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e1cedcc
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He always had to know who was going. I swear, if that guy was shipwrecked somewhere, and you rescued him in the god damn boat, he'd want to know who the guy that was rowing it before he'd even get in.
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J.D. Salinger |
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47b62bb
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However contradictory the coroner's report -- whether he pronounces Consumption or Loneliness or Suicide to be the cause of death -- isn't it plain how the true artist-seer actually dies? I say that the true artist-seer, the heavenly fool who can and does produce beauty, is mainly dazzled to death by his own scruples, the blinding shapes and colors of his own sacred human conscience.
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J.D. Salinger |
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9a21c8a
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Zooey said... It would be very nice to come home and be in the wrong house. To eat dinner with the wrong people by mistake, sleep in the wrong bed by mistake, and kiss everybody good-bye in the morning thinking they were your own family.
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J.D. Salinger |
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e39b23f
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I have scars on my hand from touching certain people. Once, in the park, when Frannie was still in the carriage, I put my hand on the downy pate of her head and left it there too long. Another time, at Loew's Seventy-second Street, with Zooey during a spooky movie. He was about six or seven, and he went under the seat to avoid watching a scary scene. I put my hand on his head. Certain heads, certain colors and textures of human hair leave p..
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J.D. Salinger |
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55e4835
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Anyway, I started bitching one night before the broadcast. Seymour'd told me to shine my shoes just as I was going out the door with Waker. I was furious. The studio audience were all morons, the announcer was a moron, the sponsors were morons, and I just damn well wasn't going to shine my shoes for them, I told Seymour. I said they couldn't see them anyway, where we sat. He said to shine them anyway. He said to shine them for the Fat Lady.
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J.D. Salinger |
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00de610
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If God had wanted somebody with St. Francis's consistently winning personality for the job in the New Testament, he'd've picked him, you can be sure. As it was, he picked the best, the smartest, the most loving, the least sentimental the most un itative master he could possibly have picked. And when you miss seeing that, I swear to you, you're missing the whole point of the Jesus Prayer. The Jesus Prayer has one aim, and one aim . To endow..
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J.D. Salinger |
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b8bfa09
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I was surrounded by jerks. I'm not kidding.
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J.D. Salinger |
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10391f7
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That's the whole trouble. You can't ever find a place that's nice and peaceful, because there isn't any.
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J.D. Salinger |
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86fc13a
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The cards are stacked (quite properly, I imagine) against all professional aesthetes, and no doubt we all deserve the dark, wordy, academic deaths we all sooner or later die.
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J.D. Salinger |
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6c6e718
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You never even worried with Jane, whether your hand was sweaty or not. All you knew was, you were happy. You really were.
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J.D. Salinger |
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6b6529e
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Women kill me. They really do. I don't mean I'm oversexed or anything like that--although I am quite sexy. I just like them, I mean. They're always leaving their goddam bags out in the middle of the aisle.
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J.D. Salinger |
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b12aea0
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I'd swear to God, if I were a piano player or an actor or something and all those dopes thought I was terrific, I'd hate it. I wouldn't even want them to clap for me. People always clap for the wrong things. If I were a piano player, I'd play it in the goddam closet.
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J.D. Salinger |
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78b6502
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The more expensive a school is, the more crooks it has -- I'm not kidding.
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young-adult
school
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J.D. Salinger |
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e3f69cf
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While I was walking I passed these two guys that were unloading this big Christmas tree off a truck. One guy, kept saying to the other guy, 'Hold the sonunvabitch up! Hold it up, for Chrissake!' It certainly was a gorgeous way to talk about a Christmas tree.
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J.D. Salinger |
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d115333
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That cat was a spy. You to take a pot shot at it. It was a very clever German midget dressed up in a cheap fur coat.
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humor
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J.D. Salinger |
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5b4d822
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Listen," he said. "If you was a fish, Mother Nature'd take care of you, wouldn't she? Right? You don't think them fish just die when it gets to be winter, do ya?" No, but--" You're goddam right they don't"
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J.D. Salinger |
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f4f1c67
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I don't even like old cars. I mean, they don't even interest me at all. I'd rather have a goddam horse. A horse is at least human
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J.D. Salinger |
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a5c276f
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That's the terrible part. I swear to God I'm a madman.
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J.D. Salinger |
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c13d143
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Get your dirty stinking moron knees off my chest.
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J.D. Salinger |
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3bbfeff
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God damn it, there are nice things in the world - and I mean things. We're all such morons to get so sidetracked.
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J.D. Salinger |
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14156ed
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I told her I loved her and all. It was a lie, of course, but the thing is, I meant it when I said it. I'm crazy. I swear to God I am.
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J.D. Salinger |
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403a67d
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What happened was, I got the idea in my head-and I could not get it out eu that college was just one more dopey, inane place in the world dedicated to piling up treasure on earth and everything. I mean treasure is treasure, for heaven's sake. What's the difference whether the treasure is money, or property, or even culture, or even just plain knowledge? It all seemed like exactly the same thing to me, if you take off the wrapping eu and it ..
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J.D. Salinger |
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c326cf9
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He seemed unaware of the messiness of the arrangement.
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J.D. Salinger |
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a9e6750
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My brother Allie had this left-handed fielder's mitt. he was left handed. The thing that was descriptive about it though, was that he had poems written all over the fingers and the pocket and everywhere. In green ink. He wrote them on it so that he'd have something to read when he was in the field and nobody was up to bat. He's dead now.
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J.D. Salinger |
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11431b1
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Well. He's a very sensitive boy. He's really never been a terribly good mixer with other boys...' Sensitive. That killed me. That guy Morrow was about as sensitive as a goddamn toilet seat.
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J.D. Salinger |
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646fc4d
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Don't ever tell anybody anything. If you do, you start missing everybody
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J.D. Salinger |
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c0de191
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I said old Jesus probably would've puked if He could see it - all those fancy costumes and all. Sally said I was a sacrilegious atheist. I probably am. The thing Jesus really would've liked would be the guy who plays the kettle drums in the orchestra.
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J.D. Salinger |
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741e8a4
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It's nice when somebody tells you about their uncle. Especially when they start out telling you about their father's farm and then all of a sudden get more interested in their uncle.
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J.D. Salinger |
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4508dd5
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But doctors talk about cells as if they had such unlimited importance all by themselves. As if they didn't really belong to the person that has them." Teddy brushed back his hair from his forehead with one hand. "I grew my own body," he said. "Nobody else did it for me. So if I grew it, I must have known how to grow it. Unconsciously, at least. I may have lost the conscious knowledge of how to grow it sometime in the last few hundred thousa..
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J.D. Salinger |
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e7badbf
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D.B. asked me what I thought about all this stuff I just finished telling you about. I didn't know what the hell to say. If you want to know the truth, I don't know what I think about it. I'm sorry I told so many people about it. All I know about it is, I sort of miss everybody I told about. Even old Stradlater and Ackley, for instance. I think I even miss that goddam Maurice. It's funny. Don't ever tell anybody anything. If you do, you sta..
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ending-lines
holden-caulfield
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J.D. Salinger |
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60381c9
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Who in the Bible besides Jesus knew--knew--that we're carrying the Kingdom of Heaven around with us, inside, where we're all too goddam stupid and sentimental and unimaginative to look?
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J.D. Salinger |
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cc21aa0
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Did you know, God damn it, that Les was all for bringing a tangerine in to you last night before he went to bed? My God. Even Bessie can't stand stories with tangerines in them. And God knows I can't. If you're going to go on with this breakdown business, I wish to hell you'd go back to college to have it. Where you're not the baby of the family. And where, God knows, nobody'll have any urges to bring you any tangerines. And where you don't..
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J.D. Salinger |
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d244fdf
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She was always reading, and she read very good books.
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J.D. Salinger |
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6d1c7e8
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Do it for the fat lady!
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J.D. Salinger |
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30c2952
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Keep me up till five because all your stars are out, and for no other reason.
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J.D. Salinger |
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961075b
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Lane himself lit a cigarette as the train pulled in. Then, like so many people, who, perhaps, ought to be issued only a very probational pass to meet trains, he tried to empty his face of all expression that might quite simply, perhaps even beautifully, reveal how he felt about the arriving person. Franny was among the first of the girls to get off the train, from a car at the far, northern end of the platform. Lane spotted her immediately,..
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J.D. Salinger |
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b37e94c
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You know Sven? The man who takes care of the gym?' he asked. He waited till he got a nod from Nicholson. 'Well, if Sven dreamed tonight that his dog died, he'd have a very, very bad night's sleep, because he's very fond of that dog. But when he woke up in the morning, everything would be all right. He'd know it was only a dream.' Nicholson nodded. 'What's the point exactly?' The point is if his dog really died, it would be exactly the same ..
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illusion
dream
teddy
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J.D. Salinger |
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e93d48d
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I mean not try to analyze everything to death for once, if possible, especially me.
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J.D. Salinger |
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c9c5ac1
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I thought it was, "If a body catch a body," Anyway, i keep picturing all these little kids playing some game in this big field of rye and all. Thousands of little kids, and no ones around - nobody big I mean - except me. And I'm standing on the edge of this crazy cliff. What i have to do, I have to catch everybody if they start to go over the cliff - I mean if they're running and they don't look where they are going I have to come out from ..
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J.D. Salinger |
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cc11dfc
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yh chyzy khh khyly rwm tthyr gdhsht yn khnwmh bwd khh bGlm nshsth bwd w hmh sh gryh my khrd.hr chy fylmh mzkhrf tr my shd byshtr gryh my khrd. adm fkhr my khrd chwn adm mhrbwnyh drh gryh my khnh wly z yn khbr nbwd. mn bGlsh nshsth bwdm w khwb my dwnm.yh bchh hmrsh bwd khh Tflkh khyly khsth shdh bwd w my khwst brh dstshwyy wly khnwmh hy bhsh my gft arwm bgyrh w mwZb rftrsh bshh.ndzh y ykh grg mhrbwn bwd.b`Dy h yn Twry n. wsh yh fylmi chrt w ..
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J.D. Salinger |
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ec20c52
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You're a real prince. You're a gentleman and a scholar, kid.
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J.D. Salinger |
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5ba384a
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There isn't anyone anywhere who isn't Seymour's Fat Lady. Don't you know that? Don't you know that goddam secret yet? And don't you know -- listen to me, now -- don't you know who that Fat Lady really is? . . . Ah, buddy. Ah, buddy. It's Christ Himself. Christ Himself, buddy.
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J.D. Salinger |
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10834d5
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I thought the two ugly ones were sisters, but they got very insulted when I asked them. You could tell neither one of them wanted to look like the other one, and you couldn't blame them, but it was very amusing anyway.
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ugliness
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J.D. Salinger |
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c776058
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His eldest sister (who modestly prefers to be identified here as a Tuckahoe homemaker) has asked me to describe him as looking like 'the blue-eyed Jewish-Irish Mohican scout who died in your arms at the roulette table at Monte Carlo.
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J.D. Salinger |