Salinger Page #13

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Holden wasn't violent,

but he had a violent thought

of shooting someone.

The word 'kill' is used

a lot in the book.

"This is my people-shooting hat.

I kill people in this hat."

The word 'phoney' is used

over 30 times in the book.

Chapman read an article

in 'Esquire' magazine.

The theme of the article was

John Lennon was a sell-out,

John Lennon was a phoney.

I say to myself,

"That phoney. That bastard."

If you are reading the

book through a distorted lens,

you feel so acutely

Holden's powerlessness,

and you say,

"Yeah. I feel powerless too."

John Lennon

was talking to a nobody

to sign an album for a nobody.

"Look at this guy.

He's a big rock star.

"He comes in a limousine."

Look, he's a phoney.

"You want me to teach you

what reality is?" Bang!

Mark David Chapman

wrote me a letter

that I should read

'Catcher in the Rye'

to understand

why he committed this murder.

He reads that novel in open

court when he is sentenced.

This is my statement,

underlining the word 'this'.

If one... person used something

I had written

as their justification

for killing somebody,

I'd say,

"God, people are crazy."

It didn't end

with the death of John Lennon.

You keep paying for this

over and over

when you hear

of a death of a celebrity,

and maybe they've got

'The Catcher in the Rye',

as John Hinckley did.

Young Hinckley,

the whiz-kid who shot Reagan,

and his press secretary said,

"if you want my defence,

"all you have to do is read

'Catcher in the Rye'."

Rebecca Schaeffer

was expecting a script

to be delivered to her

for 'Godfather III'.

Rebecca Schaeffer

came to the door.

Like this.

Among the pieces of evidence

was a copy of

'Catcher in the Rye'.

But if three people

use something I had written

as justification,

I would really be

very, very troubled by it.

It's not the one.

It's the series of three.

I would see him downtown

and I'd say hi

and he'd walk right by

and not even say hi.

And I knew him well.

I was talking to

a friend who owned a bookstore,

and I told him, I said, "I'm

really thinking I'll just go

"up to New Hampshire

and find J.D. Salinger."

And he says, "Yeah, well,

I think you oughta call up NASA

"and, you know, bum a ride

on the next space shuttle too."

Well, the minute

you go into town

and you say "J.D. Salinger",

everybody becomes your enemy.

This one lady in the shop would

not sell me an ice-cream cone.

So I thought, "Ooh!

Not my friendliest place."

The owner of the market

suggested that I write a note,

that I didn't need

a mailing address,

just leave it

at the post office.

I bought a notebook,

went outside, sat on the kerb,

wrote a note - I was determined

not to go to his property.

I wasn't gonna

cross that river.

I thought if he came in

voluntarily to where I was

that no-one could ever say

with any truth

that I had sabotaged the man,

that I had waylaid him

or any of those things.

So I was ready.

Sat down where I said

I would be and waited.

He doesn't have to go down

and meet her in her Pinto.

If he really wants to protect

his seclusion that much,

he doesn't go.

And so here he came.

He walked across the bridge.

I didn't know what to expect.

We've all seen that photograph

on the back of the book.

You expect people

to age, but...

...somehow,

it's not the same as seeing it.

There he was,

and I was shocked.

He was as tall

as I thought he would be,

but he had snow-white hair,

and I was not prepared for that.

We shook hands, and he said,

"if you're a writer, you need

to quit that newspaper.

"Newspapers serve no purpose."

And he said publishing was the

worst thing a person could do.

He insisted that he was

working, working for himself,

and that's what

writing should be -

that every writer should write

for their own reasons,

but it should be

for themselves alone.

The only important thing

was the writing.

According to J.D. Salinger.

What is he writing about?

He said, "I will say this.

"It is of far more significance

"than anything

I ever wrote about Holden."

He said, "I have

really serious issues

"that I'm trying to tackle with

these new writing projects."

And he always said 'writing'.

I persisted - I wanted to know

if he was writing a sequel

to 'The Catcher in the Rye'.

And he became

rather annoyed, agitated.

And so I finally just put the

notebook down, put my pen down

and looked up at him and said,

"Why did you come here?"

He lost some of his intensity,

uncrossed his arms

and he said that he thought

writing Holden was a mistake.

It meant he couldn't live

a normal life.

His children suffered.

Why couldn't his life

be his own?

Then he turned around

and stalked off.

And so I watched him walk away

and I took the photo of him

walking back toward the bridge.

It was just the personification

of his attitude.

"Just leave me alone."

J.D. Salinger

is very much a Howard Hughes.

He is still a man in control

of his domain there.

And it remains to be seen

what, actually,

he is sitting upon.

I think the guy's

earned the right

to do it his way,

and you know what,

whether he's earned it or not,

he's doing it his way anyway.

I guess what I'd like to ask

him is what he's written for

the last 40 years - isn't that

what everybody wants to know?

It's

the great literary mystery.

I want to believe.

I want to see more of the work.

He promised in the back flaps

of 'Franny and Zooey'

and 'Seymour, an Introduction'

that he's writing other stories.

I just wanna see that stuff.

If he published

a book tomorrow,

it would be a number one

bestseller the next day.

He very proudly showed me

a set of files

where a red dot meant "This is

ready to go upon my death,"

a green dot meant

"This needs editing."

Someone cracks that code, man,

it's gonna be

the story of the century.

If he does publish and

the writing is actually good,

it will be a second act

unlike almost

any American writer has had.

I wanted you to ask me

if I ever met J.D. Salinger.

Mr Berg, have you

ever met J.D. Salinger?

I've never met J.D. Salinger.

But I came close.

When I was researching my book

on Max Perkins,

I went up to visit

Max Perkins's sister,

and as we're sitting there

at dinner, I said,

"Gosh," you know, "as I was

driving up to see you,

"it occurred to me that

across the covered bridge

"is Cornish, New Hampshire, and

J.D. Salinger lives over there.

"Have you ever seen

J.D. Salinger?"

And she said, "Well,

why do you want to know?"

I said,

"Well, I was just curious."

And she said, "Well,

as a matter of fact,

"he sat in that chair you're

sitting in just last night

"when I served him dinner."

I said, "You're kidding."

She said, "No, no,

he comes over here regularly,

"'cause he comes over

to pick up his mail.

"He'll stop in. Sometimes

I'll ask him to stay to dinner."

I said, "Really? J.D. Salinger?"

She said, "Well, do you have

anything to say to him?"

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