1. “I can’t explain what I mean. And even if I could, I’m not sure I’d feel like it.” J. D. Salinger
2. “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.” J. D. Salinger
3. “Don’t ever tell anybody anything. If you do, you start missing everybody.” J. D. Salinger
4. “I’m up to my ears in unwritten words.” J. D. Salinger
5. “I can’t explain what I mean. And even if I could, I’m not sure I’d feel like it.” J. D. Salinger
6. “All morons hate it when you call them a moron.” J. D. Salinger
7. “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.” J. D. Salinger
8. “I’ll read my books and I’ll drink coffee and I’ll listen to music, and I’ll bolt the door.” J. D. Salinger
9. “I’m just sick of ego, ego, ego. My own and everybody else’s. I’m sick of everybody that wants to get somewhere, do something distinguished and all, be somebody interesting. It’s disgusting.” J. D. Salinger
10. “People always clap for the wrong reasons.” J. D. Salinger
11. “The world is full of actors pretending to be human.” J. D. Salinger
12. “Are all your stars shining?” J. D. Salinger
13. “Know your true measurements and dress your mind accordingly.” J. D. Salinger
14. “I have so much I want to tell you, and nowhere to begin.” J. D. Salinger
15. “I am a kind of paranoid in reverse. I suspect people of plotting to make me happy.” J. D. Salinger
16. “It’s funny. All you have to do is say something nobody understands and they’ll do practically anything you want them to.” J. D. Salinger
17. “I’m sick of not having the courage to be an absolute nobody.” J. D. Salinger
18. “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.” J. D. Salinger
19. “Most stuff that is genuine is better left unsaid.” J. D. Salinger
20. “You’re lucky if you get time to sneeze in this goddam phenomenal world.” J. D. Salinger
21. “The true poet has no choice of material. The material plainly chooses him, not he it.” J. D. Salinger
22. “Oh, this happiness is strong stuff.” J. D. Salinger
23. “Listen, if you’re not going to be a nun or something, you might as well laugh.” J. D. Salinger
24. “An artist’s only concern is to shoot for some kind of perfection, and on his own terms, not anyone else’s.” J. D. Salinger
25. “Make sure you marry someone who laughs at the same things you do.” J. D. Salinger
26. “I’m quite illiterate, but I read a lot.” J. D. Salinger
27. “I can be quite sarcastic when I’m in the mood.” J. D. Salinger
28. “I have scars on my hands from touching certain people Certain heads, certain colours and textures of human hair leave permanent marks on me.” J. D. Salinger
29. “Among other things, you’ll find that you’re not the first person who was ever confused and frightened and even sickened by human behavior. You’re by no means alone on that score, you’ll be excited and stimulated to know. Many, many men have been just as troubled morally and spiritually as you are right now. Happily, some of them kept records of their troubles. You’ll learn from them—if you want to. Just as someday, 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.” J. D. Salinger
30. “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.” J. D. Salinger
31. “Anyway, I keep picturing all these little kids playing some game in this big field of rye and all. Thousands of little kids, and nobody’s around – nobody big, I mean – except me. And I’m standing on the edge of some crazy cliff. What I have to do, I have to catch everybody if they start to go over the cliff – I mean if they’re running and they don’t look where they’re going I have to come out from somewhere and catch them. That’s all I do all day. 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.” J. D. Salinger
32. “How long should a man’s legs be? Long enough to touch the ground.” J. D. Salinger
33. “The mark of the immature man is that he wants to die nobly for a cause, while the mark of the mature man is that he wants to live humbly for one.” J. D. Salinger
34. “Poets are always taking the weather so personally. They’re always sticking their emotions in things that have no emotions.” J. D. Salinger
35. “I don’t exactly know what I mean by that, but I mean it.” J. D. Salinger
