"...if you really want to hear about it..."

Okay. Some people have crazy ideas. It happens. But there can be fewer crazier ideas than that of a certain "JD California" (not his real name!). His bright idea was to write a sequel to The Catcher in the Rye...

Now, call me Picky McPicky, the Pickiest Person in Pickyland, winner of the Gold Medal in the Olympics for Pickiness, but if I were ever to be interested in reading a Catcher in the Rye sequel, really, there's only one person I'd want to have written it, and that's JD Salinger. The characters contained within the book are his to do as he pleases. No-one else. 

So, this "JD California's" sequel, entitled "60 Years Later; Coming Through the Rye" again sees Holden Caulfield on the run, only this time it's not from his school. It's from his retirement home, where the setpugenarian Caulfield lives. And there also appears to me some element of meta-fiction in the book, as Salinger appears as a character within it, deciding whether or not to revive Holden's story. Hmm.

The question you have to ask about this book is a very simple, brief one; why? I mean, what is the point of it? Just because he got a publisher for it, what's really the difference between this book and any number of fan fiction Caulfield stories? None at all. As mentioned previously, there's only one person I'd be interested in seeing a Catcher sequel from...

It would appear that I'm in good company in not liking the idea of this book. A certain JD Salinger dislikes the idea also, and has taken legal steps to prevent its publication. I hope he wins. This chancer is standing on the shoulder of a giant; he knows there will be a certain number of people who will buy the book out of sheer curiousity as to what happened to Holden next. But whatever suggestions he posits on the book are irrelevant, and are no more important than my ideas, or your ideas, or anyone else but Salinger's. 

There is talk that Salinger may not be able to block the publication of the book, citing the case of the unauthorised sequel to Gone With the Wind which had a similar lawsuit taken out to prevent its publication by Margaret Mitchell's estate. This lawsuit failed, and the book was published (though, the estate got a cut of royalties). It strikes me that the main difference here is that Salinger is still alive, and therefore could argue that the publication of an unauthorised sequel could harm the market for any sequel he might desire to write. Though, of course, chances of such a sequel are slim.

However, surely the most salient point is that Holden Caulfield is Salinger's character; he owns the copyright in him (and indeed on all of the characters within the book). For someone to be allowed to take characters which belong to someone else, and exploit them in a way that their creator does not intend is clearly wrong. Now, as mentioned earlier fan fiction does exist; but this is small potatoes in comparison. Fan fiction is shared freely between fan communities, and no attempt is made to gain financially. It's a very niche section of any fandom, as there will always be plenty of fans who do not care for it at all. Indeed, I count myself among their number. The release, however, of a published book takes things to a different, higher, level. 

There are some very real issues at stake at the heart of this lawsuit; that of the right of the creator of a work to be able to control how it is exploited. If Salinger loses this case, this is a fundamental blow to the rights of creators of works of art.