The author of the cult novel “The Catcher in the Rye” (1951), J.D. Salinger, has maintained the status of one of the most mysterious figures in world literature for six decades. He was considered the prophet of the hippie generation, and today his books are among the most frequently quoted and successfully sold. "The Catcher..." can seriously compete in terms of total circulation with the Bible, "Gone with the Wind" and the works of JK Rowling. The writer himself did not attach the slightest importance to his phenomenal success and always remained distant and inaccessible. He spent the last half century of his life in seclusion, hiding from prying eyes, suppressing any attempts to stir up his past and present and continuing to work on new texts that no one had yet seen. All this time, fans of Salinger’s talent were tormented by the question of how many more priceless masterpieces there were lies in the genius’s desk and when they will be published. Salinger's death gave these expectations even greater urgency, and the information that appeared to appear contained exclusively contradictory guesses and hypotheses. And only Kenneth Slavensky, having collected a huge amount of material bit by bit, was able to slightly lift the veil of secrecy surrounding the life and work of the Great Hermit.