I just read it for the first time. Maybe it's because I never read it as a disenfranchised teenager or something, but it's a pretty mediocre read. The
protagonist seems like a rich little crybaby. Holden Caulfied is always made out to been this cool character by so many actors, writers, and the like. I think in real life, he would have been more like the fat rich kid who stole Pee-Wee's bike in Pee-Wee's Big Adventure. Sorrow outcasts, social retards, and the like, but that's I see it.

Catcher is very overrated. Salinger is pretty much a one (well, technically three) trick pony.

For my money, give me Tropic of Cancer as the ultimate nihilistic first person "fuck all" novel.

I always wanted to read it but figured I missed the boat since I'm no longer a teenager. Franny and Zooey translates better to adulthood. I recommend it.

I red this book when I was 15, it didn t impress me back then, wouldn t describe Holden as cool either.... Maybe I should read it again now...

I read Catcher in the Rye in high school, and didn't dig it, but re-read it later and thought it was pretty funny. Thanks for the review of King Dork, cause I was planning on reading it, but was kind of scared to do so. Have any of you read Apathy and Other Small Victories by Paul Neilan? I love that book.

Catcher in the Rye will always remain a blueprint to the disenfranchised youth. However, time changes everything, and as time goes on the very definition of the disenfranchised changes. It would be safe to say that many of us now have become disenfranchised with Holden's disenfranchisement. How's that for chaotic redundancy?

I read the novel King Dork by Frank Portman not too long ago. It wasn't very good. It's a kids book. I think he only wrote it so 14 year olds would read about bands like The Ramones and Sweet. But much of the book is based on the main character's dislike of Catcher in the Rye and he makes similar points about Catcher being mediocre. I liked Catcher in the Rye when I was 16 but I didn't understand why they made us read it in school since it seems to go against everything school stands for. Maybe it's one of those things where it's just subversive enough to act as a "release valve" for disenfranchised youth but not so subversive that they actually go around formulating their own opinions or anything. Kind of like office workers and Dilbert comics.