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If Only You’d Remember Before Ever You Sit Down To Write That You’ve Been A Reader Long Before You Were Ever A Writer. You Simply Fix That Fact In Your Mind, Then Sit Very Still And Ask Yourself, As A Reader, What Piece Of Writing In All The World Buddy Glass Would Most Want To Read If He Had His Heart’s Choice. The Next Step Is Terrible, But So Simple I Can Hardly Believe It As I Write It. You Just Sit Down Shamelessly And Write The Thing Yourself. I Won’t Even Underline That. It’s Too Important To Be Underlined.

-J. D. Salinger

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If Only You’d Remember

J. D. Salinger

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If Only You’d Remember Before Ever You Sit Down To Write That You’ve Been A Reader Long Before You Were Ever A Writer. You Simply Fix That Fact In Your Mind, Then Sit Very Still And Ask Yourself, As A Reader, What Piece Of Writing In All The World Buddy Glass Would Most Want To Read If He Had His Heart’s Choice. The Next Step Is Terrible, But So Simple I Can Hardly Believe It As I Write It. You Just Sit Down Shamelessly And Write The Thing Yourself. I Won’t Even Underline That. It’s Too Important To Be Underlined.

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You Can Hit My Father Over The Head With A Chair And He Won't Wake Up, But My Mother, All You Have To Do To My Mother Is Cough Somewhere In Siberia And She'll Hear You.

The True Poet Has No Choice Of Material. The Material Plainly Chooses Him, Not He It.

Sentimentality Is Loving Something More Than God Does.

Loving Something

Sensitive. That Killed Me. That Guy Morrow Was About As Sensitive As A Toilet Seat.

I Ignored The Flashes Of Lightning All Around Me. They Either Had Your Number On Them Or They Didn't.

Girls. You Never Know What They're Going To Think.

If You Can't, Or Won't, Think Of Seymour, Then You Go Right Ahead And Call In Some Ignorant Psychoanalyst. You Just Do That. You Just Call In Some Analyst Who's Experienced In Adjusting People To The Joys Of Television, And Life Magazine Every Wednesday, And European Travel, And The H-bomb, And Presidential Elections, And The Front Page Of The Times, And God Knows What Else That's Gloriously Normal.

If I'd Wanted This Place To Fill Up With Every Fat Irish Rose That Passes By, I'd've Said So.

I Mean They Don't Seem Able To Love Us Just The Way We Are. They Don't Seem Able To Love Us Unless They Can Keep Changing Us A Little Bit. They Love Their Reasons For Loving Us Almost As Much As They Love Us, And Most Of The Time More.

I'm Sick Of Just Liking People. I Wish To God I Could Meet Somebody I Could Respect.

John Keats / John Keats / John / Please Put Your Scarf On.

Its Really Hard To Be Roommates With People If Your Suitcases Are Much Better Than Theirs.

Happiness Is A Solid And Joy Is A Liquid.

They Didn't Act Like People And They Didn't Act Like Actors. It's Hard To Explain. They Acted More Like They Knew They Were Celebrities And All. I Mean They Were Good, But They Were Too Good.

People Are Mostly Hot To Have A Discussion When You're Not.

Boy, Did He Depress Me! I Don't Mean He Was A Bad Guy- He Wasn't. But You Don't Have To Be Bad Guy To Depress Somebody- You Can Be A Good Guy And Do It.

He Had A Theory, Walt Did, That The Religious Life, And All The Agony That Goes With It, Is Just Something God Sics On People Who Have The Gall To Accuse Him Of Having Created An Ugly World.

We’re Freaks, That’s All. Those Two Bastards Got Us Nice And Early And Made Us Into Freaks With Freakish Standards, That’s All. We’re The Tattooed Lady, And We’re Never Going To Have A Minute’s Peace, The Rest Of Our Lives, Until Everybody Else Is Tattooed, Too.

Do You Know What I Was Smiling At? You Wrote Down That You Were A Writer By Profession. It Sounded To Me Like The Loveliest Euphemism I Had Ever Heard. When Was Writing Ever Your Profession? It's Never Been Anything But Your Religion.

Bessie: 'why Don't You Get Married?' Zooey: 'i Like Riding In Trains Too Much. You Never Get To Sit Next To The Window Anymore When You're Married.

I Don't Really Deeply Feel That Anyone Needs An Airtight Reason For Quoting From The Works Of Writers He Loves, But It's Always Nice, I'll Grant You, If He Has One.

I'm Not Afraid To Compete. It's Just The Opposite. Don't You See That? I'm Afraid I Will Compete - That's What Scares Me.

If Somebody At Least Listens It Not Too Bad

Life Is A Gift Horse In My Opinion.

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 Thing. Only He Wouldn't Know It. I Mean He Wouldn't Wake Up Till He Died Himself.

If Only You’d Remember Before Ever You Sit Down To Write That You’ve Been A Reader Long Before You Were Ever A Writer. You Simply Fix That Fact In Your Mind, Then Sit Very Still And Ask Yourself, As A Reader, What Piece Of Writing In All The World Buddy Glass Would Most Want To Read If He Had His Heart’s Choice. The Next Step Is Terrible, But So Simple I Can Hardly Believe It As I Write It. You Just Sit Down Shamelessly And Write The Thing Yourself. I Won’t Even Underline That. It’s Too Important To Be Underlined.

I Don't Even Know What I Was Running For—i Guess I Just Felt Like It.

That's Something That Annoys The Hell Out Of Me-i Mean If Somebody Says The Coffee's All Ready And It Isn't.

I Think If You Don't Really Like A Girl, You Shouldn't Horse Around With Her At All, And If You Do Like Her, Then You're Supposed To Like Her Face, And If You Like Her Face, You Ought To Be Careful About Doing Crumby Stuff To It, Like Squirting Water All Over It. It's Really Too Bad That So Much Crumby Stuff Is A Lot Of Fun Sometimes.

Marriage Partners Are To Serve Each Other. Elevate, Help, Teach, Strengthen Each Other, But Above All, Serve. Raise Their Children Honorably, Lovingly And With Detachment. A Child Is A Guest In The House, To Be Loved And Respected - Never Possessed, Since He Belongs To God. How Wonderful, How Sane, How Beautifully Difficult, And Therefore True. The Joy Of Responsibility For The First Time In My Life.

Franny Has The Measles, For One Thing. Incidentally, Did You Hear Her Last Week? She Went On At Beautiful Length About How She Used To Fly All Around The Apartment When She Was Four And No One Was Home. The New Announcer Is Worse Than Grant - If Possible, Even Worse Than Sullivan In The Old Days. He Said She Surely Dreamt That She Was Able To Fly. The Baby Stood Her Ground Like An Angel. She Said She Knew She Was Able To Fly Because When She Came Down She Always Had Dust On Her Fingers From Touching The Light Bulbs.

I Mean Most Girls Are So Dumb And All. After You Neck Them For A While, You Can Really Watch Them Losing Their Brains. You Take A Girl When She Really Gets Passionate, She Just Hasn't Any Brains. -holden Caulfield

This Fall I Think You're Riding For—it's A Special Kind Of Fall, A Horrible Kind. The Man Falling Isn't Permitted To Feel Or Hear Himself Hit Bottom. He Just Keeps Falling And Falling. The Whole Arrangement's Designed For Men Who, At Some Time Or Other In Their Lives, Were Looking For Something Their Own Environment Couldn't Supply Them With. Or They Thought Their Own Environment Couldn't Supply Them With. So They Gave Up Looking. They Gave It Up Before They Ever Really Even Got Started.

Then The Carousel Started, And I Watched Her Go Round And Round...all The Kids Tried To Grap For The Gold Ring, And So Was Old Phoebe, And I Was Sort Of Afraid She's Fall Off The Goddam Horse, But I Didn't Say Or Do Anything. The Thing With Kids Is, If They Want To Grab For The Gold Ring, You Have To Let Them Do It, And Not Say Anything. If They Fall Off, They Fall Off, But It Is Bad To Say Anything To Them.

It's Really Too Bad That So Much Crumby Stuff Is A Lot Of Fun Sometimes.

If A Body Catch A Body Coming Through The Rye.

She Was There, And She Was The Whole City, And That’s That.

People Never Believe You.

You Never Even Worried, With Jane, Whether Your Hand Was Sweaty Or Not. All You Knew Was, You Were Happy. You Really Were.

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.

If Death Stepped Miraculously Through The Glass And Came In After You, In All Probability You Just Got Up And Went Along With Him, Ferociously But Quietly.

I'm The Most Terrific Liar You Ever Saw In Your Life. It's Awful. If I'm On My Way To The Store To Buy A Magazine, Even, And Somebody Asks Me Where I'm Going, I'm Liable To Say I'm Going To The Opera. It's Terrible.

Pencey Was Full Of Crooks. Quite A Few Guys Came From These Wealthy Families, But It Was Full Of Crooks Anyway. The More Expensive A School Is, The More Crooks It Has - I'm Not Kidding.

Each Of His Phrases Was Rather Like A Little Ancient Island, Inundated By A Miniature Sea Of Whiskey.

You Asked Me How To Get Out Of The Finite Dimensions When I Feel Like It. I Certainly Don't Use Logic When I Do It. Logic's The First Thing You Have To Get Rid Of.

It's No Fun To Be Yellow. Maybe I'm Not All Yellow. I Don't Know. I Think Maybe I'm Just Partly Yellow And Partly The Type That Doesn't Give Much Of A Damn If They Lose Their Gloves. One Of My Troubles Is, I Never Care Too Much When I Lose Something - It Used To Drive Mother Crazy When I Was A Kid. Some Guys Spend Days Looking For Something They've Lost. I Never Seem To Have Anything That If I Lost It I'd Care Too Much. Maybe That's Why I'm Partly Yellow. It's No Excuse, Though. It Really Isn't. What You Should Be Is Not Yellow At All.

We Don't Talk, We Hold Forth. We Don't Converse, We Expound.

I Wouldn't Exactly Describe Her As Strictly Beautiful. She Knocked Me Out, Though.

I Prayed For The City To Be Cleared Of People, For The Gift Of Being Alone—a-l-o-n-e: Which Is The One New York Prayer That Rarely Gets Lost Or Delayed In Channels, And In No Time At All Everything I Touched Turned To Solid Loneliness.

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.

I'm Up To My Ears In Unwritten Words.

I Was Sixteen Then, And I'm Seventeen Now, And Sometimes I Act Like I'm About Thirteen. Sometimes, I Act A Lot Older Than I Am--i Really Do. But People Never Notice It. People Never Notice Anything.

Something Else An Academic Education Will Do For You. If You Go Along With It Any Considerable Distance, It Will Begin To Give You An Idea What Size Mind You Have. What’ll Fit And, Maybe, What It Won’t. After A While, You’ll Have An Idea What Kind Of Thoughts Your Mind Should Be Wearing. For One Thing, It May Save You An Extraordinary Amount Of Time Trying On Ideas That Won’t Suit You, Aren’t Becoming To You. You’ll Begin To Know Your True Measurements And Dress Your Mind Accordingly.

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.

Against My Better Judgment I Feel Certain That Somewhere Very Near Here—the First House Down The Road, Maybe—there's A Good Poet Dying, But Also Somewhere Very Near Here Somebody's Having A Hilarious Pint Of Pus Taken From Her Lovely Young Body, And I Can't Be Running Back And Forth Forever Between Grief And High Delight.

I'm Known As A Strange, Aloof Kind Of Man. But All I'm Doing Is Trying To Protect Myself And My Work.

Phooey, I Say, On All White-shoe College Boys Who Edit Their Campus Literary Magazines. Give Me An Honest Con Man Any Day.

She Said She Knew She Was Able To Fly Because When She Came Down She Always Had Dust On Her Fingers From Touching The Light Bulbs.

There Isn’t A Nightclub In The World That You Can Sit In For A Long Time Unless You Can At Least Buy Some Liquor And Get Drunk. Or Unless You’re With Some Girl That Really Knocks You Out.

Sometimes You Get Tired Of Riding In Taxicabs The Same Way You Get Tired Riding In Elevators. All Of A Sudden, You Have To Walk, No Matter How Far Or How High Up.

Don't Tell People What You Are Thinking, Or You Will Miss Them Terribly When You Are Away.

I Can Be Quite Sarcastic When I'm In The Mood.

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.

If You Weren't Around, I'd Probably Be Someplace Way The Hell Off. In The Woods Or Some Goddamn Place. You're The Only Reason I'm Around, Practically.

The Existence Of God, The Why Of Life, Was All That Really Only A Question Of Glands?

Existence Of God

I Felt So Lonesome, All Of A Sudden. I Almost Wished I Was Dead.

I Was About Half In Love With Her By The Time We Sat Down. That's The Thing About Girls. Every Time They Do Something Pretty... You Fall Half In Love With Them, And Then You Never Know Where The Hell You Are.

God, I Wish You Could Have Been There.

Could Have Been

Don't Ever Tell Anybody Anything. If You Do, You Start Missing Everybody.

Who Wants Flowers When Youre Dead? Nobody.

I Kept Picturing All These Little Kids In This Big Field Of Rye... If They're Running And They Don't Look Where They're Going, I Have To Come Out From Somewhere And Catch Them.

If There Is An Amateur Reader Still Left In The World - Or Anybody Who Just Reads And Runs - I Ask Him Or Her, With Untellable Affection And Gratitude, To Split The Dedication Of This Book Four Ways With My Wife And Children.

She Was Not One For Emptying Her Face Of Expression.

But You Can't Always Tell - With Somebody's Mother, I Mean. Mothers Are All Slightly Insane.

Most Stuff That Is Genuine Is Better Left Unsaid.

People Always Clap For The Wrong Reasons.

Rewards And Recognition

He Said You Were The Only One Who Was Bitter About S.'s Suicide And The Only One Who Really Forgave Him For It. The Rest Of Us, He Said, Were Outwardly Unbitter And Inwardly Unforgiving.

There's A Marvelous Peace In Not Publishing, There's A Stillness. When You Publish, The World Thinks You Owe Something. If You Don't Publish, They Don't Know What You're Doing. You Can Keep It For Yourself.

How Long Should A Man's Legs Be? Long Enough To Touch The Ground.

I'm Sick Of Not Having The Courage To Be An Absolute Nobody. I'm Sick Of Myself And Everybody Else That Wants To Make Some Kind Of A Splash.

I’m Not Going To Bed After All. Somebody Around Here Hath Murdered Sleep. Good For Him.

But I'm Crazy. I Swear To God I Am.

I Live In New York, And I Was Thinking About The Lagoon In Central Park, Down Near Central Park South. I Was Wondering If It Would Be Frozen Over When I Got Home, And If It Was, Where Did The Ducks Go? I Was Wondering Where The Ducks Went When The Lagoon Got All Icy And Frozen Over. I Wondered If Some Guy Came In A Truck And Took Them Away To A Zoo Or Something. Or If They Just Flew Away.

It's Funny. All You Have To Do Is Say Something Nobody Understands And They'll Do Practically Anything You Want Them To.

Holden Caulfield

Life Is A Game, Boy. Life Is A Game That One Plays According To The Rules.

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

There Isn't Anyone Out There Who Isn't Seymour's Fat Lady.

You Don't Have To Think Too Hard When You Talk To Teachers.

I Have Scars On My Hands From Touching Certain People.

If You Have Something To Offer, Someone Will Learn Something From You. It's A Beautiful Reciprocal Arrangement. And It Isn't Education. It's History. It's Poetry.

I Can’t Explain What I Mean. And Even If I Could, I’m Not Sure I’d Feel Like It.

It Was The Last Game Of The Year And You Were Supposed To Commit Suicide Or Something If Old Pencey Didn't Win.

The Sentence Im Reading Is Terrific.

If There's One Thing I Hate, It's The Movies. Don't Even Mention Them To Me.

I'm Aware That Many Of My Friends Will Be Saddened And Shocked, Or Shock-saddened, Over Some Of The Chapters In 'the Catcher In The Rye.' Some Of My Best Friends Are Children. In Fact, All My Best Friends Are Children. It's Almost Unbearable For Me To Realize That My Book Will Be Kept On A Shelf Out Of Their Reach.

I Have Scars On My Hands From Touching Certain People…certain Heads, Certain Colours And Textures Of Human Hair Leave Permanent Marks On Me.

But Guilt Is Guilt. It Doesn't Go Away. It Can't Be Nullified. It Can't Even Be Fully Understood, I'm Certain - It's Roots Run Too Deep Into Private And Long-standing Karma. About The Only Thing That Saves My Neck When I Get To Feeling This Way Is That Guilt Is An Imperfect Form Of Knowledge. Just Because It Isn't Perfect Doesn't Mean That It Can't Be Used. The Hard Thing To Do Is To Put It To Practical Use, Before It Gets Around To Paralyzing You.

It's So Silly. All You Do Is Get The Heck Out Of Your Body When You Die. My Gosh, Everybody's Done It Thousands Of Times. Just Because They Don't Remember, It Doesn't Mean They Haven't Done It.

I Was Six When I Saw That Everything Was God, And My Hair Stood Up, And All, Teddy Said. It Was On A Sunday, I Remember. My Sister Was A Tiny Child Then, And She Was Drinking Her Milk, And All Of A Sudden I Saw That She Was God And The Milk Was God. I Mean, All She Was Doing Was Pouring God Into God, If You Know What I Mean.

Poets Are Always Taking The Weather So Personally.

Boy, When You're Dead, They Really Fix You Up. I Hope To Hell When I Do Die Somebody Has Sense Enough To Just Dump Me In The River Or Something. Anything Except Sticking Me In A Goddam Cemetery. People Coming And Putting A Bunch Of Flowers On Your Stomach On Sunday, And All That Crap. Who Wants Flowers When You're Dead?

It's Not Too Bad When The Sun's Out, But The Sun Only Comes Out When It Feels Like Coming Out.

I Was Surrounded By Phonies...they Were Coming In The Goddam Window.

Holden Caulfield

It Always Smelled Like It Was Raining Outside, Even If It Wasn't, And You Were In The Only Nice, Dry, Cosy Place In The World.

You Take A Really Sleepy Man, Esmé, And He Always Stands A Chance Of Again Becoming A Man With All His Fac — With All His F-a-c-u-l-t-i-e-s Intact.

This Is A People Shooting Hat," I Said. "i Shoot People In This Hat.

If Sentiment Doesn't Ultimately Make Fibbers Of Some People, Their Natural Abominable Memories Almost Certainly Will.

She's Quite Intelligent, In My Stupidity.

Tilting His Head Back He Slowly Released An Enormous Quantity Of Smoke From His Mouth And Drew It Up Through His Nostrils. He Continued To Smoke In This "french-inhale" Style. Very Probably, It Was Not Part Of The Sofa Vaudeville Of A Showoff But, Rather, The Private, Exposed Achievement Of A Young Man Who, At One Time Or Another, Might Have Tried Shaving Himself Left-handed.

Enormous Quantities

It Is My Rather Subversive Opinion That A Writer's Feelings Of Anonymity-obscurity Are The Second Most Valuable Property On Loan To Him During His Working Years.

The Color Of His Pallor, However, Was A Curiously Basic White - Unmixed, That Is, With The Greens And Yellows Of Guilt Or Abject Contrition. It Was Very Like The Standard Bloodlessness In The Face Of A Small Boy Who Loves Animals To Distraction, All Animals, And Who Has Just Seen His Favourite, Bunny-loving Sister's Expression As She Opened The Box Containing His Birthday Present To Her - A Freshly Caught Young Cobra, With A Red Ribbon Tied In An Awkward Bow Around Its Neck.

In The First Place, You’re Way Off When You Start Railing At Things And People Instead Of At Yourself.

Seymour Once Said That All We Do Our Whole Lives Is Go From One Little Piece Of Holy Ground To The Next.

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

The Room Was Not Impressively Large, Even By Manhattan Apartment-house Standards, But Its Accumulated Furnishings Might Have Lent A Snug Appearance To A Banquet Hall In Valhalla.

I Have So Much I Want To Tell You, And Nowhere To Begin.

After I Go Out This Door, I May Only Exist In The Minds Of All My Acquaintances…i May Be An Orange Peel.

You’d Better Get Busy, Though, Buddy. The Goddam Sands Run Out On You Every Time You Turn Around. I Know What I’m Talking About. You’re Lucky If You Get Time To Sneeze In This Goddam Phenomenal World.

There Are Still A Few Men Who Love Desperately.

It's Partly True, Too, But It Isn't All True. People Always Think Something's All True.

Some Game. If You Get On The Side Where All The Hot-shots Are, Then It's A Game, All Right - I'll Admit That. But If You Get On The Other Side, Where There Aren't Any Hot-shots, Then What's A Game About It? Nothing. No Game.

Why's It So Sunny?" She Repeated. Zooey Observed Her Rather Narrowly. "i Bring The Sun Wherever I Go, Buddy," He Said.

Ask Her If She Still Keeps All Her Kings In The Back Row.

Listen, If You're Not Going To Be A Nun Or Something, You Might As Well Laugh.

People Never Think Anything Is Anything Really. I'm Getting Goddam Sick Of It.

Then Again You May Pick Up Just Enough Education To Hate People Who Say, 'it's A Secret Between He And I.'

Your Heart, Bessie, Is An Autumn Garage.

But I Do Say That Educated And Scholarly Men, If They’re Brilliant And Creative To Begin With—which, Unfortunately, Is Rarely The Case—tend To Leave Infinitely More Valuable Records Behind Them Than Men Do Who Are Merely Brilliant And Creative. They Tend To Express Themselves More Clearly, And They Usually Have A Passion For Following Their Thoughts Through To The End.

How Do You Know You're Going To Do Something, Untill You Do It?

What I Really Felt Like, Though, Was Committing Suicide. I Felt Like Jumping Out The Window. I Probably Would've Done It, Too, If I'd Been Sure Somebody'd Cover Me Up As Soon As I Landed. I Didn't Want A Bunch Of Stupid Rubbernecks Looking At Me When I Was All Gory.

Know Your True Measurements And Dress Your Mind Accordingly

Probably For Every Man There Is At Least One City That Sooner Or Later Turns Into A Girl. How Well Or How Badly The Man Actually Knew The Girl Doesn’t Necessarily Affect The Transformation. She Was There, And She Was The Whole City, And That’s That

The World Is Full Of Actors Pretending To Be Human

I Feel Overwhelmingly Grateful To Them, But I Don't Know What To Do With Their Invisible Gifts.

It Was A Very Stupid Thing To Do, I'll Admit, But I Hardly Didn't Even Know I Was Doing It.

I Was Trying To Feel Some Kind Of Good-bye. I Mean I’ve Left Schools And Places I Didn’t Even Know I Was Leaving Them. I Hate That. I Don’t Care If It’s A Sad Good-bye Or A Bad Good-bye, But When I Leave A Place I Like To Know I’m Leaving It. If You Don’t You Feel Even Worse.

She Wasn't Doing A Thing That I Could See, Except Standing There Leaning On The Balcony Railing, Holding The Universe Together.

I'd Never Yell, "good Luck!" At Anybody. It Sounds Terrible, When You Think About It.

I Have Scars On My Hands From Touching Certain People...certain Heads, Certain Colours And Textures Of Human Hair Leave Permanent Marks On Me. Other Things, Too. Charlotte Once Ran Away From Me, Outside The Studio, And I Grabbed Her Dress To Stop Her, To Keep Her Near Me. A Yellow Cotton Dress I Loved Because It Was Too Long For Her. I Still Have A Lemon-yellow Mark On The Palm Of My Right Hand. Oh God, If I'm Anything By A Clinical Name, I'm A Kind Of Paranoiac In Reverse. I Suspect People Of Plotting To Make Me Happy.

I'm Quite Illiterate, But I Read A Lot.

I'd Just Be The Catcher In The Rye And All. I Know It's Crazy, But That's The Only Thing I'd Really Like To Be. I Know It's Crazy.

I Just Never Felt So Fantastically Rocky In My Entire Life.

I Love You To Pieces, Distraction, Etc.

I Love To Write And I Assure You I Write Regularly... But I Write For Myself, For My Own Pleasure. And I Want To Be Left Alone To Do It.

He Once Told Allie And I That If He'd Had To Shoot Anybody, He Wouldn't've Known Which Direction To Shoot In. He Said The Army Was Practically As Full Of Bastards As The Nazis Were.

But I Was Afraid Of The Questions (much More Than The Accusations) You Might Both Put To Me.

Get Your Dirty Stinking Moron Knees Off My Chest.

Some Of My Best Friedns Are Children. In Fact, All Of My Best Friends Are Children.

The Thing With Kids Is, If They Want To Grab For The Gold Ring, You Have To Let Them Do It, And Not Say Anything. If They Fall Off, They Fall Off, But It's Bad If You Say Anything.

He Was One Of Those Guys That Think They're Being A Pansy If They Don't Break Around Forty Of Your Fingers When They Shake Hands With You. God I Hate That Stuff.

I Held Hands With Her All The Time...that Doesn't Sound Like Much, I Realize, But She Was Terrific To Hold Hands With. Most Girls If You Hold Hands With Them, Their Goddam Hand Dies On You, Or Else They Think They Have To Keep Moving Their Hand All The Time, As If They Were Afraid They'd Bore You Or Something.

I Don't Know What Good It Is To Know So Much And Be Smart As Whips And All If It Doesn't Make You Happy.

I Don't Suppose A Writing Man Ever Really Gets Rid Of His Old Crocus-yellow Neckties. Sooner Or Later, I Think, They Show Up In His Prose, And There Isn't A Hell Of A Lot He Can Do About It.

For Joy, Apparently, It Was All Franny Could Do To Hold The Phone, Even With Both Hands.

Franny Was Staring At The Little Blotch Of Sunshine With A Special Intensity, As If She Were Considering Lying Down In It.

The Worst Thing That Being An Artist Could Do To You Would Be That It Would Make You Slightly Unhappy Constantly.

There Is A Marvelous Peace In Not Publishing ... I Like To Write. I Love To Write. But I Write Just For Myself And My Own Pleasure.

I Am Always Saying "glad To've Met You" To Somebody I'm Not At All Glad I Met. If You Want To Stay Alive, You Have To Say That Stuff, Though.

Maybe There's A Trapdoor Under My Chair, And I'll Just Disappear.

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.

I Like It When Somebody Gets Excited About Something. It's Nice.

Holden Caulfield

She Was Terrific To Hold Hands With. Most Girls If You Hold Hands With Them, Their Goddam Hand Dies On You, Or Else They Think They Have To Keep Moving Their Hand All The Time, As If They Were Afraid They'd Bore You Or Something. Jane Was Different. We'd Get Into A Goddam Movie Or Something, And Right Away We'd Start Holding Hands, And We Wouldn't Quit Till The Movie Was Over. And Without Changing The Position Or Making A Big Deal Out Of It. You Never Even Worried, With Jane, Whether Your Hand Was Sweaty Or Not. All You Knew Was, You Were Happy. You Really Were.

In Every School I've Gone To, All The Athletic Bastards Stick Together.

But Where Does By Far The Bulk, The Whole Ambulance Load, Of Pain Really Come From? Where Must It Come From? Isn't The True Poet Or Painter A Seer? Isn't He, Actually, The Only Seer We Have On Earth? Most Apparently Not The Scientist, Most Emphatically Not The Psychiatrist.

It Happens To Be One Of Those Days When I See Everybody In The Family, Including Myself, Through The Wrong End Of A Telescope.

One Of Those Days

It Isn't Very Serious, I Have This Tiny Little Tumor On The Brain.

We Are, All Four Of Us, Blood Relatives, And We Speak A Kind Of Esoteric, Family Language, A Sort Of Semantic Geometry In Which The Shortest Distance Between Any Two Points Is A Fullish Circle.

I Don't Even Like Old Cars. I'd Rather Have A Goddam Horse. A Horse Is At Least Human, For God's Sake.

God, How I Still Love Private Readers. It’s What We All Used To Be.

I Drew Laughing, High-breasted Girls Aquaplaning Without A Care In The World, As A Result Of Being Amply Protected Against Such National Evils As Bleeding Gums, Facial Blemishes, Unsightly Hairs, And Faulty Or Inadequate Life Insurance. I Drew Housewives Who, Until They Reached For The Right Soap Flakes, Laid Themselves Wide Open To Straggly Hair, Poor Posture, Unruly Children, Disaffected Husbands, Rough (but Slender) Hands, Untidy (but Enormous) Kitchens.

Poets Are Always Taking The Weather So Personally. They're Always Sticking Their Emotions In Things That Have No Emotions.

If You Really Want To Hear About It, The First Thing You'll Probably Want To Know Is Where I Was Born, And What My Lousy Childhood Was Like, And How My Parents Were Occupied And All Before They Had Me, And All That David Copperfield Kind Of Crap, But I Don't Feel Like Going Into It, If You Want To Know The Truth.

I'm One Of The Little Foxes That Spoil The Grapes.

All Mothers Are Slightly Insane.

If You're Going To Say The Jesus Prayer, At Least Say It To Jesus, And Not To St. Francis And Seymour And Heidi's Grandfather All Wrapped Up In One.

You Can't Argue With Someone Who Believes, Or Just Passionately Suspects, That The Poet's Function Is Not To Write What He Must Write But, Rather, To Write What He Would Write If His Life Depended On His Taking Responsibility For Writing What He Must In A Style Designed To Shut Out As Few Of His Old Librarians As Humanly Possible.

Her Joke Of A Name Aside, Her General Unprettiness Aside, She Was, In Terms Of Permanently Memorable, Immoderately Perceptive, Small-area Faces, A Stunning And Final Girl.

Do It For The Fat Lady!

Just Go To Bed, Now. Quickly. Quickly And Slowly.

I Used To Think She Was Quite Intelligent , In My Stupidity. The Reason I Did Was Because She Knew Quite A Lot About The Theater And Plays And Literature And All That Stuff. If Somebody Knows Quite A Lot About All Those Things, It Takes You Quite A While To Find Out Whether They're Really Stupid Or Not.

She Was Wearing A Canary-yellow Two-piece Bathing Suit, One Piece Of Which She Would Not Actually Be Needing For Another Nine Or Ten Years.

You Can't Exist In This World With Such Strong Likes And Dislikes.

Likes And Dislikes

For A Psychoanalyst To Be Any Good... He'd Have To Believe That It Was Through The Grace Of God That He'd Been Inspired To Study Psychoanalysis In The First Place.

Oh, This Happiness Is Strong Stuff.

Don't Hate Me Because I Can't Remember Some Person Immediately. Especially When They Look Like Everybody Else, And Talk And Dress And Act Like Everybody Else.

Mothers Are All Slightly Insane.

I Thought What I'd Do Was I'd Pretend I Was One Of Those Deaf-mutes.

Grand. There's A Word I Really Hate. It's A Phony. I Could Puke Every Time I Hear It.

One Day A Long Time From Now You'll Cease To Care Anymore Whom You Please Or What Anybody Has To Say About You. That's When You'll Finally Produce The Work You're Capable Of.

They Love Their Reasons For Loving Us Almost As Much As They Love Us, And Most Of The Time More. It's Not So Good, That Way.

When I Really Worry About Something, I Don’t Just Fool Around. I Even Have To Go To The Bathroom When I Worry About Something. Only, I Don’t Go. I’m Too Worried To Go. I Don’t Want To Interrupt My Worrying To Go.

But It Wasn't Just That He Was The Most Intelligent Member In The Family. He Was Also The Nicest, In Lots Of Ways. He Never Got Mad At Anybody. People With Red Hair Are Supposed To Get Mad Very Easily, But Allie Never Did, And He Had Very Red Hair.

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.

It's One Of Those Places That Are Supposed To Be Very Sophisticated And All, And The Phonies Are Coming In The Window.

I Just Hope That One Day - Preferably When We’re Both Blind Drunk - We Can Talk About It.

I Live Alone (but Catless, I'd Like Everybody To Know).

I Know He's Dead! Don't You Think I Know That? I Can Still Like Him, Though, Can't I? Just Because Somebody's Dead, You Don't Just Stop Liking Them, For God's Sake--especially If They Were About A Thousand Times Nicer Than The People You Know That're Alive And All.

All Morons Hate It When You Call Them A Moron.

A Confessional Passage Has Probably Never Been Written That Didn't Stink A Little Bit Of The Writer's Pride In Having Given Up His Pride.

It Was Just Terrible! And The Worst Part Was, I Knew What A Bore I Was Being, I Knew How I Was Depressing People, Or Even Hurting Their Feelings- But I Just Couldn't Stop! I Just Could Not Stop Picking!

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Nicholas Negroponte

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