The Catcher in the Rye (No Rating)

So, before I picked up The Catcher in the Rye, my only real knowledge of the book is that it is one of the most banned books of all time. It is also often a required book in High School, however, I wasn't ever asked to read it through school.

The Catcher in the Rye, J.D. Salinger. 1945. This book follows the life of a young man from prep school, to a trip to New York to....oh wait, I can't tell you where it goes because I chose not to finish the book. Now, it wasn't that I couldn't find the will to continue, it wasn't that bad. In fact, there were a couple of bright spots, particularly when the boy reminisces about his younger brother who has passed away. I got a little more than 100 pages into the book, and while I have to say I found the story uninteresting, the main character completely uncompelling, and the writing more than a bit lazy, every character was almost the exact same person, my real problem was the gratuitous use of profanity. No, not just the swearing, for good or ill I am fairly calloused to just bad language, I mean the actual definition of profanity. If you pop this book open, and two facing pages, I would bet that you will find at the very least 15 uses of the Lords name, minimum. Not only did I find this incredibly lazy writing, again every single character talked this way, but I couldn't continue, it grated so badly that I had to put the book down. I won't be finishing it.

Now, someone may say I have missed out on some grand conclusion, some wonderful character development, or brilliant insight into the American Experience. My only answer to that is, maybe Salinger should have done a dang sight better. While I clearly would not support the book banning, I can definitely see why so many people would rather their children not read this book.

I give it no rating, I can't truly judge the work in its entirety when I haven't read it.