The movie clip I referenced in my earlier post - complete with a ready-made interpretation, so proceed at your own risk ;)

As I said, that monologue surely got me interested, but I'd have to agree with huppurnies. Reading it while being a teen myself, maybe I just wasn't truly mature enough to "get it", but it didn't offer me any amazing insights or new viewpoints. "Life is scary and bleak, everybody's weird and I don't know what to do with myself." I can absolutely believe that it simply didn't speak to me in the way it did to other people (in the - it's me, not you sort of way). I guess it's easiest to just give it a shot yourself and see what you'll find.
It's fairly short, and I remember finding the prose quite enjoyable, so, there's always that.

Mark David Chapman, the guy who killed Lennon, had it in his nightstand too.

Conspiracy theorists say it's used as the trigger to activate mental conditioning. Some hypnotism, MK Ultra nonsense.

Murderous Rampage?

Looks like your conditioning is taking hold nicely

I thought only Relax had such powers?

(I might be watching too many shitty movies...)

Great book. The argument of "its a teenage thing" could be applied to just about any coming of age story ever. To each their own, its certainly not everyones cup of tea. The banning in the US was around the masturbation and prostitution threads. Pretty sure you are also talking the 70s, I dont think its currently on any major banned list. Of course some po-dunk town will have it on there but nothing state or even county wide. Could be wrong of course.

ugh, that book.

I have always been an avid reader, and at the time I read that I could easily do a hundred pages in an evening of light reading, and have plenty of time to spare.

Come across a friend of mine, stop to talk to her, and she's talking about how her brother and all the other kids at what was basically juvie loved this book, and I should read it, and here have this copy.
Ok, sure, free book, I'll read it.

I hated it so much (and refused to give up on a book at the time, I was stubborn) that it took me a month to read it.
98 freaking pages, should have finished it that evening. Nope, one solid freaking month.

That is one of the books I can put on the list of reasons why I finally realized you don't have to finish a book if you don't enjoy it.

I don't even really remember many details other than whiny kid goes around New York (?or some big city), and me thinking, "How in the hell did this inspire the shooting of John Lennon?"

"and all" -Holden Caulfield

I can relate. Perhaps I was already too old when I read it, or I was going through a rough period in my life, but I just couldn't stand bloody Holden Caulfield whining and acting like a spoiled brat all the time.

I doubt a teenager would really understand it, unless he goes throught exactly the same problems.

I believe it talks about failure in a world where everything is prepared for you, everyone is concerned about you, success is reachable with just a little effort and yet nothing of this appeals to you.
You feel the coming of wasted years before actually living them. You see the life prepared for you not being what you want.
What do you do then? The depressed hero of this book does exactly what was considered "unacceptable" by society.

I agree with molerat though. Couldn't read it in an afternoon, had to pause and re-read parts many times. Difficult book

I also could not understand what the fuss was about. Granted, my memory of reading it is a little fuzzy as I read it as a rather precocious 12 year old, but I do remember thinking that the nutters who claimed it was an inspiration to murder and mayhem was just plain that - nuts.

I did enjoy it, but I was also attempting to understand the viewpoint/philosophy of Nietzsche and nihilism at the same time. Caulfield seemed to be so aggressively stuck in place, I couldn't like him all that much as a character. I did however like Zooey and their inter-relationship.

I always meant to go back and re-read it as an adult having (hopefully) passed over the river Teenager and its tributary Angst. Perhaps there would be new insights reading in hindsight... Or not... ;)

A book about a dude who is constantly pissed off about things that are not worth being pissed off about. At the beginning it made me chuckle a few times, but as the pages went on it started to get really old and annoying. Also there's not really a story. It's more like reading page 153 to 319 of a teenagers 500 page diary, book #11 out of 15.

I don't regret reading it. It's rather short, so I didn't waste too much time. But I couldn't see anything in it to justify its cultural significance. Have you seen the South Park episdoe? Yeah, that's how I felt about this book.

You mentioning re-reading makes me think you couldn't read it in an afternoon for entirely different reasons. I may be wrong, but re-reading implies you wanted deeper or better understanding of the book and the events therein. Or something similar.

My trouble was I just didn't like it. I found myself wanting to do ANYTHING other than read that book, and the only reason I kept picking it up is because I stubbornly liked to finish what I started reading.

I've since learned better. If something I decide to read for leisure turns out to be shit, I find something better to do with my time.

I'm curious, did anyone get the joke of my original post? I was spoofing the most common/unusual phases of the book. Here's a few more:

moron
bastard
I felt like giving old Jane Gallagher a buzz but then I didn't feel like it
flitty

Right on brother! I have always thought of it as Fight Club 1.