American Legends: The Life of J. D. Salinger
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American Legends: The Life of J. D. Salinger
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Narrated by:
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Nicholas S. Johnson
About this listen
"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)
A lot of ink has been spilled covering the lives of history's most influential figures, but how much of the forest is lost for the trees? In Charles River Editors' American Legends series, listeners can get caught up to speed on the lives of America's most important men and women in the time it takes to finish a commute, while learning interesting facts long forgotten or never known.
J. D. Salinger might have been one of America's greatest 20th century authors, but only he knows for sure. As a young adult, Salinger wrote a number of short stories that were published during the 1940s in Story Magazine, and his story "A Perfect Day for Bananafish" appeared in The New Yorker magazine to wide praise. Salinger followed that up with his most famous work, the 1951 novel The Catcher in the Rye, which was popular among adults and adolescents alike.
Regardless of whether Salinger was one of the 20th century's greatest authors, he was certainly one of the most unique. In the aftermath of his novel's incredible success, Salinger became steadily more reclusive, publishing less and less in the 1950s until he disappeared entirely from the public eye for the last 40 years of his life. Salinger was rarely heard from, except for when he was filing lawsuits alleging copyright infringement to protect his work, and in one of his few statements, he stated, "There is a marvelous peace in not publishing.... I pay for this kind of attitude. I'm known as a strange, aloof kind of man. But all I'm doing is trying to protect myself and my work."
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-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 79
New York Times best-selling author and biographer Charles J. Shields crafts this fascinating portrait of literary icon Kurt Vonnegut. The first authorized biography of the influential American writer, And So It Goes examines Vonnegut’s life, from his childhood to his death in 2007, and explores how the author changed the conversation of American literature.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Probably only for die hard Vonnegut fans
- By Watery M on 12-22-12
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Salinger
- By: David Shields, Shane Salerno
- Narrated by: Peter Friedman, January LaVoy, Robert Petkoff, and others
- Length: 19 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 136
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 123
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Story4 out of 5 stars 121
Shields and Salerno illuminate most brightly the last 56 years of Salinger’s life: a period that, until now, had remained completely dark to biographers. Provided unprecedented access to diaries, letters, legal records, and secret documents, listeners will feel they have, for the first time, gotten beyond Salinger’s meticulously built-up wall. The result is the definitive portrait of one of the most fascinating figures of the 20th century.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Ingenious novel or biography? Hard to tell....
- By Melinda on 09-05-13
By: David Shields, and others
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Ayn Rand and the World She Made
- By: Anne C. Heller
- Narrated by: Bernadette Dunne
- Length: 19 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 339
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 203
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Story4 out of 5 stars 209
Ayn Rand is the author of two phenomenally best-selling ideological novels, The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged, which have sold over 12 million copies in the United States alone. Through them, she built a right-wing cult following in the late 1950s and became the guiding light of Libertarianism and of White House economic policy in the 1960s and '70s. Her defenses of radical individualism and of selfishness as a "capitalist virtue" have permanently altered the American cultural landscape.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Great history of both Rand and her era
- By Mark on 08-07-10
By: Anne C. Heller
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Empire of Self
- A Life of Gore Vidal
- By: Jay Parini
- Narrated by: John Lescault
- Length: 16 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 103
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 91
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 91
The product of 30 years of friendship and conversation, Jay Parini's Empire of Self probes behind the glittering surface of Gore Vidal's colorful life to reveal the complex emotional and sexual truth underlying his celebrity-strewn life. But there is plenty of glittering surface as well - a virtual who's who of the American Century, from Eleanor Roosevelt and Amelia Earhart through the Kennedys, Princess Margaret, and the creme de la creme of Hollywood.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Well done!
- By Christopher on 03-22-16
By: Jay Parini
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Butterfly in the Typewriter
- The Tragic Life of John Kennedy Toole and the Remarkable Story of a Confederacy of Dunces
- By: Cory MacLauchlin
- Narrated by: Nick Sullivan
- Length: 11 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 59
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 48
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 48
The saga of John Kennedy Toole is one of the greatest stories of American literary history. In Butterfly in the Typewriter, Cory MacLauchlin draws on scores of new interviews with friends, family, and colleagues as well as full access to the extensive Toole archive at Tulane University, capturing his upbringing in New Orleans, his years in New York City, his frenzy of writing in Puerto Rico, his return to his beloved city, and his descent into paranoia and depression.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Worth it! Good biography. Informative.
- By French Quarter on 07-09-13
By: Cory MacLauchlin
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Every Love Story Is a Ghost Story
- A Life of David Foster Wallace
- By: D. T. Max
- Narrated by: Malcolm Hillgartner
- Length: 12 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 384
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 342
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 341
David Foster Wallace was the leading literary light of his generation, a man who not only captivated readers with his prose but also mesmerized them with his brilliant mind. In this, the first biography of the writer, D. T. Max sets out to chart Wallace’s tormented, anguished, and often triumphant battle to succeed as a novelist as he fights off depression and addiction to emerge with his masterpiece, Infinite Jest.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Max avoids hagiography or a sycophant's biography
- By Darwin8u on 06-11-13
By: D. T. Max
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So We Read On
- How the Great Gatsby Came to Be and Why It Endures
- By: Maureen Corrigan
- Narrated by: Maureen Corrigan
- Length: 10 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 240
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 201
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 200
Conceived nearly a century ago by a man who died believing himself a failure, it's now a revered classic and a rite of passage in the reading lives of millions. But how well do we really know The Great Gatsby? As Maureen Corrigan, Gatsby lover extraordinaire, points out, while Fitzgerald's masterpiece may be one of the most popular novels in America, many of us first read it when we were too young to fully comprehend its power.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Reading Gatsby as an adult reveals its greatness!
- By Mark on 10-06-14
By: Maureen Corrigan
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Outlaw Marriages
- The Hidden Histories of Fifteen Extraordinary Same-Sex Couples
- By: Rodger Streitmatter
- Narrated by: Christopher Hurt
- Length: 7 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 169
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 147
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 148
For more than a century before gay marriage became a hot-button political issue, same-sex unions flourished in America. Pairs of men and pairs of women joined together in committed unions, standing by each other "for richer and for poorer, in sickness and in health" for periods of 30 or 40 - sometimes as many as 50 - years. In short, they loved and supported each other every bit as much as any husband and wife. In Outlaw Marriages, cultural historian Rodger Streitmatter reveals how some of these unions didn’t merely improve the quality of life for the two people involved but also enriched the American culture.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Sames Sex Couples Through History
- By Susie on 12-11-12
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Gabriel Garcia Marquez: A Life
- By: Gerald Martin
- Narrated by: Sean Crisden
- Length: 22 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 75
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 58
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 62
In his novels and short stories, Gabriel García Márquez has transformed the particulars of his own life and the lives of his fellow Colombians into wondrous fiction. While telling the story of the sloppily dressed, skinny young man who rose from obscurity as a provincial journalist to international fame as the progenitor of a new literature, Gerald Martin also considers the tensions in García Márquez's life between celebrity and the personal quest for literary quality, between politics and writing, and between the seductions of power, solitude, and love.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Great content, somewhat disappointing narrator.
- By Paola Herrington on 01-08-13
By: Gerald Martin
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Nazi Literature in the Americas
- By: Roberto Bolaño, Chris Andrews - translator
- Narrated by: Jonathan Davis
- Length: 6 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 72
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 61
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Story4 out of 5 stars 60
A tour de force of black humor and imaginary erudition, Nazi Literature in the Americas presents itself as a biographical dictionary of writers who espoused extreme right-wing ideologies in the 20th and 21st centuries.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Eerie and fascinating
- By Jikai Zenshin on 03-19-21
By: Roberto Bolaño, and others
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Zelda Fitzgerald
- The Tragic, Meticulously Researched Biography of the Jazz Age's High Priestess
- By: Sally Cline
- Narrated by: Coleen Marlo
- Length: 17 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 83
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 73
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Story4 out of 5 stars 74
Zelda Fitzgerald was the mythical American Dream Girl of the Roaring Twenties who became, in the words of her husband, F. Scott Fitzgerald, "the first American flapper." Their romance transformed a symbol of glamour and spectacle of the Jazz Age. When Zelda cracked up, not long after the stock market crash of 1929, Scott remained loyal to her through a nightmare of later breakdowns and final madness.
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2 out of 5 stars
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The Beautiful and the Bungled
- By Silverthorne on 12-08-17
By: Sally Cline
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The Stephen King Companion
- Four Decades of Fear from the Master of Horror
- By: George Beahm
- Narrated by: Fleet Cooper, Claire Christie
- Length: 24 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 77
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 67
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 66
The Stephen King Companion is an authoritative look at horror author King's personal life and professional career, from Carrie to The Bazaar of Bad Dreams. King expert George Beahm, who has published extensively about Maine's main author, is your seasoned guide to the imaginative world of Stephen King, covering his varied and prodigious output: juvenalia, short fiction, limited edition books, best-selling novels, and film adaptations.
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5 out of 5 stars
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A Kingopedia: Books, Movies, Bio and Art
- By tru britty on 02-28-16
By: George Beahm
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Process
- The Writing Lives of Great Authors
- By: Sarah Stodola
- Narrated by: Andi Arndt
- Length: 7 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 155
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 128
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 125
Ernest Hemingway, Zadie Smith, Joan Didion, Franz Kafka, David Foster Wallace, and more. In Process, acclaimed journalist Sarah Stodola examines the creative methods of literature's most transformative figures. Each chapter contains a mini biography of one of the world's most lauded authors, focused solely on his or her writing process.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Excellent!
- By Davina Rush on 04-10-15
By: Sarah Stodola
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The Secret History of Wonder Woman
- By: Jill Lepore
- Narrated by: Jill Lepore
- Length: 9 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 798
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 704
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 704
Like every other superhero, Wonder Woman has a secret identity. Unlike every other superhero, she has also has a secret history. Harvard historian and New Yorker staff writer Jill Lepore has uncovered an astonishing trove of documents, including the never-before-seen private papers of William Moulton Marston, Wonder Woman's creator.
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2 out of 5 stars
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Narration ruined it for me
- By Julia on 11-09-14
By: Jill Lepore
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Libertarians on the Prairie
- Laura Ingalls Wilder, Rose Wilder Lane, and the Making of the Little House Books
- By: Christine Woodside
- Narrated by: Gabra Zackman
- Length: 6 hrs and 13 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 86
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 73
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Story4 out of 5 stars 73
Generations of children have fallen in love with the pioneer saga of the Ingalls family, of Pa and Ma, Laura and her sisters, and their loyal dog. Laura Ingalls Wilder's Little House books have taught millions of Americans about frontier life, giving inspiration to many and in the process becoming icons of our national identity. Yet few realize that this best-selling series wandered far from the actual history of the Ingalls family and from what Laura herself understood to be central truths about pioneer life.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Very Interested!!
- By ME00625 on 01-16-17
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Manifesto
- On Never Giving Up
- By: Bernardine Evaristo
- Narrated by: Bernardine Evaristo
- Length: 6 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 30
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 22
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 21
From the best-selling and Booker Prize-winning author of Girl, Woman, Other, Bernardine Evaristo’s memoir of her own life and writing, and her manifesto on unstoppability, creativity, and activism.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Glorious performance and inspiring story
- By Maggi Morehouse on 01-25-22
What listeners say about American Legends: The Life of J. D. Salinger
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Frank Donnelly
- 07-10-19
Excellent For What It Is, A Very Brief Synopsis of A Life
I completely enjoyed this audiobook, although it is very short. I felt that this biography placed important context to certain parts of both "The Catcher in The Rye" and "A Perfect Day For Bananafish". I did find some of the biography sad and, I suppose, I feel some disenchantment.
However this work itself is excellent, if brief. I have a longer traditional biography of Mister Salinger that I intend to read in the near future. Thank You...
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