SAMANTHA “MC HOLIDAY SAM” MORONI, 19, BUSHWICK

Wow, it’s nice to hear people talking about real things. I usually just hear Puerto Ricans yelling.

Uh, so what do you think aboutCatcher in the Rye lawsuit?

I guess if somebody took my book and took my characters and made a sequel, I think I would consider that flattery. If it’s selling, it has nothing to do with me—I mean, it does, because I would have had to make the characters and everything, but—the second writer had to come up with a whole new story line.

More or less.

I think maybe he should get some of the profit like 30 percent, because the characters are about 30 percent of the story itself. So yeah. Salinger should get a cut, but, I don’t know if he should sue ‘em.

You said you were supposed to have read the book, but you didn’t in the end.

AP Lit, yeah. I kind of just never read any of the books, but when I took my exam I made a 100, so. I just BS really well. I guess I’m just smarter than what’s considered average. It was when I was in Florida at some horrible school called Okeechobee High School. Their mascot is a cow, if that tells you anything.

Ouch.

But, yeah. I heard the book was good from people who’d read it. Something I did read was something by Dante.

The Inferno?

Yeah, it was horrible. Oof! I got only half-way through it. It’s really complicated and long. It was like 700 pages. Who needs to talk that much? I’m more into poetry. I like Chaucer and older stuff like The Iliad and The Odyssey. It’s poetry and it flows really nicely.

How about contemporary authors?

Ugh. Name me some.

Have you read anything that was in Oprah’s Book Club?

No [laughs]. But I love Harry Potter. I’ve read all of them about 20 times.

Literally 20 times?

Literally 20 times. I really like Harry Potter.

So what if I told you I was this author who published another Harry Potter book but I didn’t ask the author. Would you be interested in reading what I’d written?

Yeah, I would because I think every perspective is important. Once you create a story, it’s kind of your property but it’s kind of not. It’s out there for anybody and anybody could take that idea and make it into something else. And J.K. Rowling is already copying other people. There’s been plenty of young adult books that dealt with wizardry. I guess [regarding the Salinger thing] I would be biased and say I would like another installment because she’s not putting out anything more about Harry Potter.

Do you make art?

I sing R&B and rap, but I was trained in opera. My Myspace got deleted but I’m going to try-out for “American Idol” in Boston this weekend. I’m going to sing my own song, so that should be interesting. I had recorded a couple of things but I had a falling out with my manager. That’s no more. I don’t make my own beats but I write my own stuff. I have a lot of friends who just give me beats. They’re enough to get a mixtape out or a demo.

What if you made a mixtape and you sold it around the neighborhood, and then you heard someone else’s stuff on the local radio, and it sounded pretty much just like your stuff?

Oh, I’d be pissed. I’d beat her face in. No, I take that back. I guess the thing about being an artist or an author is that you would be confident in your own work enough that even if someone were to take it and expound upon it or to copy it, you’d know that your version is the better one out there. Now, if it was like a sequel to a song I’d written, I’d be cool with that so long as you gave me a cut. And she should at least get me drunk. If she was a complete bitch? You know what? Maybe what happened with Salinger was that the guy had talked to him and he was a complete asshole so he just sued him.

People say Salinger is a total recluse. He last published in 1965, and his last interview was in 1980.

You know, that’s how it goes with most people who have higher intelligence. I don’t really like people, either. I’m not saying I’m comparable to J.D. Salinger. I just don’t leave my house unless I have to. I work and I make music. If I’m not getting paid, I don’t want to be around people. People are kind of stupid.

-PETER MADSEN

Related posts:

1. WORD ON THE STREET: CATCHER IN THE RYE PT. 2
2. WORD ON THE STREET: CATCHER IN THE RYE PT. 1
3. WORD ON THE STREET: CATCHER IN THE RYE PT. 3
4. WORD ON THE STREET: WHAT’S THE WORD?
5. WORD ON THE STREET: CATCHER IN THE RYE PT. 5