About Dead Caulfields

 

Dead Caulfields

The Life & Works of J.D. Salinger

Dead Caulfields was established in 2004 as an online resource focused on the life and works of J.D. Salinger. The site's exploration covers not only Salinger's classic novel The Catcher in the Rye, but also the author's lesser-known writings, published and unpublished.

I am an amateur reader. For me, discovering the life of J.D. Salinger was a form of self-exploration. It was plain from the beginning of that journey that the balance of Salinger 's life was inseparable from the stories that he penned. Salinger 's work had always been the force of his life and it is impossible to examine one without reviewing the other. While Salinger 's stories can be effectively interpreted without intimate knowledge of the author, to view the life of J.D. Salinger without examining the stories that he wrote is to encounter only a fraction of his story.

To read the writings of JD Salinger is to travel with the author on an amazing journey in search of spiritual enlightenment. While on that road, he introduces to us some of the most remarkable characters of modern literature. Our interaction with these characters serve to aide us as we journey along this spiritual path, testing its waters. Some of these characters are representational of our journey in the search for greater truth. Other characters are contrasts set along the way to remind us why it is that we search at all. All of these characters are real people. The characters of JD Salinger are not fabrications, they are you and I. Their triumphs are the same triumphs contained in the seemingly average moments of our lives that we overlook. Their value is the same value that ennobles us all, of which we are blind.

This is a site which concentrates on the works of J.D. Salinger, not his legendary years of seclusion. As this is an expanding site in perpetual progress, new content is constantly forthcoming. Attention is duly paid to his famous novel The Catcher in the Rye , which is rightfully the catalyst for many reader's interest in the author.
Additional attention is directed to the Caulfield stories, a little-known body of eight literary pieces (excluding the novel) which center around the family of Holden Caulfield. While we know the character of Holden Caulfield through the novel, the corresponding Caulfield stories enrich us with the complex personalities of his family, among them his brothers D.B. (Vincent) and Allie (Kenneth). None of the three Caulfield brothers will survive these stories. In fact, the last of them, "The Stranger" is a reminiscence of Vincent by his friend Babe Gladwaller. That's why the name "Dead Caulfields."

Yet thoughtful readers of J.D. Salinger will realize that the Caulfields never really die; that death is a spiritual state that we struggle against from the moment of awareness; that the loss of "innocence" is actually the loss of the ignorance of that struggle.
The Caulfields show us that the end result of that struggle is not inevitable. They show us that enlightenment often resides in the last place that we seek it: within ourselves and within each other.
Many of the stories of J.D. Salinger can be divided into three parts: death, burial, and resurrection. Even the blackest of his stories offer a shining hope. While so many of his characters may speak to us from the dead, they hold that hope out to us as an offering.That's why the name "Dead Caulfields."

It is my sincere hope that you will enjoy both the academic and interpretive materials which this site contains. It is also my hope that you will come to better know and appreciate the author whose contribution to American Literature and to the American psyche is undeniable.