Jerome David Salinger

Jerome David Salinger (English: Jerome David Salinger, /ˈsælɪndʒər/, January 1, 1919 – January 27, 2010), referred to as J.D. Salinger, was an American writer best known for his book Catcher in the Rye. Salinger grew up in Manhattan, New York, and began writing short stories in high school. Several of them were published in Story magazine in the early 1940s, just before Salinger entered active duty with the outbreak of World War II. In 1948, he published his critically acclaimed novel "A Best Day for Bananafish" in The New Yorker magazine, which has since become the publication site for most of Salinger's works. Salinger died of natural causes at his home in Cornish, New Hampshire, on January 27, 2010. Salinger's "Catcher in the Rye" was an enthusiastic hit upon its publication. The book features the lost boy Holden Caulfield as the protagonist, and this character has a profound impact on young readers. The book was the subject of much controversy, and its success drew public attention to its author, Salinger. But Salinger didn't like this kind of attention, so he became reclusive and published less. After Catcher in the Rye in 1951, Salinger published a collection of short stories, Nine Stories (1953); Franny and Zooey (1961), which contained a novella and a short story; Raise the Roof Beams, Carpenters; Seymour: A Biography (1963), which contained two novellas. Salinger's last published work was "Hapworth 16, 1924," which was published in The New Yorker magazine on June 19, 1965. Salinger hated prying eyes on his private life. He filed a lawsuit against biographer Ian Hamilton in the 1980s. In the late 1990s, two people close to Salinger (ex-girlfriend Joyce Menager and daughter Margaret Salinger) published memoirs about Salinger.