Holden Caulfield Analysis

Mentally Confined: The Status of Holden Caulfield

Making mistakes is a completely normal part of life. Learning from your mistakes is a necessity because it’s the only way to progress. Beatrice Wood, an artist and sculptor speaks one solution for dealing with mistakes. “Life is full of mistakes. They’re like pebbles that make you a good road.” These “pebbles” (mistakes), which come in all different shapes and sizes create structure for us to go anywhere in life. By contrast, Holden’s resistance towards his school work creates too many pebbles, and he is stuck spinning his tires in rocks. In The Catcher in Rye, J.D. Salinger displays through Holden that making mistakes and learning from them is a vital part of growing up, because running

Holden’s idea of doing well is creating a relationship and connection that is not “fake”, but in order to create this he needs to be more accepting of others. He has no regard for his classmates’ and teachers’ feelings because of his judgmental attitude. We see him shout towards his class down from a hill as he leaves Pencey, “Sleep tight, ya morons!" I'll bet I woke up every bastard on the whole floor. Then I got the hell out” (59). This arrogant behavior is just one of the reasons Holden has such trouble accepting others. Holden even judges his roommate Stradlater as a “stupid bastard” but still prefers him over the past, less wealthy roommate that he shared a sense of humor with, “The thing is, it's really hard to be roommates with people if your suitcases are much better than theirs--if yours are really good ones and theirs aren't. You think if they're intelligent and all, the other person, and have a good sense of humor, that they don't give a damn whose suitcases are better, but they do. They really do. It's one of the reasons why I roomed with a stupid bastard like Stradlater. At least his suitcases were as good as mine”(59). This is a transparent example of the type of isolation Holden’s going through. Holden sees the suitcases as his and his roommate's only connection. The symbolism of the suitcase may mean a form of dominance over others to Holden. The way he holds himself above others is the cause of his isolation. The mistakes that follow his judgemental actions must be dealt with and learned from, but instead, he creates them over and over