Skip to main content

The Catcher in the Rye

The Catcher in the Rye written by J.D. Salinger published in 1951, follows the story of 16-year old Holden Caulfield. He has a nonchalant personality and is constantly failing out of school. I think, as much as he says the world is "phony" and adults are fake, some part of him does care because he's hurting. During his conversation with his little sister Pheobe when he comes home early, we see part of where his mind is at. Specifically when he mentions how his favorite thing is Allie, to which Pheobe retaliates. It's clear that Holden is still holding onto emotional trauma from the death of his brother. This could very well be the reason why the idea of adults/growing up is so off-putting to him because he lost his brother when he was young. And the older he get's the more time goes past without Allie. Other than Pheobe, he seems to be the person that Holden has connected the most with. 

His relationship with Pheobe is interesting in the sense that although she is younger than him, she has a clear understanding of the world and of Holdens world. She is able to get inside of his mind in a way that his old teacher couldn't. The whole scene the night Holden snuck home told us a lot about Holden that we may not have gotten without Pheobe playing a role. It is also clear that Pheobe cares deeply about Holden and wants the best for him. The way Holden leans on and views Pheobe and Allie makes me wonder sometimes what his life would be like if he was an only child or didn't have Pheobe in his life. 


Comments

  1. MitchellMarch 10, 2023 at 2:20 PM

    Maybe Phoebe can "get inside Holden's mind" better than Mr. Spencer can, but it is interesting that, if anything, she pushes back on Holden's BS even *harder* than Spencer does, and her complaints are pretty close to Spencer's--Holden doesn't care about anything, doesn't like anything that's happening, needs to start applying himself in school, etc. She listens, but she also pushes back, which he clearly doesn't anticipate. And now that he's spent so many words telling us how smart and perceptive she is, he can't dismiss her as a moron the way he can with Spencer.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Song of Solomon: Milkman's Identity

The Song of Solomon definitely caught us off guard at first; there was so much going on to say the least. I think the most perplexing character is Milkman, because up until the more recent chapters he was the only character that didn't really have much of anything going on. He was in the same limbo state that we saw with Clarissa Dalloway, he is middle aged and is kind of settling for life. It's too late for him to really choose a career path, yet he's not necessarily happy with the way things are going for him now. Most of the time his identity is attached to that of his father or from the unfortunate nickname of Milkman. However, we see some sort of shift in him when he begins to travel and learn about his family. Milkman begins to discover his identity when he leaves to travel alone. Towards the start of his journey he still has an identity that is tied to his father, but his outlook on the gold changes. However, it's still significant to note that while he is travel...
4 comments
Read more

The Sun Also Rises: Brett and Jake

     The Sun Also Rises takes us on the journey of Brett’s adventures and life- particularly her love life. Perhaps out of all the men Brett has been with, Jake is the most notable, her relationship with him is different than those of the other men. The other’s seem to be mere hookups, other than her fiance which she doesn’t even seem to have that much of an emotional attachment to. From the first scene Brett and Jake are introduced together, we can clearly tell something is up. The taxi cab scene tells us a lot about both Jake and Brett as people but also their relationship to each other. For example, we are able to pick up on the fact that Brett is one of the only people that knows about Jake’s injury because of how they met in the war. Not only this but the scene unveils that Brett and Jake had a past that didn’t work out, and it seems as though it won’t work out in the future. The two of them want to be together but know it won’t work because it didn’t in the past....
2 comments
Read more

Invisible Man: puppet on a string

Throughout Invisible Man,  Ellison hides many metaphors that relate to the narrators life. From the reoccurring theme of running to the coin bank at Marry's, but one particularly interesting one was the doll that pops up before the climax of the book. He stumbles upon Clifton (who he doesn't notice till later) advertising and selling racist puppet dolls. Like everyone else, the narrator finds himself sucked into the doll fascinated with how it moves, he doesn't even realize Clifton is the one selling the dolls nor does he get upset that they're racist dolls. The police eventually come and everyone runs away and the narrator grabs a doll off the ground later putting it into his brief case (another reoccurring metaphor). Upon picking it up he finally realizes how the doll was able to move, it had tiny black strings which Clifton were using to move it in such a way.  This scene essentially creates a puppet on a string metaphor. In many ways, the Narrator is the puppet on t...
11 comments
Read more