Sound Off To America - The Catcher in the Rye Cover I Never Knew

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SOUND OFF / J.D. Salinger

The Catcher in the Rye Cover I Never Knew

Posted: Friday, January 29, 2010 by CMichaels

I was reading through the J.D. Salinger tributes last night and saw this Catcher in the Rye book cover. It’s from 1953, two years after the book was released. I’d never seen it before.

Apparently Salinger didn’t like it because he didn’t want to display any physical appearances of Holden Caulfield to the reader. Through the years Catcher in the Rye has been best identified through two covers, the plain red one displaying only the title and Salinger’s name and perhaps as its best known, the carousel horse amidst the city backdrop emblematic of the book’s final scene.

But I really like this cover here. It’s pretty much the book in a nutshell. Holden moving on through the city, killing time between brief encounters and pondering life’s inevitable. I always felt like I knew Holden Caulfield pretty well but now I feel like I know him a little better.

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Comments

Posted: Saturday, January 30, 2010 by ChaseMorgan

What a great book! Thanks for sharing. I may have to agree with Salinger on this one though - Holden is supposed to be a symbol of "all" or "any" young male. I read this book when I was about 14 and found the character as a representative of what many young boys may feel like. He's kinda supposed to represent the reader, so putting a face to him sort of takes away from the symbolism Salinger was portraying.