The Catcher in the Rye

Один раз я сидел рядом с Экли на баскетбольных состязаниях. Там в команде был потрясающий игрок, Хови Койл, он мог забросить мяч с самой середины точно в корзину. А Экли всю игру бубнил, что у Койла хороший рост для баскетбола - и всё, понимаете? Ненавижу такую болтовню.

Малыши, в общем, все славные. Я её спросил, не хочет ли она выпить горячего шоколада, но она ответила: "Спасибо, не хочется". Сказала, что её ждёт подруга. Этих маленьких вечно кто-нибудь дожидается. Умора.

Он ненавидел, когда его обзывали кретином. Все кретины ненавидят, когда их обзывают кретинами.

Он всегда бреется по второму разу, красоту наводит. А бритва у него грязная.

Оркестр был гнусный, Бадди Сингера. Ужасно громкий — но не по-хорошему громкий, а безобразно громкий.

Меня провел в номер коридорный — старый-престарый, лет под семьдесят. Он на меня нагонял тоску еще больше, чем этот номер. (...). Вообще, что за работа для такого старика — носить чужие чемоданы и ждать чаевых? Наверно, он ни на что больше не годился, но все-таки это было ужасно.

Голос у него был, как у президента Линкольна, ужасно честный, искренний.

The thing with kids is, if they want to grab 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 them.

You hate to tell new stuff to somebody around a hundred years old. They don't like to hear it.

I pictured her out with the Lunts and all somewhere, and that Andover jerk. All of them swimming around in a goddam pot of tea and saying sophisticated stuff to each other and being chaming and phony.

She said she had to meet her friend. Kids always have to meet their friend. That kills me.

I can understand somebody going to the movies because there's nothing else to do, but when somebody really wants to go, and even walks fast so as to get there quicker, then it depresses hell out of me.

Catholics are always trying to find out if you're a Catholic.

People always clap for the wrong things.

So we said good-by and all. I told them I'd look them up in Seattle sometime, if I ever got there, but I doubt if I ever will. Look them up, I mean.

Some people you shouldn't kid, even if they deserve it.

I danced with them all - the whole three of them - one at a time. The one ugly one, Laverne, wasn't too bad a dancer, bit the other one, Old Marty, was murder. Old Marty was like dragging the Statue of Liberty around the floor.

I live in New York, and I was thinking about the lagoon in Central Park, down near Central Park South. I was wondering if it would be frozen over when I got home, and if it was, where did the ducks go. I was wondering where the ducks went when the lagoon got all icy and frozen over. I wondered if some guy came in the truck and took them away to a zoo or something. Or they just flew away.

I just thanked her and told her I was going to South America with my grandmother. Which was really a hot one, because my grandmother hardly ever even goes out of the house, except maybe to go to a goddam matinee or something.

Then I started reading this timetable I had in my pocket. Just to stop lying. Once I get started, I can go on for hours if I feel like it. No kidding. Hours.