Symbolisms Impact on the Theme of Catcher
The Catcher in the Rye is about a depressed boy named Holden who takes the reader on a journey that exposes corruption in the world. Symbolism is an immense literary device J.D Salinger uses to show how he lost his childhood innocence and how losing it should occur naturally. In The Catcher in the Rye, J.D. Salinger uses symbolism to convey the theme that people cannot preserve or prevent the loss of innocence due to the corruption of the adult world. The profanity written in the school and the museum symbolizes the corruption of the adult world. Holden tries “to rub it off with [his] hand again but stops because “it's hopeless” and that if you had “a million years to do it you couldn't rub out even
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Holden says,“All the kids were reaching for the gold ring, and so was Phoebe, and I was sort of afraid she’d fall off the horse”(Salinger 232). This shows the pure innocence of children and how they do not understand the dangers of adult life around them. If Phoebe falls off reaching for the ring, it represents her losing her innocence abruptly like Holden did. The circle of the carrousel represents childhood and how it keeps going until someone falls off or the ride of immaturity ends. Holden comes to the realization that if children “want to grab at the golden ring let them” because “if they fall off the fall off.”(Salinger 232). This is important because Holden understands that the loss of innocence should occur naturally and as an adult, this is an important responsibility to stay out of the way.
All the uses of symbolism in this book helps show why it is important for kids to lose their innocence naturally. This is vital to the book because if there was no symbolism this book would not have a deeper meaning at all. All of these uses by J.D Salinger makes people think about what they are doing daily that can be affecting childhood
Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye follows the journey of a young boy, Holden Caulfield, from adolescence to adulthood. There are a number of symbols that Salinger uses to help to portray the various stages that Holden goes through as he matures into adulthood. The snowball incident, his sense of fulfillment when at the museum, and his run in with a pimp, are all representations of how Holden is deeply obsessed with innocence thoughts and how reluctant he is to give them up.
... the other children on the carrousel reaching for their gold rings he realizes, “If they fall off, they fall off” (211). This is so significant because Holden becomes conscious of the fact that whatever happens, happens. He cannot control or protect anyone, or himself, from the future. Holden’s last two sentences of the novel really capture the entire journey he has gone through: “Don’t ever tell anybody anything. If you do, you start missing everybody” (214). This is Holden getting over everything that has happened to him. He understands that he can overcome what has happened from him in order to learn from his past and move forward to the future.
The Catcher in the Rye is a story about a teenage rebel who is exploring the world on his own. The author, Salinger, uses many tools to deepen the impression on the reader such as linking the title to the story in an intricate way or creating a complex name for the protagonist. The symbols used in The Catcher in the Rye are there for a just reason, an example being how the author used the title, which is also a poem, as a symbol. Salinger uses the geographical locations, such as the Museum of Natural History, as symbols as well.
The theme of The Catcher in the Rye is simple. J. D. Salinger uses this novel to draw a clear distinction between the purity of childhood and the wickedness attained when one reaches adulthood. Salinger uses multiple literary devices including diction, symbolism, tone, and even the title of the novel to drive home his ideas about the innocence of children and the corruption of the world.
If there are 785 instances of profanity in the book, I contend there are well over a hundred scenes where Holden used the word depressed. D"Ambrosio presents this same thought saying, "It should be obvious by now that I don't see The Catcher in the Rye as a coming of age story . . . adolescence isn't the source of Holden's outsized feelings"(37).
The Catcher in the Rye Essay Through Salinger's use of symbolism, as a society, he depicts the importance of preserving innocence. We want to save our innocence. In court, people try to plead not guilty, meaning that they are innocent. Holden Caulfield tries to protect kids from becoming guilty. He wants to make people never become guilty.
An image he has created in his mind as someone who overlooks children playing in a rye in order to save them shall they fall off the cliff at the end of the rye. Holden’s only dream serves as a parallel of his life, showing his inability to strive for anything real as it simultaneously reveals his fear of falling from childhood or innocence. Childhood is associated with innocence in Holden’s eyes as he sees all things beyond it as something you need to be saved from. Holden believes he needs to save these children before they fall from their
“I was crying and all, I don’t know why, but I guess it was because I was feeling so damn depressed and lonesome” (53), Holden says. As humans, we have a hard time belonging in society. This is the same case for Holden Caulfield, the main character from the Catcher in the Rye. The Catcher in the rye, a novel by J.D Salinger, is about Holden, a lost boy in desperate need of help. Throughout the novel, Holden seems to be excluded by the world around him. He continually attempts to try and belong in a world in which he is isolating from. In this novel, Salinger uses symbols such as the red hunting hat, the ducks and Allie’s glove to support the theme, belonging and isolation.
In The Catcher in the Rye, Holden’s outlook in life is either the innocence of childhood or the cruelty of adulthood. He believes that the innocence of childhood is very valuable and it should be protected from the cruelty and phoniness of the adult world. Therefore Holden has a desire and is compelled to protect a child’s innocence at all costs. This is revealed when Holden tells Phoebe that he wants to be the catcher in the rye. Holden says to Phoebe, “What I have to do, I have to catch everybody if they start to go over the cliff - I mean if they’re ru...
The carousel scene serves as a climax for the book. Holden realizes that he won’t be able to create a utopia where children never reach the phoniness of adulthood. Now he understands that “if [kids] want to grab for the gold ring, you have to let them do it, and not say anything” (211). They should be allowed to make mistakes on their own, and learn from them without any interference “If they fall off, they fall off, but it's bad if you say anything to them”, they have no need for anyone to protect their innocence (211). The additional significance of this scene lies in the gold ring’s symbol. It is a physical manifestation of th...
Holden has a very hard time throughout the book trying to keep people’s innocence, only to come to notice that it really can’t be tamed pure. “All the kids kept trying to grab for the gold ring, and so was old Phoebe, and I was sort of afraid she was going to fall off the goddam horse, but I didn’t say anything or do anything. The thing with kids is, if they want to grab for the gold ring, you have to let them do it, and not say anything. If they fall of, the fall of, but it’s bad if you say anything to them.” (273) In the quote, Salinger changes Holden into learning that innocence is something that is learned about and can’t be kept fully pure forever. The carousel is usually thought of a place where kids are set free and have fun all around, and in the book the carousel going around is seen as how life and innocence goes. Kids trying to grab the golden ring, is a very common thing, but Holden is seeing it as failure always teaches a lesson. The whole book he is trying to fight the loss of innocence and is looking for an unrealistic society where ”phonies” don’t exist. The loss of Allie, had really affected and confused Holden causing him to not relate to others decisions. At the end though he finally realizes that innocence is the cycle of life and something everyone will have to deal with and to try and make the
Holden Caulfield, the teenage protagonist of Catcher In The Rye by J.D. Salinger, struggles with having to enter the adult world. Holden leaves school early and stays in New York by himself until he is ready to return home. Holden wants to be individual, yet he also wants to fit in and not grow up. The author uses symbolism to represent Holden’s internal struggle.
Upon introduction, Holden Caulfield gives the impression of being a textbook teenage boy. He argues that Pencey Prep, the all-boys academy at which he studied, is no greater than any other school and is “full of crooks.”(Salinger, 7) His harsh language only further argues that he is situated in an all-male environment and has no apparent filter for when swearing is inappropriate. Despite all of the indications that Holden is typical, it soon becomes evident that Holden’s personality does not conform to the teenage stereotype. Although he appears to have some friends, namely, his roommate, Stradlater, and ‘Ackley kid’, it is clear that he does not integrate well with his peer group. Holden’s inability to read social cues leaves him in the dust when all of his “friends” have matured enough to recognize his need for improvement. He is constantly making jokes out of everything without any thought as to how h...
Holden’s obsession with removing the profanity is notable, for it shows his distaste for anything that may corrupt the innocence of the children. Holden wishes to shelter children from adult experiences, revealing his fear of maturity and further establishing his dream of being the catcher in the rye. He sees more profane language marked on the wall of the school in marker and scratched in, asserting how his cause is ‘hopeless anyway... impossible’ (222). The museum a place that is supposed to be frozen in time also has a ‘F*** you’ written in crayon. The museum represents the world Holden wishes to live in: it’s a world of his catcher in the rye fantasy, a world where nothing changes. Holden is still avoiding his fear and as he visits the museum it confronts him
...ing them how they should behave, and what they should feel. A sense of self is bigger than what one person or group of people can tell you; it is found from within. Salinger, Plath, and Heller capture ambiguity on a personal level; their characters must look within themselves and beyond the ambiguity to discover who they are. They could easily accept what society tells them, but they would be embarking on a journey of misery. They must be strong enough to resist what others tell them about war, themselves, and everyone else. The experiences are truly unique, even if they are painful. They reveal the journey of self.