My rereading has led me to believe that Catcher in the Rye is

File: IMG_2164.jpg (38KB, 259x194px) Image search: [Google]

38KB, 259x194px

My rereading has led me to believe that Catcher in the Rye is a horror story. Like Lolita, in the mind of a maniac. Most review it like it is some Ode to Youth, or criticizing Holden for his petulance like he actually wrote the book or something. I do see that Salinger was channeling his frustrations through Holden but I don't think it's about teenage angst but about something much more frightening. With Mark Chapman and company in mind, and the fact that Salinger was there on D Day and for the freeing of Dachau camp, and for that line in the book about how when DB was in the war he felt like shooting everyone- Reading it again as a somewhat healthy/mature person, I get this overwhelming sense of dread, terror and forboding, like Holden is going to do something very terrible. I think it's to Salinger's merit that he created a character that comes to life, but this animation seems to distract readers from the underlying movement created by Salinger at ever turn. The universality of a young voice slowly losing grip with humanity is not only terrifying, but makes me realize that Salinger was, like Nabokov, prophesizing through fiction .