THE CATCHER IN THE RYE, JEROME DAVID SALINGER

TITLE: THE CATCHER IN THE RYE (EL GUARDIÁN ENTRE EL CENTENO)

AUTHOR: Jerome David Salinger (United States of America)

YEAR OF PUBLICATION: 1951

For the third time I read "The Catcher In The Rye", written by Jerome David Salinger, and by general opinion, it is considered a classic work in the contemporary literature of the United States of America. 

Like many books in their beginning, "The Catcher In The Rye" caused a lot of controversy due to the topics that the story depicts. Sex, alcohol, some kind of profligancy, or unadapted social behaivor, for example. All the before mentioned caused a breakdown in the conservative society of that time.

In some senses, this book encompasses and deals with the universal topics that other literary masterpieces have done. Such things that define us as humans, for instance, the blue, the loneliness, the constant quest of identitiy and self-questioning and the non-sense sensation in a caothic world. Likewise, this Salinger's work represents some rejection or rupture point with some traditional values, a confrontation with the consumerism, the social fakeness, the success and happiness definitions, and maybe implied; the value of education. Through the whole book we will testify all of this in the situations and dialogues that the main character sustains. And it is in this point, for me, in which "The Catcher In The Rye has its great and most outstanding merit that supports the points previously stated. 

But wherther or not this book has  subersive or challenging content, Salinger wrote one of the best characters in the literature with an undeniable identity: yes, he is Holden Caulfiel, the catcher in the rye. Known and read in first person, the reader will  deal with the features of the book anteriorly referred, but by doing so in a hilarious, sarcastic and vivid narration that portraits Holden's mind. One could read many characters within a lot of stories, but among them, one could identify to Holden Caulfield by the hand of Salinger. What I mean, is that the reader will hate or love to Holden Caulfiel due to his nitid and honest personification, and also, due to -I would like to think so- that Salinger's really known his character, and more than a character, he conceived a real human being -as anybody of us- with all the issues of life. That is to say, someone with fears, doubts and uncertainity, with merits and mistakes, and in constant changing.