J.D. Salinger: biography

Jerome David Salinger, best known as J.D. Salinger, is one of the most popular and influential authors of American fiction after World War II. We all know him because of his controversial novel Catcher in the Rye.

J.D. Salinger was born on January 1, 1919 in New York, N.Y., as a second child of Sol and Miriam Salinger. J.D. Salinger was raised on Manhattan where he attended McBurney School, a private preparatory school in Manhattan (Commire 201). He never finished this school; he was also expelled from other private preparatory schools before graduating from Valley Forge Military Academy in 1936. Then, he attended Columbia University, where he started writing short novels. He also attended New York University and Ursinus College. In 1942 he was drafted into the United States Army (Commire 205). He became a staff sergeant and served in Europe till 1945. After the World War II he received five battle stars. Salinger did not stop writing even in the battlefield. He carried a “portable typewriter with him in the back of his jeep”. In September 1945, he married Sylvia, a French physician. This marriage lasted only two years. In 1946, J.D. Salinger returned to the United States. In October 1955, he got married for the second time. His new wife was Claire Douglas. This time, his marriage lasted twelve years. J.D. Salinger has two children from his second marriage: Margaret Ann, and Matthew. J.D. Salinger became a recluse in early 1960’s. He lives in New Hampshire now, where he continues writing, but for himself only (Discovering Authors).

J.D. Salinger is best known for his novel Catcher in the Rye. He started to write it while he was working for “New Yorker”, and then, on July 16, 1951, he published it (Discovering Authors). The novel tells a story of a sixteen-year-old Holden Caulfield. Throughout the Catcher in the Rye, he fights with phonies and the “phony” world (Commire 206). In spite of the novel’s instantaneous popularity, it was banned by many people and from many schools, because of novel’s “language and social criticism” (Commire 207).

J.D. Salinger is also known for his short stories. His most famous collection is Nine Stories, which was first published in 1953. All of the stories are about the Glass family. The opening story, “A Perfect Day For Bananafish”, which I analyzed from the historical perspective, is about the suicide of Seymour Glass. Every story is about a different member of this family, and every story is about the war between a sensitive individuality and all of the phonies (Discovering Authors). Nine Stories carries us through a series of “human spiritual evolution”, and that is why Salinger gained popularity after the publication of this collection (Discovering Authors).

Franny and Zooey also brought enormous popularity to J.D. Salinger
(Discovering Authors). When he published it in autumn of 1960, the book became the literary event of the year. Franny and Zooey contains two stories: “Franny” and “Zooey”, both, much like the Nine Stories, are about the Glass family. Critics generally applauded the structure of “Franny”, “as well as its appealing portrait of its heroine, while “Zooey” was praised for its meticulous detail and psychological insight” (Discovering Authors). Franny and Zooey, alongside the Nine Stories, is claimed as Salinger’s best short fiction.

J.D. Salinger contributed to the literature in several ways. The most significant contribution is Catcher in the Rye. Its phenomenon is so emphatic, that every self-respecting reader had to read the novel one, or more times. The novel touched such themes and subjects, that no other famous book touched before, as “sexual subject matter, and rejection of traditional American“ (Discovering Authors). People of 1950’s found in the novel “the voice of their Generation” (Commire 206). Now, Catcher in the Rye is regarded as a “classic work of adolescent angst”. 1950’s have been called “The Age of Holden Caulfield”, because the book is “the voice of a in revolt against a world and in search of mystical escapes from deteriorating society rather than cause-providing political revolution or reform” (Discovering Authors).
J.D. Salinger’s work became a great criticism material. He is criticized for many things, like his style, themes, influences, etc. First of all, Philip Stevick in his criticism calls his style a “brisk, ironic New Yorker style”. He also wrote that Salinger’s stories are anti-narrative, because J.D. Salinger loves first-person point of view. Ihab Hasaan wrote that J.D. Salinger imposed a limit to the language and form s of his fiction. “Most of his work are very short, highly colloquial, sentimental, yet heavily ironic tales”, wrote Philip Stevick (Discovering Authors).
Second of all, Salinger’s themes are causing much criticism. Philip Stevick called Salinger’s fiction as an “attack on the life-style of the highly educated, urban, upper middle class”; adolescents and younger adults attack it. These teenagers and younger adults are fighting against this “phony” world, and they often find only one way out: suicide (Discovering Authors).

Salinger’s influences are also criticized (Discovering Authors). Take Holden Caulfield from Catcher in the Rye, for an example. He is much like a young Salinger, with little differences, like Salinger was not a post World War II teenager, while Holden was (Commire 206). Salinger has this tendency of writing almost autobiographical stories, according to Philip Stevick. J.D. Salinger’s own experiences are a great influence on his work. You can find many Zen attitudes in Salinger’s stories. J.D. Salinger started to be interested in Zen attitudes toward life and art after he visited the Rama Krishna-Vivekananda Center in New York. According to this Zen culture, a suicide is not a defeat, but a triumph, and that is why Seymour Glass in “A Perfect Day For Bananafish” decided to commit suicide (Commire 208). Also Salinger’s military experience influenced his work. Ihab Hasaan wrote that Seymour Glass was placed in United States Army on purpose. Salinger simply wanted to imply Seymour’s mental problems, what were caused by his war experience. Salinger wanted us to have an explanation for Seymour’s death.