. People always think something's all true.

I'm the most terrific liar you ever saw in your life. It's awful. If I'm on my way to the store to buy a magazine, even, and somebody asks me where I'm going, I'm liable to say I'm going to the opera. It's terrible.

In the first place, I'm sort of an atheist. I like Jesus and all, but I don't care too much for most of the other stuff in the Bible. Take the Disciples, for instance. They annoy the hell out of me, if you want to know the truth. They were all right after Jesus was dead and all, but while He was alive, they were about as much use to Him as a hole in the head. All they did was keep letting Him down. 

 

Take most people, they're crazy about cars. They worry if they get a little scratch on them, and they're always talking about how many miles they get to a gallon, and if they get a brand-new car already they start thinking about trading it in for one that's even newer. I don't even like cars. I mean they don't even interest me. I'd rather have a goddam horse. A horse is at least human, for God's sake.

These intellectual guys don't like to have an intellectual conversation with you unless they're running the whole thing. They always want you to shut up when they shut up.

Boy, when you're dead, they really fix you up. I hope to hell when I do die somebody has sense enough to just dump me in the river or something. Anything except sticking me in a goddam cemetery. People coming and putting a bunch of flowers on your stomach on Sunday, and all that crap. Who wants flowers when you're dead? Nobody

It's funny. All you have to do is say something nobody understands and they'll do practically anything you want them to

Mr Antolini: "Among other things, you'll find that you're not the first person who was ever confused and frightened and even sickened by human behavior. You're by no means alone on that score, you'll be excited and stimulated to know. Many, many men have been just as troubled morally and spiritually as you are right now. Happily, some of them kept records of their troubles."

If you want to know the truth, I don't know what I think about it. I'm sorry I told so many people about it. All I know about it is, I sort of miss everybody I told you about. It's funny. Don't ever tell anybody anything. If you do, you start missing everybody.

You'll probably never see a film adaptation of Catcher in The Rye because J.D Salinger refused it all of his life, and it is still being refused. I think that's romantic as hell. Celebrities and directors like Jerry Lewis, Marlon Brando, Jack Nicholson, Leonardo di Caprio, Steven Speilberg and John Cusack have all attempted to create or star in an adaptation of J.D Salinger's original work. Isn't that something? 

Stranger yet is that when Salinger became incredibly famous for this novel - he sort of disappeared, stopped publishing - but never stopped writing. It's all very mysterious, and those close to him were very tight-lipped about the details until the author's death in 2010.

Anyway, what I really wanted to tell you is that a documentary aptly named "SALINGER" has been created and is due for release in South Africa in November this year. The documentary apparently provides an unprecedented look inside the private world of J.D. Salinger, the reclusive author of The Catcher in the Rye. It features appearances by Edward Norton, Judd Apatow and Philip Seymour Hoffman. Directed by Shane Salerno and produced by Buddy Squires, Craig Flanning and Deborah Randall. Here is the trailer. Quick: someone knock me out and wake me up on 1 November.