In a career spanning sixty years, author J.D. Salinger famously gave very few interviews. Now another interview has emerged, two years after his death in January 2010. Just 1,200 words long, it was written by 18-year-old journalism student Shirley Ardman after she met the man who would go on to write The Catcher in the Rye in the bar of a New York hotel.

He was only 21, and had just had his first short story published.

The piece was not published at the time as Salinger had not yet made his name. After a few attempts at publication in the 1960s, the interview vanished, buried into a cupboard.

Here, The Drum publishes the interview, which gives an insight into the life led by the young Salinger, arguably already wise beyond his years. The author’s words of advice have a surprising resonance even today, 72 years after the interview.