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 to… — J. D. Salinger Copy Share Image
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. — J. D. Salinger Copy Share Image
... even the most sublimely accomplished non-stop talker can't consistently please. — J. D. Salinger Copy Share Image
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… — J. D. Salinger Copy Share Image
“Nobody'd be different. The only thing that would be different would be you. Not that you'd be so much older or anything. It wouldn't… — J. D. Salinger Copy Share Image
“Meant-to-be-picked-up books. Permanently-left-behind books. Uncertain-what-to-do-with books. But books, books.” — J. D. Salinger Copy Share Image
But if we come back, if German men come back, if British men come back, and Japs, and French, and all the other men,… — J. D. Salinger Copy Share Image
Then again you may pick up just enough education to hate people who say, 'It's a secret between he and I.' — J. D. Salinger Copy Share Image
The worst thing that being an artist could do to you would be that it would make you slightly unhappy constantly. — J. D. Salinger Copy Share Image
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… — J. D. Salinger Copy Share Image
“You keep records of their troubles. You’ll learn from them. If you want to Just as someday, if you have something to offer, someone… — J. D. Salinger Copy Share Image
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… — J. D. Salinger Copy Share Image
