J.D. Salinger was so fiercely protective of his privacy that he once registered his unpublished letters with the Copyright Office in an attempt to prevent the publication of an unauthorized biography that made extensive use of them (it almost worked!). Any person willing to pay $10 could visit the office and read the author’s correspondence, and for a 1987 issue of New York, Phoebe Hoban did. Her piece is now available on Google Books for your reading pleasure. Also of interest to fans of J.D.’s private business will be Paul Alexander’s 1998 piece on Joyce Maynard and the real-life paramours who inspired Salinger’s fictional women.
The Salinger File [NYM/Google Books]
J. D. Salinger’s Women [NYM]
