The Catcher in the Rye
Analysis
Task 1
- “I have a feeling that you're riding for some kind of a terrible, terrible fall. But I don't honestly know what kind.... It may be the kind where, at the age of thirty, you sit in some bar hating everybody who comes in looking as if he might have played football in college. Then again, you may pick up just enough education to hate people who say, 'It's a secret between he and I.' Or you may end up in some business office, throwing paper clips at the nearest stenographer. I just don't know.”
- Mr. Antolini
”The Catcher in the Rye” is a novel by J.D. Salinger, which was published in 1951. It was originally intended for adults, but has eventually become popular among teenagers as well, because of its genuine way of bringing up teenage confusion, angst, depression and so on. The story being told is that of Holden Caulfield, a clever boy with many inner struggles. Holden grew up in a wealthy home, but became depressed after his younger brother, Allie, died at a young age. After this he began struggling in school and in life. His parents sent him to four different boarding schools, but he was expelled from every single one. This story takes place in the few days after he leaves the last school, Pencey.
Holden does not come off as a particularly warm or sensitive person. There are only a handful of people he respects, and most of these belong to his family. His sister Phoebe, though, seems to be the person he admires the most, perhaps because he has never had any form of sexual relationship with her. The only people he seems to bond with are the people he has something in common with. He shares the pain connected to his brother’s death with his family, the feeling of not being understood or accepted with Mr Antolini and Jane Gallagher (the only girl he respects and finds attractive) had “a lousy childhood, just like him.”
Sex really does play a big part in this novel. In fact, Holden spends the majority of the book...