"The Laughing Man" is a short story by J. D. Salinger, published originally in The New Yorker on March 19, 1949; and also in Salinger's short story collection Nine Stories.[1] It largely takes the structure of a story within a story and is thematically occupied with the relationship between narrative and narrator, and the end of youth. The story is inspired by the 1869 Victor Hugo novel of the same name: The Man Who Laughs (L'homme qui rit).