"Both Parties Concerned" is an uncollected work of short fiction by

J. D. Salinger Jerome David Salinger ( ; January 1, 1919 – January 27, 2010) was an American author best known for his 1951 novel '' The Catcher in the Rye''. Salinger published several short stories in '' Story'' magazine in 1940, before serving in World Wa ...

which appeared in the 26 February 1944 issue of

The Saturday Evening Post ''The Saturday Evening Post'' is an American magazine published six times a year. It was published weekly from 1897 until 1963, and then every other week until 1969. From the 1920s to the 1960s, it was one of the most widely circulated and influ ...

. The original title of the story as submitted by Salinger was “Wake Me When It Thunders” to emphasize the story’s climax. The distinctive first-person narrative voice that identifies Salinger’s protagonist

Holden Caulfield Holden Caulfield (identified as "Holden Morrisey Caulfield" in the story "Slight Rebellion Off Madison", and "Holden V. Caulfield" in ''The Catcher in the Rye'') is a fictional character in the works of author J. D. Salinger. He is most famous f ...

in his 1951 novel

Catcher in the Rye ''The Catcher in the Rye'' is the only novel by American author J. D. Salinger. It was partially published in serial form in 1945–46 before being novelized in 1951. Originally intended for adults, it is often read by adolescents for its theme ...

first emerged in “Both Parties Concerned” with the character Billy Vullmer.

Plot

The story examines the lives of a young working-class couple, the twenty-year-old Billy Vullmer and his spouse of 17, Ruthie, chronicling their struggle to mature emotionally and cope with raising a baby. Billy, in an attempt to evade his responsibilities as a young father, insists that Ruthie accompany him on nightly visits to music venues where they drink and dance. Ruth recognizes this as selfish and juvenile behavior. She briefly leaves Billy. He is deeply shaken by the separation. During an electrical storm, Billy wakes and discovers that Ruth is not in bed. He goes downstairs and discovers her alone in the kitchen, terrified by the thunder. Billy recognizes her suffering and comforts her. His expression of empathy marks the beginning of a rapprochement between the couple and the prospect that he is gaining a new emotional maturity.

Style and Theme

The first-person narrator in “Both Parties Concerned,” the young married father, Billy Vullmer, resembles the distinctive voice of

in Salinger’s 1951 novel ''

''. Salinger adopts a first-person account so as to elaborate Billy’s struggle to discover and express his discontents. Literary critic John Wenke observes that “like Holden in Catcher (italics) , Billy tends to repeat rhetorical tropes.” Wenke continues: The characterizations of Billy and Ruthie were widely recognized by Americans, especially couples, who after two years of

war War is an armed conflict between the armed forces of states, or between governmental forces and armed groups that are organized under a certain command structure and have the capacity to sustain military operations, or between such organi ...

identified with their difficulties.Slawenski, 2010 p. 64-65 Biographer Kenneth Slawenski remarks on the significance of Salinger’s ability to convey his protagonist’s experience:

Footnotes

Sources

*Slawenski, Kenneth. 2010. J. D. Salinger: A Life.

Random House Random House is an imprint and publishing group of Penguin Random House. Founded in 1927 by businessmen Bennett Cerf and Donald Klopfer as an imprint of Modern Library, it quickly overtook Modern Library as the parent imprint. Over the foll ...

, New York. *Wenke, John. 1991. J. D. Salinger: A Study of the Short Fiction. Twaynes Studies in Short Fiction,

Gordon Weaver Gordon A. Weaver (February 2, 1937 – April 2, 2021) was an American novelist and short story writer. Life and career Weaver was born in Moline, Illinois in February 1937, the fifth of the five children of Noble Rodell Weaver and Inez Katherine ...

, General Editor.

Twayne Publishers Gale is a global provider of research and digital learning resources. The company is based in Farmington Hills, Michigan, United States, west of Detroit. It has been a division of Cengage since 2007. The company, formerly known as Gale Research a ...

, New York. {{J. D. Salinger 1944 short stories Short stories by J. D. Salinger Works originally published in The Saturday Evening Post