So this is one of those books that people are supposed to have read, or else they’re a philistine or whatever, so I read it.
Maybe I’m not all that literate or something, because I’m not entirely sure what makes it such a huge freaking deal that it’s one the 100 best novels of all time.
I liked it ok, it was a nice story, but I guess I’m missing the big secret meaning or whatever. Maybe back when it was written, it was a big deal to point out how everything is fake and how everyone is full of shit, but now-a-days, everybody already just assumes that everybody else is a big, fake sack of shit, and it’s not really anything to get excited about.
I give The Catcher in the Rye 3 Jihadis out of 5
I agree with you about Catcher In The Rye. I’m 40 years old and was able to get through high school without having to read this book. After reading the book recently I thought “What’s the big deal about this book? Caulden seemed like a whiny kid who needed a slap in the back of the head every time he judged people he knew nothing about.”
The beauty of Catcher in the Rye is not in Holden’s blabber of how everyone is shit and the reader realizes that his blabber is true throughout the book. The beauty of the book lies in the nature of Holden’s character. Holden goes through a really scary moment in his life where he is depressed and wondering if his life is really worth living. It’s one of the first novels to look in the psyche of the teenage mind and show that it is a tough time for them. Holden is stuck between adolescence and adulthood and he doesn’t know which way to go, he wants to grow up and not be treated like a kid, but he misses the innocence of childhood.
I think maybe it would have been better for me to have been a teenager when I first read this book, instead of a grumpy old man 🙂