The Catcher in the Rye," written by J.D. Salinger and published in 1951, is a classic American novel that explores the themes of adolescence, alienation, and identity through the eyes of its protagonist, Holden Caulfield. The novel is set in the 1950s and follows Holden, a 16-year-old who has just been expelled from his prep school, Pencey Prep. Disillusioned with the world around him, Holden decides to leave Pencey early and spend a few days alone in New York City before returning home. Over the course of these days, Holden interacts with various people, including old friends, a former teacher, and strangers, all the while grappling with his feelings of loneliness and dissatisfaction. Holden is deeply troubled by the "phoniness" of the adult world and is haunted by the death of his younger brother, Allie, which has left a lasting impact on him. He fantasizes about being "the catcher in the rye," a guardian who saves children from losing their innocence by catching them before they fall off a cliff into adulthooda. The novel ends with Holden in a mental institution, where he is being treated for a nervous breakdown. He expresses some hope for the future, indicating a possible path to recovery..

It's Christmas time and Holden Caulfield has just been expelled from yet another school...Fleeing the crooks at Pencey Prep, he pinballs around New York City seeking solace in fleeting encounters -- shooting the bull with strangers in dive hotels, wandering alone round Central Park, getting beaten up by pimps and cut down by erstwhile girlfriends. The city is beautiful and terrible, in all its neon loneliness and seedy glamour, its mingled sense of possibility and emptiness. Holden passes through it like a ghost, thinking always of his kid sister Phoebe, the only person who really understands him, and his determination to escape the phonies and find a life of true meaning.

From the bestselling, Booker Prize-winning author of The Sense of an Ending comes an extraordinary fictional portrait of the relentlessly fascinating Russian musician and composer Dmitri Shostakovich and a stunning meditation on the meaning of art and its place in society. • “Brilliant…. As elegantly constructed as a concerto.” —NPR 1936: Dmitri Shostakovich, just thirty years old, reckons with the first of three conversations with power that will irrevocably shape his life. Stalin, hitherto a distant figure, has suddenly denounced the young composer’s latest opera. Certain he will be exiled to Siberia (or, more likely, shot dead on the spot), Shostakovich reflects on his predicament, his personal history, his parents, his daughter—all of those hanging in the balance of his fate. And though a stroke of luck prevents him from becoming yet another casualty of the Great Terror, he will twice more be swept up by the forces of despotism: coerced into praising the Soviet state at a cultural conference in New York in 1948, and finally bullied into joining the Party in 1960. All the while, he is compelled to constantly weigh the specter of power against the integrity of his music.

Presents a collection of essays analyzing Salinger's The catcher in the rye, including a chronology of his works and life.

Five essays focus on various aspects of the novel from its ideology within the context of the Cold War and portrait of a particular American subculture to its account of patterns of adolescent crisis and rich and complex narrative structure.

J. D. Salinger's 1951 novel, The Catcher in the Rye, is the definitive coming-of-age novel and Holden Caulfield remains one of the most famous characters in modern literature. This jargon-free guide to the text sets The Catcher in the Rye in its historical, intellectual and cultural contexts, offering analyses of its themes, style and structure, and presenting an up-to-date account of its critical reception.

"The puzzling, frustrating world of Holden Caulfield never loosens its grip on our imagination. Somehow, the growing pains of a privileged, alienated teenager lock onto deeper issues that continue to haunt us all. The Catcher in the Rye and Philosophy exposes these deeper issues by looking at Salinger's masterpiece through a philosophic lens."--Publisher's website.

"The official book of the acclaimed documentary film"--Jacket.

J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye (1951) is a twentieth-century classic. Despite being one of the most frequently banned books in America, generations of readers have identified with the narrator, Holden Caulfield, an angry young man who articulates the confusion, cynicism and vulnerability of adolescence with humour and sincerity. This guide to Salinger’s provocative novel offers: an accessible introduction to the text and contexts of The Catcher in the Rye a critical history, surveying the many interpretations of the text from publication to the present a selection of new critical essays on the The Catcher in the Rye, by Sally Robinson, Renee R. Curry, Denis Jonnes, Livia Hekanaho and Clive Baldwin, providing a range of perspectives on the novel and extending the coverage of key critical approaches identified in the survey section cross-references between sections of the guide, in order to suggest links between texts, contexts and criticism suggestions for further reading. Part of the Routledge Guides to Literature series, this volume is essential reading for all those beginning detailed study of The Catcher in the Rye and seeking not only a guide to the novel, but a way through the wealth of contextual and critical material that surrounds Salinger’s text.

A collection of nine exceptional stories from the acclaimed author of The Catcher in the Rye 'This is the squalid, or moving, part of the story, and the scene changes. The people change, too. I'm still around, but from here on in, for reasons I'm not at liberty to disclose, I've disguised myself so cunningly that even the cleverest reader will fail to recognize me.' This collection of nine stories includes the first appearance of J. D. Salinger's fictional Glass family, introducing Seymour Glass in the unforgettable 'A Perfect Day for Bananafish'. 'The most perfectly balanced collection of stories I know' Ann Patchett