I have been in the rare and antiquarian book business for over forty years; my family has been in the rare books business since 1876. Rare books are in my blood.
Catcher in the Rye, The
Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1951. Item #06595
The Defining American First Novel of Youthful Alienation
A Landmark in Modern Literature - In the Scarce First Issue Jacket
SALINGER, J.D. The Catcher in the Rye. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1951.
First edition of the author’s first book.
Octavo (7 11/16 x 5 1/4 inches; 198 x 133 mm.). [2, blank], [6], [1-2], 3–277, [3, blank] pp.
Publisher’s original black cloth, decoratively stamped and lettered in gilt on spine. Small insect? stain on lower blank margin of page 277. In the original first issue color pictorial dust jacket designed by Michael Mitchell, with author photograph on the rear panel by Lotte Jacobi, correctly cropped at the head, and priced $3.00 on the front flap. Discreetly repaired tear to lower rear spine edge of jacket; light chipping at head of spine; lower spine panel a bit stained. A clean, attractive copy in a very good dust jacket.
A cornerstone of twentieth-century American literature, The Catcher in the Rye introduced the unforgettable Holden Caulfield and, with him, a new literary voice - colloquial, defiant, and disarmingly candid. In the hands of J. D. Salinger, adolescent disaffection became not merely a subject, but a fully realized psychological landscape.
The novel’s depiction of alienation, sexuality, and the perceived “phoniness” of adult society was considered deeply controversial upon publication. As noted in The New York Herald Tribune Book Review, readers accustomed to the language of war fiction found such expressions “peculiarly offensive” when voiced by the young. Yet it is precisely this authenticity - Salinger’s unmatched ear for dialogue - that secured the book’s enduring reputation.
Set over the course of several days in New York City, Holden’s wandering odyssey charts a descent both physical and emotional, culminating in one of the most quietly affecting conclusions in modern fiction. Today, the novel stands as a defining text of postwar identity and rebellion.
Starosciak A30.a.
Price: $7,500.00