호밀밭의 파수꾼(the Catcher in the Rye) - J.D.Salinger, 1951

유명한 소설이었음에도 내용에 대한 어떤 선행지식도 없이 읽기 시작했다. 

그리고는 한동안 홀든 콜필드에게 푹 빠져있었던 것 같다.

기성 사회에 적응하지 못했던, 아니 이를 이해할 수 없었던 홀든, 작가의 분신인 홀든 말이다.

홀든의 수식어 '반항아'라는 말에 선뜻 동의가 되지 않는다.

그저 세상이 당연하다고 말하는 것들이 당연하지 않게 느껴질 뿐이고, 그런 것들을 당연하게 받아들이는 이 세상을 받아들일 수가 없을 뿐이고, 결국 그런 것들을 받아들이고 싶지 않는 자신은 호밀밭의 파수꾼이 되고 싶었을 뿐이다.

남들보다 섬세하게, 예민하게 태어난 그의 타고난 시선을 '반항'이라고 부를 수 있을까?

'나를 좀 내버려둬'라고 외치는 쥐스킨트와 샐린저 역시 홀든처럼 섬세한, 남들보다 예민한 사람들로, 다른 사람들과 거리를 둠으로써 행복을 찾은 듯하다. (팟캐스트 지대넓얕의 "남보다 예민한 사람들" 편 참조)

아이러니한 점은 두 작가의 작품 모두 많은 사람들의 사랑을 받았다는 점이다.

통념과 가식으로 가득한 이 세상을 채우고 있는 많은 사람도, 마음 깊은 곳은 결국 홀든과 같은 건 아닐까?

 

 

내가 할 일은 아이들이 절벽으로 떨어질 것 같으면, 재빨리 붙잡아주는 거야. 애들이란 앞뒤 생각 없이 마구 달리는 법이니까 말이야. 그럴 때 어딘가에서 내가 나타나서는 꼬마가 떨어지지 않도록 붙잡아주는 거지. 온종일 그 일만 하는 거야. 말하자면 호밀밭의 파수꾼이 되고 싶다고나 할까. 바보 같은 얘기라는 건 알고 있어. 하지만 정말 내가 되고 싶은 건 그거야. 바보 같겠지만 말이야.

 

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’d 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. I know it’s crazy. p.88

 

 

 

“Life is a game, boy. Life is a game that one plays according to the rules.” (p. 4)

 

I don’t give a damn, except that I get bored sometimes when people tell me to act my age. Sometimes I act a lot older than I am—I really do—but people never notice it. People never notice anything. (p. 5)

 

You never saw such gore in your life. I had blood all over my mouth and chin and even on my pajamas and bathrobe. It partly scared me and it partly fascinated me.  (p. 23)

 

funny. I swear to God, if I were a piano player or an actor or something and all those dopes thought I was terrific, I’d hate it. I wouldn’t even want them to clap for me. People always clap for the wrong things. If I were a piano player, I’d play it in the goddam closet.  (p. 44)

 

The Navy guy and I told each other we were glad to’ve met each other. Which always kills me. I’m always saying “Glad to’ve met you” to somebody I’m not at all glad I met. If you want to stay alive, you have to say that stuff, though.  (p. 46)

 

What I’ll have to do is, I’ll have to read that play. The trouble with me is, I always have to read that stuff by myself. If an actor acts it out, I hardly listen. I keep worrying about whether he’s going to do something phony every minute. (p. 60)

 

The best thing, though, in that museum was that everything always stayed right where it was. Nobody’d move. (p. 62)

 

They were different, though, I’ll say that. They didn’t act like people and they didn’t act like actors. It’s hard to explain. They acted more like they knew they were celebrities and all. I mean they were good, but they were too good. When one of them got finished making a speech, the other one said something very fast right after it. It was supposed to be like people really talking and interrupting each other and all. The trouble was, it was too much like people talking and interrupting each other. They acted a little bit the way old Ernie, down in the Village, plays the piano. If you do something too good, then, after a while, if you don’t watch it, you start showing off. And then you’re not as good any more. (p. 64)

 

“It’s full of phonies, and all you do is study so that you can learn enough to be smart enough to be able to buy a goddam Cadillac some day, and you have to keep making believe you give a damn if the football team loses, and all you do is talk about girls and liquor and sex all day, and everybody sticks together in these dirty little goddam cliques. The guys that are on the basketball team stick together, the Catholics stick together, the goddam intellectuals stick together, the guys that play bridge stick together. Even the guys that belong to the goddam Book-of-the-Month Club stick together. If you try to have a little intelligent—” (p. 66)

 

The trouble with girls is, if they like a boy, no matter how big a bastard he is, they’ll say he has an inferiority complex, and if they don’t like him, no matter how nice a guy he is, or how big an inferiority complex he has, they’ll say he’s conceited. Even smart girls do it. (p. 69)

 

He said the Army was practically as full of bastards as the Nazis were. (p. 71)

 

These intellectual guys don’t like to have an intellectual conversation with you unless they’re running the whole thing. They always want you to shut up when they shut up, and go back to your room when they go back to their room....The thing he was afraid of, he was afraid somebody’d say something smarter than he had. (p. 74)

 

It’s funny. All you have to do is say something nobody understands and they’ll do practically anything you want them to. (p.80)

 

I figured I could get a job at a filling station somewhere, putting gas and oil in people’s cars. I didn’t care what kind of a job it was, though. Just so people didn’t know me and I didn’t know anybody. I thought what I’d do was, I’d pretend I was one of those deaf-mutes. That way I wouldn’t have to have any goddam stupid useless conversations with anybody. If anybody wanted to tell me something, they’d have to write it on a piece of paper and shove it over to me. They’d get bored as hell doing that after a while, and then I’d be through with having conversations for the rest of my life. Everybody’d think I was just a poor deaf-mute bastard and they’d leave me alone. They’d let me put gas and oil in their stupid cars, and they’d pay me a salary and all for it, and I’d build me a little cabin somewhere with the dough I made and live there for the rest of my life. I’d build it right near the woods, but not right in them, because I’d want it to be sunny as hell all the time. I’d cook all my own food, and later on, if I wanted to get married or something, I’d meet this beautiful girl that was also a deaf-mute and we’d get married. She’d come and live in my cabin with me, and if she wanted to say anything to me, she’d have to write it on a goddam piece of paper, like everybody else. If we had any children, we’d hide them somewhere. We could buy them a lot of books and teach them how to read and write by ourselves. (p.101~102)