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fact, in 1941, The New Yorker rejected not only “Lois Taggett” but seven Salinger stories in all. “The Hang of It” had been returned by March, “The Heart of a Broken Story” by July, and “The Long Debut of Lois Taggett” before summer’s end. In addition, stories such as “The Fisherman,” “Monologue for a Watery Highball,” and “I Went to School with Adolph Hitler” not only were rejected by the magazine but are now lost.29 Salinger, who was probably desperate for any form of affirmation after this string of defeats, actually found encouragement in one of these dismissals. While declining to publish another now-lost story called “Lunch for Three,” New Yorker editor John Mosher sent a note to Dorothy Olding giving it positive personal feedback. “There is certainly something quite brisk and bright about this piece,” he wrote. The magazine, however, was searching for short stories of a more conventional nature.30

Meanwhile, Salinger’s personal life was proving as thorny as his professional. After returning from the Jersey shore, he managed several dates with Oona O’Neill in Manhattan, where she was attending the Brearley School, close to Salinger’s home. Catering to Oona’s flamboyant tastes, he paraded down Fifth Avenue with her, dined at fine restaurants he could barely afford, and spent evenings sipping cocktails at the glamorous Stork Club, where they socialized with movie stars and high-society celebrities in an atmosphere that must have made Salinger cringe. He was, he confessed to Elizabeth Murray, simply “crazy about her.” Yet by October, Salinger was seeing less and less of O’Neill and was increasingly forced to sustain the romance through letters.31

The chill in Salinger’s relationship with Oona O’Neill added urgency to his need to be published by The New Yorker. Perhaps such a high-profile success would command Oona’s attention and place him closer to the preening personalities she had so admired at the Stork Club.

In October 1941, Salinger received the news that The New Yorker had accepted one of his submissions, the portion of his novel he had reworked at the Beekman Tower Hotel and delivered to his agent in August. He had renamed the story “Slight Rebellion off Madison” and described it as “a sad little comedy about a prep school boy on Christmas vacation.”32 It was a spiritually autobiographical piece, he admitted, starring a discontented young New Yorker named Holden Morrisey Caulfield. (Salinger spelled Morrisey with one “s,” unlike the more usual Morrissey.)

To coincide with the story’s Christmas setting, The New Yorker planned to publish it in its December issue. Salinger was ecstatic, believing he had finally won the recognition he so frantically craved. When he received the news, he was completing a piece entitled “Mrs. Hincher,” which he described as a horror story, adding that it would be his first and last.* He would now concentrate on stories about Holden Caulfield instead. “Slight Rebellion” had unlocked a path to creativity that would alter his life.

The first of nine stories featuring the Caulfield family, “Slight Rebellion” supplied the avenue along which Salinger’s career would move until it culminated in The Catcher in the Rye. Proclaiming his upcoming New Yorker debut to Elizabeth Murray, Salinger bragged that the magazine had requested he write more stories about Holden Caulfield. Salinger said that he did indeed have another Caulfield story ready for submission but, still testing the waters, decided to submit a different story instead.33

“Slight Rebellion” would prove to have a long history that would deliver both pain and triumph. Salinger reworked it several times and even changed its title. Still struggling with the piece in 1943, he would refer to it in sarcastic frustration as “Are You Banging Your Head Against the Wall?” Unfortunately, whatever Salinger had hoped to accomplish with “Slight Rebellion,” at least artistically, evaded him. Despite his near obsession with the story, he was never completely happy with it.34 It is the first story in which he appears to examine his own character