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The book lingered at No. 1 for 26 weeks, and was on the hardcover list for 54 — making it easily Salinger’s best-performing book here. “The Catcher in the Rye” (1951) spent 29 weeks on the list; “Nine Stories” (1953) appeared here for 15; and “Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters” (1963) was a best seller for 21 weeks. John Updike reviewed “Franny and Zooey” in the Book Review, and some of his words were prophetic about the future of fiction in this country: “We live in a world ... where the decisive deed may invite the holocaust, and Salinger’s conviction that our inner lives greatly matter peculiarly qualifies him to sing of an America where, for most of us, there seems little to do but to feel. Introversion, perhaps, has been forced upon history; an age of nuance, of ambiguous gestures and psychological jockeying on a national and private scale, is upon us, and Salinger’s intense attention to gesture and intonation help make him, among his contemporaries, a uniquely relevant literary artist. As Hemingway sought the words for things in motion, Salinger seeks the words for things transmuted into human subjectivity.”