Birth. Life. Death. These are three things every living thing will experience during a forever changing world. Everyone will experience some kind of change throughout life. Change must be accepted and overcome because it helps correct the mistakes all humans will make in life. In the novel, The Catcher in the Rye, J.D. Salinger analyzes the battle against growing up in an unjust world. He conveys that everyone grows up showing the world who they are. Over time, the innocence and purity of children are masked by the instinct to conform to society. In conforming, humans lose their right to true freedom, but gain the negative habits of “phoniness”. This phoniness is what J.D. Salinger battles with while confronting the right to stay as an innocent …show more content…
For Holden change represents the unknown variables in life that can not be reconciled with. Not being able to realize the positive changes around him affects his ability to think clearly. In the text, Holden percisted on knowing what happened to the ducks during the winter time and wondered where they went. The change in the ducks lives scare Holden because it was different and unknown (2017 Litcharts 4). Holden would like to believe that the ducks never move and always stay where they are, but the reality that the ducks migrated to live an easier life becomes too hard for Holden to contemplate. Holden never imagines the positive aspects of change and growth because he is too busy reflecting on the …show more content…
In Holden's case, the death of a loved one affects his ability to want to be successful. “Holden Caulfield is a deeply troubled sixteen-year-old boy who is totally alienated from his environment and from society as a whole. He looks on people and events with a distaste bordering on disgust. The reader can view him either as an adolescent struggling with the angst of growing up or as a rebel against what he perceives as hypocrisy in the world of adults.” ("The Catcher in the Rye." Novels for Students). Holden believes that he does not fit into the adult world because of how “phony” they are. Furthermore, Holden refuses to make friends with people who he believes are “phony”. Throughout the book Holden only has a few people who he truly trusts as friends. In addition, Holden can not invision himself functioning in society because he does not want to grow up. “The only role that Holden envisions for himself in life—catching children before they fall off a cliff—is symbolic of his wish to save himself and other children from having to one day grow up.” (2015 Litcharts 3). Holden imprisoned himself into thinking that he did not want to be apart of society. Holden could only imagine himself having a figurative role in society. This lack of self commitment directly correlates to the death of his brother. Holden believes everyone is “phony” because no one understands what he went through.
Holden also has a negative perspective of life that makes things seem worse than they really are. In addition to Holden’s problems he is unable to accept the death of his brother at a young age. Holden’s immaturity, negative mentality, and inability to face reality hold him back from moving into adulthood. Holden’s immaturity causes him many problems throughout the story. Although he is physically mature, he acts more like a child.
There is one universal truth that will exist through out all of time and space that affects all that live to experience it. That truth is known as grief. We all experience grief, and for Holden Caulfield, grief is a major aspect of his life, the force that drives him to do everything he does in the novel, The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger. There are seven stages to this emotion known as grief: denial, depression, anger, bargaining, guilt, reconstruction, and finally, acceptance. There are many parts in the novel that could have influenced Holden’s grief, but the main one that most people who read the novel have figured it out was the death of his little brother Allie. The root to Holden’s grief lies with his brother which cause Holden’s to act and change the way he does in the novel.
Before this book was written in it's time frame, Holden deals with some struggles that change and impact his life quite a bit. The author portrays Holden's personality through his actions for the audience to understand him. Some of the actions are going back to visit the museum, calling and visiting Phoebe at home, visiting the park, keeping Allie's baseball mitt, wearing the red hunting hat, and asking about the ducks. These examples all play a part in showing that Holden is afraid of change. Holden is starting to grow up and make the transition into an adult, but the audience can tell Holden is struggling.
Depression is the storm whose rain can drown a person to oblivion if they have nothing to cling onto. This sea of confusion swirls in an endless tsunami of despair whose only savior is love, for its intensity shines through the storm and calms the sea. Catcher in the Rye, written by J.D Salinger, explores this emotion through Holden Caulfield. Adolescence is often a time of confusion and yearning to find a place of belonging; this is no exception to Holden who seeks connection with other people and struggles to understand the changing world alongside his transition into young adulthood. Holden’s struggle throughout the novel ultimately illustrates the hypocritical notions society tries to teach the new generations such as being an individual
Salinger presents the epitome of a young person who is scared to grow up. Salinger utilizes the theme of resistance to grow up to build an obstinate bildungsroman to tell Holden’s story. Holden’s persistence with the ducks in the lagoon show his undying curiosity and youthfulness. His aspiration to be the catcher in the rye present his need to save others from the destruction of innocence. Finally, his love for the unchanging Museum of Natural History show his love for stability. All three symbols work together to form a theme of defiance during Holden’s coming of
Throughout the novel, Holden leaves hints insinuating that he is distancing himself from people and society through his actions and decisions. Holden shows his hate towards the adult world by mentioning “phoniness” throughout the book, insinuating that he will never be like this, even though it’s impossible. His constant failing at school evidences that he isn’t planning to have a common future by having a job like most people would. It was evidently explained that Holden doesn’t fit in because he doesn’t want to be part of humans’ corrupted society. Regardless of how one feels about society, it is evident that its flaws made a teenager retract from accepting humans’ adult world, and instead negated to be a part of it.
Another poignant example of Holden’s penchant for stagnation is when he sits on the museum steps and two kids ask him for help to find the mummy exhibit. Strangely enough, he is able to find it quickly regardless of the fact that he hadn’t been there in years. The boys are driven away by fear of the dead bodies that hadn’t decayed and Holden is left alone with the preserved corpses. He experiences a moment of peace there, possibly due to the silence and being encompassed by humans whose bodies are frozen in
In J.D. Salinger’s Catcher in the Rye, the main character Holden Caufield believes that innocence is corrupted by society. He exposes his self-inflicted emotional struggles as he is reminiscing the past. For Holden, teenage adolescence is a complicated time for him, his teenage mentality in allows him to transition from the teenage era to the reality of an adult in the real world. As he is struggling to find his own meaning of life, he cares less about others and worries about how he can be a hero not only to himself but also to the innocent youth. As Holden is grasping the idea of growing up, he sets his priorities of where he belongs and how to establish it. As he talks about how ‘phony’ the outside world is, he has specific recollections that signify importance to his life and he uses these time and time again because these memories are ones that he wont ever let go of. The death of his younger brother Allie has had a major impact on him emotionally and mentally. The freedom of the ducks in Central Park symbolize his ‘get away’ from reality into his own world. His ideology of letting kids grow up and breaking the chain loose to discover for themselves portrays the carrousel and the gold ring. These are three major moments that will be explored to understand the life of Holden Caufield and his significant personal encounters as he transitions from adolescence into manhood.
The origins of Holden’s disillusionment and the reason that it all started is the death of his younger brother which he was very fond of and admired, Allie, three years ago. The death of Allie is very significant in Holden’s mind since it is an event which he remembers quite clearly at multiple occasions during the book. For example, when Holden is writing a descriptive composition for his roommate Stradlater, he decides to write about Allie’s baseball mitt since it is the only thing on his mind. “My brother Allie had this left-handed fielder’s mitt. He was
We approach the world of adulthood in many ways. Graduating from high school, heading to college, attaining your dream job, buying a new house to later call home, or even getting married. We move on from our childhood because that is the way of life. As human beings we change for the better. As we reach adulthood, we can still cherish the memories we had as children but we no longer are fully attached to them. However, the main character Holden Caulfield from the novel The Catcher in the Rye, struggles with facing reality and maturity. He fears change and wants to remain in his childhood bubble forever. Throughout the novel, multiple symbols are used to convey Holden’s fear of moving on and losing his innocence. Both the author J.D. Salinger and critics Dennis McCort and S. N. Behrman offer evidence from “Hyakujo’s Geese” and “S. N. Behrman on Holden’s Innocence” to show Holden’s doubts about progressing into the adult world. Throughout J.D. Salinger’s novel The Catcher in the Rye, Holden shows a fear of maturity therefore grasping onto his innocence and dreading entering the phony adult world.
Both of these previously stated relationships offer Holden an opportunity to step out of his isolated bubble. They also introduce what he distresses most about the adult world which according to him is the complexity, unpredictability, and the possibility of a conflict or change. This connects to the symbol of the Museum of Natural History, and shows how Holden likes the world to be predictable and unchanging and in a way slow and still. Unpredictable adults often challenge Holden and make him question his self-confidence and self-worth. Holden has trouble dealing with something complex like this, possibly because of the passing of his brother. Since then, Holden completely isolated himself from everybody as a means of self-protection. Although he is handed opportunities for both physical and emotional intimacy, he disregards all of them. Even so, Holden desperately continues searching for new relationships, while habitually aborting his own attempts but only at the last
The Theme of Change: The Catcher in the Rye Change has one of the large-scale consequences on our inhabits. Even though it is often never observed, change occurs every minute and every second we are living on this world. We live each day without recognising the dissimilarities in us, if it's a personal or a mental change. It's not until we gaze back on our past through recollections and images that we realize how much we've really altered over time. Sometimes, we have to look actually deep and analyze locations or things that are untouched by change to help us realize how much we indeed have changed. J.D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye exemplifies the hardships of Holden, a troubled adolescent considering with his fear and disapprove of change in his life. The extent to which his anxiety with change moves is shown by his concept of being the catcher in the rye area, catching young kids that drop off the cliff. The tranquility he finds inside things residing the same is epitomized by his admiration of the never-changing Eskimos in the repository. The contradictory effect of change upon him, however, is best shown through his trauma regarding the death of his dear male sibling, Allie.
Holden Caulfield can be analyzed through his thoughts, actions and circumstances which surround his everyday life. Holden acts like a careless teenager. Holden has been to several prep-schools, all of which he got kicked out of for failing classes. After being kicked out of the latest, Pency Prep, he went off to New York on his own. Holden seems to have a motivation problem which apparently affects his reasoning. The basis of his reasoning comes from his thoughts. Holden thinks the world is full of a bunch of phonies. All his toughs about people he meets are negative. The only good thoughts he has are about his sister Phoebe and his dead brother Alley. Holden, perhaps, wishes that everyone, including himself, should be like his brother and sister. That is to be intelligent, real and loving. Holden’s problem is with his heart. It was broken when his brother died. Now Holden goes around the world as his fake self, wearing his mask. Holden is looking for love, peace and understanding. He is scared to love because he is afraid he might lose it like he did with his brother. That is the reason for Holden's love of the museum, he feels safe because it never changes it always stays the same. Holden is troubled with the pain of death, it effects every aspect of his life causing him to not care about the future, himself or anyone, except Phoebe and Alley.
There is one event that unites all human beings. This event is the process of growing up and becoming an adult. The transition into adulthood from childhood can be very long and confusing. As a kid most of them can not wait to become an adult but once you experience adulthood you miss your childhood. The novel Catcher in the Rye shows how a teenager on the break of entering adulthood can get scared. Through the main protagonist Holden Caulfield, J.D. Salinger captures the confusion of a teenager when faced with the challenge of adapting to an adult society. Holden is faced with many problems as some teens
Holden’s goal is to resist the process of maturing. He fears change and because of this, he comes up with two different personalities; one for childhood and one for adulthood. He feels more safe in one than