海角大神

To many fans, the mere idea of J.D. Salinger's classic "The Catcher in the Rye" being turned into a movie seems wrong. After all, didn't protagonist Holden Caulfield very clearly state: "If there's one thing I hate, it's the movies. Don't even mention them to me"?

But since Salinger's death in January of this year, . While Salinger definitively shut the door on the idea in his lifetime (he once wrote to a movie producer that 鈥淗olden Caulfield himself, in my undoubtedly super-biased opinion, is essentially unactable鈥�), he did also add in the same letter that he might think of "leaving the unsold rights to my wife and daughter as a kind of insurance policy."

Will his heirs take the bait? There has been further speculation this year that might pressure them to do so 鈥� and do so quickly.

A new indicates that 65 percent of voters believe that a film version will be made.

Those who say yes are, perhaps, hoping for a miracle along the lines of "To Kill a Mockingbird," in which a great book was turned into an equally great movie. But how many times in the average lifetime does such a thing happen?

Already, pundits are pleading for Hollywood to keep its hands off Holden. "Is 'The Catcher in the Rye' really unfilmable?" asks Stuart McGurk in , only to conclude that, when it comes to casting Holden, "even the more realistic candidates don't feel quite right." Matt Zoller Seitz, writing for , is even more definitive. Even after conceding a film probably will be made, Seitz declares: " 'The Catcher in the Rye' should never be made into a movie. Period."

You have only to go on YouTube, of course, to see or of the visions that some have had for such a project. Whether these horrify or entice you 鈥� well, that's probably a personal matter between Holden and you.

Marjorie Kehe is the Monitor's book editor.

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