J.D. Salinger was catapulted to fame in 1951 with the publication of a short novel, The Catcher in the Rye, which has become the treasured handbook of alienation for generations of angst-ridden teenagers.
With its themes of rebellion, young sexuality and lost innocence, it tells the story of teenager Holden Caulfield, who is both protagonist and narrator. Caulfield, apparently the victim of a mental breakdown, reflects on his expulsion from the privileged surroundings of his Pennsylvania boarding school and his subsequent experiences over three days in New York.
As well as being an immediate bestseller, the book continues to sell a quarter of a million copies annually. Salinger never wrote another novel, and in the next 12 years, before retreating to rural New Hampshire as a permanent recluse, published only three volumes of short stories and novellas. The three books after The Catcher in the Rye were For Esme – With Love and Squalor (1953); Franny and Zooey (1961); and Raise High the Roof Beam Carpenters, and Seymour: An Introduction (1963).
After 1963, Salinger spent the rest of his life successfully avoiding all but a minute circle of neighbours in Cornish, a New Hampshire hamlet. The other inhabitants gradually learnt to be defensive about their odd, uncommunicative neighbour.
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