unhappily impossible to eradicate in schools. Boys pure in mind and heart, almost children, are fond of talking in school among themselves, and even aloud, of things, pictures, and images of which even soldiers would sometimes hesitate to speak." (14/XIV: 19) (10) If Dostoevsky had had Salinger's comparative freedom of expression Kolia would have spoken very much like Holden Caulfield. (Meanwhile, by the standards of the 1980's, Holden?s speech is quite mild. He uses no major taboo words. Although the word "fuck" appears in the novel, it is not really used by Holden - though its presence in the book was enough to give Catcher world-wide notoriety. (1 1 ) The question of the real ages of Holden and Kolia is all the more interesting because each character is based in large measure on autobiographical recollections which have then been altered for literary purposes. We have already noted that Dostoevsky assigned too young an age to Kolia, then agreed to make him older, while Salinger (as mentioned in note 6) has assigned his own misadventures as a college dropout at age nineteen or twenty to a boy of sixteen. In particular, the geographical relationship between Ursinus College and Manhattan (see note 6) fits the novel. Salinger had also transferred out of a prep school due to low grades - though not at Christmastime - when he was fifteen (see note 6) . Probably elements of that experience enter into Holden?s life as well. The foregoing further contributes to the conclusion