The Spice of Life
It is strange that humanity fears death, when the act of living is far more painful. Survival is a talent. It is a victory only accomplished by the fittest. As the world’s renowned English geologist Charles Darwin stated, “It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is most adaptable to change” (Purington). This idea of adaptability towards change has been challenge for humans ever since the beginning of the time. Change is inevitable. Nothing stays still. Life is in constant motion from the molecular to the planetary level and humans are changing right along with it. An example of someone who failed to understand that was Holden Caulfield. In The Catcher
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in the Rye by J.D Salinger, adaptability was the major flaw the character had. The whole central conflict was his mentality to fight against life.
His acceptance for change was what led to the end of the story. The theme of story was that change is inexorable and it needs to be accepted.
The theme is evident in the story. The most drastic change that Holden could not accept was growing up. Rather, as the title suggests, Holden wanted to be the catcher in the rye. It referred to Robert Burn’s song, “Comin’ Thro’ the Rye.” Holden especially liked the lyric, “If a body catch a body comin’ through the rye” (Salinger 195). He imagined all the world’s children are “in a field of rye located on the top of a cliff” (Salinger 196). According to Holden, they would fall off the cliff supposedly into adulthood. Holden saw himself as “the catcher who catches them from falling” (Salinger 197). This was Holden’s refusal towards adults and the concept of transitioning himself to adulthood. He viewed adulthood as fake and “full of phonies” (Salinger 14). A few bad people and his own misjudgements lead to this trust issue he formed with almost every adult he met. He met Carl Luce, an old advisor at his school. Carl was described to have a brazen personality as he, for example, used to “speak frankly about sex with the younger kids” (Salinger 78). During the meeting with Holden, however, he seemed irritated with his juvenile
remarks about sex and homosexuals. Instead of realizing that Carl had matured, Holden calls him “phony” and how “he has an attitude” (Salinger 80). He refused to think positive about anybody or anything. His refusal to the inevitable is what lead to his destruction. Every decision he made got worse. It came to the point where he was beaten, almost raped, and almost convinced a girl to run away with him when he had no idea where to take her. After 214 pages worth of drama, at the end, he had to go with flow. At the end of the story, Holden and his younger sister, Phoebe, visit the zoo and Phoebe rides the carousel there. He explains how “children try to reach for the golden ring on the ride, however by doing so they most often fall off of the carousel” (Salinger 212). Therefore, the gold ring symbolizes the struggle to hold onto childhood. It is not possible to hold on to it. Holden realized that. He also realized that he made such a big deal out of his transition from childhood to adulthood that his own thoughts become rambunctious. He was forced to go to some sort of mental asylum where he was treated. The visual is a trifold board that shows a tree experiencing four seasons. I split the board into four quadrants that represented each season and the tree’s branches extended to each season. It is so common, yet we humans never seem to notice it. For a tree though it is the most important thing that happens to it. As humans, we do not understand what the tree really goes through internally. What if letting leaves drop or growing buds is as painful for a tree as it is for a human to give birth to child? Just imagine the burden the tree has to put up with in the sweltering heat when it has to carry thousands of leaves on its sides. Usually, trees are not supplied with daily water from humans. They have to make do with what they are getting from inside the ground. During the winter, the tree dies and sheds all its leaves. No one knows what the tree has to do to itself in order to die. How does it find the strength to come back alive again in the spring? The tree must go through so much discomfort to do that. Yet, it does so every single year. It knows that if it did not, it would not make it alive the next year. If a tree did not drop its leaves in the fall, then there is no way for it to have new, strong, healthy leaves in the upcoming summer. The tree does not question why it needs to go through this very process.It does not ask for an easier way to get new leaves. It understands that though the change is painful and takes forever, the tree’s life depends on it. It connects to the story in the sense that Holden, the main character, needed to accept what was going on with him. Yes he was not liking the adult world, but there was nothing he could do to change that. He needed to move on and let nature take care of itself. Why is change the source of so much fear and unhappiness? Why do people resist it so deeply and struggle against it so desperately? The reason is, just like Holden, we long for sameness. However, if we could arrest change and enter a world of eternal stasis we would go mad. We would stagnate and die, because change is life. Constant adaptation creates the momentum and energy that keeps us going. Nature understands this quite better than humans do. The world has thousands of trees that refuse to avoid the process of change that is meant for them. They understand that change is progress. Change is to improve. Change is the spice of life.
J.D Salinger gives his personal vision of the world successfully through his persona Holden Caulfield in the ‘Catcher in the Rye’. Caulfield struggles with the background of New York to portray Salinger’s theme – you must live the world as it is, not as you would like it to be. There by exposing Salinger’s vision on the world.
In J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye, the main character, Holden, cannot accept that he must move out of childhood and into adulthood. One of Holden’s most important major problems is his lack of maturity. 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.
J. D. Salinger’s novel, Catcher in the Rye explores the ambiguity of the adult world Holden must eventually learn to accept. Throughout the novel, Holden resists the society grownups represent, coloring his childlike dreams with innocence and naivety. He only wants to protect those he loves, but he cannot do it the way he desires. As he watches Phoebe on the carousel, he begins to understand certain aspects of truth. He writes:
Holden wants to shelter children from the adult world (Chen). In Chapter 16, the catcher in the rye finally appears. This is also a symbol for what Holden would like to be when he grows older. He pictures a group of many kids playing in a field of rye, where it is his job to catch them from falling off the cliff. This shows Holden’s love for childhood and his need to preserve it in any way he can. According to Alsen, “The way Holden explains why he wants to be the catcher in the rye shows the kindness and unselfishness of his character. However, the surreal nature of the metaphor also reveals his unwillingness to face the real life choices he needs to make now that he is approaching adulthood.” By the end of the book, Holden realizes in order for kids to grow, there can’t be protection from all of potential harm. “He therefore gives up his dream of being the catcher in the rye and is ready to make a realistic choice of what he wants to do with his life” (Alsen). Holden’s dream world, that doesn’t involve change, is unrealistic. He is terrified by the unpredictable changes of the adult world, but there is no way for Holden to avoid the experiences and changes that the
This reveals Holden’s fantasy of an idealistic childhood and his role as the guardian of innocence. Preventing children from “going over the cliff” and losing their innocence is his way of vicariously protecting himself from growing up as well. Holden acknowledges that this is “crazy,” yet he cannot come up with a different lifestyle because he struggles to see the world for how it truly is, and fears not knowing what might happen next. Holden’s “catcher in the rye” fantasy reflects his innocence, his belief in a pure, uncorrupted youth, and his desire to protect it. This fantasy also represents his disconnection from reality, as he thinks he can stop the process of growing up, yet
Annotated Bibliography of Crash Course. “Holden, JD, and the Red Cap- The Catcher in the Rye Part 2: Crash Course English Literature #7.” Youtube.
Even though “The Catcher in the Rye” was written and set in the 1950s, Salinger's story about an observative, conscious teen who is struggling to find his own identity, maintains much interest and is suitable to readers today. Many teenagers can relate to Holden Caulfield's opinionated and sentimental personality, as well as the problems he faces. These problems include sexually related rendezvouses and eagerness for independence. Holden goes against the adult world around him, which to Holden is loaded with "phonies", searching for righteousness and truth, even though several of his actions would depict him as a "phony" himself. Towards the end of the book, Holden finds it harder to deal with living in the society he is in, while dealing with his worsening depression.
The Catcher in the Rye is a story about a boy, Holden Caulfield, and a few days of his life as he goes to New York near Christmas. He has been kicked out of four distinguished high schools for his poor grades. From the beginning of the story it is visible he is very pessimistic and has a negative outlook on almost everybody in the book. It is because of this that I do not judge people based on his opinions of them. Holden’s brother died three years before the story starts, and his death might be the cause of some of his personality. At the beginning of the book, he is getting ready to leave the all-boys Pencey Prep in a few days. His roommate, Stradlater, is going on a date with Jane Gallagher, a girl whom
Which is the kind of world he wants to live in. Holden expresses his desire to preserve the innocence of others when his sister Phoebe tells Holden that he doesn't like anything, and that he has no ambitions of what he wants to be when he is older. Holden then explains that he wants to be the catcher in the rye. He says that he imagines little children playing on top of a hill and that his job is to protect children from falling of the hill. This symbolizes catching children from losing their innocence and falling into the adult world. Holden tells Phoebe, “I know it crazy, but that is the only thing I’d like to be” (172). This unrealistic desire is contributes to why Holden is struggling to transition from adolescence to adulthood. Critics of the novel have said Holden would like to suspend time stating, “Holden's desire to protect children shows his desire for suspending time, for inhabiting a space of young people conserved endlessly” (Yahya 3). Not letting go of childhood memories or accepting the harsh realities of adulthood are damaging when transitioning from
Holden wants to protect children from having to face the harsh realities of life, therefore, he wants to be a catcher in a rye. He feels so protective of others based on his own distorted outlook on the world. He hates the falseness of other people, similar to his school, but all Holden sees around him is liars and thieves. He sees Pencey Prep as a microcosm of New York City, which is filled with degenerates. Holden 's parents, also show his disregard for adulthood with their high social class position. They have not taught Holden about what is an actual reality, rather they send him off to a boarding school, creating a communication barrier between each other. Holden 's sister Phoebe, however, reflects the morality of childhood because she is bold to confront life. Adults lose the ability to be authentic and upfront, while children are more direct. One of the themes of the novel is Holden Caulfield 's conflicted relationship with youth and adulthood. In “Reconsidering the concept of therapeutic landscapes in J D Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye” written by Leonard D Baer and Wilbert M Gesler, the authors, discuss the significance of the transition between childhood and adulthood had an effect on Holden Caulfield. The authors compare J D Salinger and Holden such as both of them lived in New York City, Holden’s desire to neglect society and migrating to different locations became a reality for
Holden’s dream career of being the catcher in the rye, is symbolic. He says to phoebe that his job would be to catch the kids from falling off the cliff near the rye field where the kids are playing. The kids playing in the field symbolizes childhood and the field is symbolizing innocence. The cliff is symbolizing the idea of falling from the innocence, growing up. Holden is consistently troubled by aging throughout the book. He is frightened by change and has a difficult time understanding its complexity. Instead of acknowledging his fears of adulthood, he ignores them and over idolizes childhood. He creates this black and white world where childhood is innocence, curiosity, honesty, and the adult world is full of phoniness. The concept of the catcher in the rye is really where Holden reveals his thoughts on this. He wishes to save the kids from falling from the cliff, to
Throughout The Catcher in the Rye Holden puts himself in situations that are very stressful. His personality type puts him in these situations. Holden has trouble-making friends because he thinks almost everyone is a phony. The pressure created from not having friends and being able to be comfortable at a school forced him out of an education, “One of the biggest reasons I left Elkton Hills was because I was surrounded by phonies. That's all...For instance, they had this headmaster, Mr. Haas, that was the phoniest bastard I ever met in my life” (Salinger 13) not only did this force him out of the school but also onto the streets. The song “Under Pressure” by Queen perfectly fits the theme that the pressure Holden created on himself forced him to the edge of sanity. In the song, one of the reoccurring lines is “puts people on the streets” (Queen) referring to pressure. This song perfectly relates to this theme.
From the novel, The Catcher in the Rye, the youthful protagonist Holden Caufield, employs the word “phony” to describe the behavior of a number of characters including Mr. Spencer and Ossenburger, however it is not them who are“phony”, it is the young main character. First, Mr. Spencer, Holden’s ex- history teacher, is not described as phony, but according to the adolescent, his choice of words are. Secondly, according to our main character, Ossenburger is not the generous philanthropist he portrays himself to be, but rather a greedy undertaker. Lastly, the protagonist could quite possibly be the authentic phony. All in all, the main character’s use to describe many other characters in the book is with the single word phony, when in fact the word phony would be the most probable word to describe the lead character.
Some people feel all alone in this world, with no direction to follow but their empty loneliness. The Catcher in the Rye written by J.D Salinger, follows a sixteen-year-old boy, Holden Caulfield, who despises society and calls everyone a “phony.” Holden can be seen as a delinquent who smokes tobacco, drinks alcohol, and gets expelled from a prestigious boarding school. This coming-of-age book follows the themes of isolation, innocence, and corrupted maturity which is influenced from the author's life and modernism, and is shown through the setting, symbolism, and diction.
Holden from the start of Catcher in the Rye deems people of society to be pretentious, referring to them as ‘phonies.’ His lack of trust and belief towards adults causes him to want to save children from becoming adult themselves. As Phoebe and Holden were conversing as what they’d like to be one day, Holden points out “What I have to do, I have to catch everybody if they start to go over the cliff – I mean if they're running and they don't look where they're going I have to come out from somewhere and catch them. That's all I'd do all day. I'd just be the catcher in the rye and all”; he enthusiastically states out that he’ll be the one to save them from what he considers to be the death of their childhood (Salinger 54). The cliff symbolizes the jump from adolescence to adulthood. The determined diction shows off Holden’s genuine desire to help out kids from ever growing up. Holden holds himself to the idea that facing adulthood is a terrible fate and should be avoided w...