Literature Analysis # 1: The Catcher in the Rye by JD Salinger

(NOTE: Instead of buying or checking out a copy of The Catcher in the Rye I utilized free and legal, open source learning resources in order to read:
http://sleeplessinmumbai.files.wordpress.com/2008/09/jd-salinger-catcher-in-the-rye.pdf)

Catcher in the Rye

Literature Analysis

By Hayden Robel

1. Fresh off the heels of his expulsion from Pencey Prep academy, Holden Caulfield, a seventeen-year old ultra-cynic, nihilist, and all around negative Nancy embarks on introverted journey thru not only the seedy streets of NYC but his own mind. With an acidic tongue, brutally sardonic mental monologues, Holden explores the adult world behind what is ultimately a self-fulfilled monocle. Along his trip he frequently remarks on the stupidity, the ugliness, the generally false personas of other people or “phonies”. Whether it be lamenting about society, its apparent corruption/ turpitude, becoming involved in fights with a liaison’s operator (prostitute/pimp), going on false dates with girls he ridicules (Sally) in the process whilst avoiding those who he genuinely cares for (his family/ Jane) Holden ventures about the world, the adult world, with a myopic ultimately immature shield. He uses his cynicism, pessimistic perspicacity as a means of distancing himself from the harsh realities of the complex adult world. Caulfield constructs the world in Manichean absolutes, perceiving people as sinister, self-centered/selfish nearly Machiavellian characters (adults/other teens) or purely innocent, virtuous individuals (His young sister Phoebe) he perceives the world as black or white. He does this as a safety mechanism; he prevents people from getting close in order to hide from the truth, the actualities of reality, a hedgehog afraid of another’s potentially hurtful quills. He refuses to acknowledge the perplexities he is unable to comprehend, refuses to validate that people are not black nor are they white, that society and the world at large are not simple categorical archetypes. Holden refuses to see the world as it truly is, grey. His negativity, jacket, even red hunter cap, all proxies to protect his naive illusionary reality.  Not until the conclusion wherein Holden is turned away from his attempted train trip, self-exile, not until he realizes that a person is genuinely holding out their hand, reaching out, trying to connect with him (Phoebe/Mr. Antolini) does the ultra-cynic’s self-constructed façade collapse. “If a body catch a body, comin thro the Rye.” The eponymous song perfectly connotes Holden’s self-imposed isolation via his negative perspicacity, his fear of others due to his immaturity in understanding human relationships are indeed more then black or white, he accepts the world as grey. By the end of JD Salinger’s epic jeremiad, Holden confronts this truth, that he was in fact a child wishing to be saved, caught in the field of rye, not the Catcher.     

2. As the quintessential jeremiad of teenage angst, JD Salinger’s nearly gothic tale of an ultra-cynical teenage boy coming to grips with the adult world is rife with themes, but to select the most prevalent, relevant, it would be coming of age. Indeed Salinger’s vessel for misguided self-isolation, the proclivity for many teens to protect themselves from the complex reality with a shielding perspicacity of pessimism is Holden Caulfield, the manifestation, apotheosis of the themes of bilsdungroman. JD Salinger captures with his novel the journey of one teen that recedes to the negative abyss of his own introversion, dubbing others “phonies” as an excuse not to connect with people, mature and realize that the world is not black nor white but grey. Thru Holden, Salinger connotes the fallacy of this misguided attempt to cope with the actualities of human society, JD emphasizing the need for people (not necessarily just teens) to realize that people, the world, is and never will be simple good or evil, black or white. Salinger communicates this theme through the odyssey Holden Caulfield experiences, provoking critical thinking, rumination, self scrutinizing contemplation, The Cather in the Rye  calling people to perceive the world differently, read reality just a little bit deeper, come of age.    

3.  Utilizing an urbanized, first- person, teenage voice JD Salinger’s legendary tone in The Catcher in Rye is acidic in its blunt expletive/insult laden diction (as emboldened below), his tone brutally sarcastic/satirical almost as a means to criticize his own personal gripes about society via Holden Caulfield as a character vehicle.

·         “If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you'll probably want to know is where I was born, an what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don't feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth.”

·         “I liked her. She had a big nose and her nails were all bitten down and bleedy-looking and she had on those damn falsies that point all over the place, but you felt sort of sorry for her. What I liked about her, she didn't give you a lot of horse manure about what a great guy her father was. She probably knew what a phony slob he was.”

·         The part that got me was, there was a lady sitting next to me that cried all through the goddam picture. The phonier it got, the more she cried. You'd have thought she did it because she was kindhearted as hell, but I was sitting right next to her, and she wasn't. She had this little kid with her that was bored as hell and had to go to the bathroom, but she wouldn't take him. She kept telling him to sit still and behave himself. She was about as kindhearted as a goddam wolf. You take somebody that cries their goddam eyes out over phony stuff in the movies, and nine times out of ten they're mean bastards at heart. I'm not kidding.

 With a bevy of euphemisms unleashed alongside specific diction as highlighted above, JD Salinger’s tone is undeniably sardonic, cruel in its satirical renditions/remarks on others/society and the world in general.

4.

·         “Then, when she was all done whispering and being cute as hell, she'd sing some dopey song, half in English and half in French, and drive all the phonies in the place mad with joy. If you sat around there long enough and heard all the phonies applauding and all, you got to hate everybody in the world, I swear you did.” (pg. 76) Details Salinger’s cruel satirical/sardonic tone as he brutally, and fluidly I might add, remarks on the bar attendees fallibility dubbing them with the specific diction “phonies”.

·         “Anyway, I'm sort of glad they've got the atomic bomb invented. If there's ever another war, I'm going to sit right the hell on top of it. I'll volunteer for it, I swear to God I will.” (pg. 64) Using a black comedy, macabre sense of humor with his tone/subject matter, Salinger commits to his sarcastic diction ending with “I swear to God I will.”

·         “What he'd do was, he'd start snowing his date in this very quiet, sincere voice--like as if he wasn't only a very handsome guy but a nice, sincere guy, too. I damn near puked, listening to him. His date kept saying, "No--please. Please, don't. Please." But old Stradlater kept snowing her in this Abraham Lincoln, sincere voice, and finally there'd be this terrific silence in the back of the car. It was really embarrassing. I don't think he gave that girl the time that night--but damn near. Damn near.” (pg. 52) Salinger has perfected his tone here again using the diction of “snowing” and other odd but satirically humorous word choices and similes (highlights) to assist his purpose to paint Holden’s world with a pessimistic eye.   

·         “I told him I wasn't going to chuck it at anybody, but he wouldn't believe me. People never believe you.” (pg. 20) This characterizing excerpt caught my eye in particular as it supports my claims in question #2 as Salinger connotes Holden’s lack of trust in others, ultimately evidence to the idea that Caulfield refuses to acknowledge anything more complex then his perspective on society and the world at large.

·         “Her son was doubtless the biggest bastard that ever went to Pencey, in the whole crumby history of the school. He was always going down the corridor, after he'd had a shower, snapping his soggy old wet towel at people's asses. That's exactly the kind of a guy he was.” (pg. 30) Salinger uses direct characterization to not describe the “biggest bastard” son but ultimately Holden, cementing Caulfield’s cynical eye to which he beholds reality.

·         “Finally I sat down on this bench, where it wasn't so goddam dark. Boy, I was still shivering like a bastard, and the back of my hair, even though I had my hunting hat on, was sort of full of little hunks of ice. That worried me. I thought probably I'd get pneumonia and die.” (pg. 83) Salinger comments on Caulfield’s signature hyperbolic, melancholic melodrama as he over exaggerates “I thought probably I'd get pneumonia and die.”

·         “The mark of the immature man is that he wants to die nobly for a cause, while the mark of the mature man is that he wants to live humbly for one.” (pg. 101) Holden reads a little advice from one of the few adults he’s allowed to get closer to him, Mr. Antolini. Thru Mr. Anotlini’s advice Salinger communicates the above thoughts, no doubt his own, that Holden is indeed immature and afraid of the complexities of the adult world he is growing up in, like all teens, people have at one point confronted and either rose over or fell into the abyss of cynicism/illusory, self-deceiving coping devices. Salinger’s attempts to provoke thought have his reader’s think critically, and mentally come of age, thus his coming of age theme is realized here with Holden bearing “the mark of the immature man” perceiving the world thru a Manichean visor.

·         “I was sweating, too. When something perverty like that happens, I start sweating like a bastard. That kind of stuff's happened to me about twenty times since I was a kid. I can't stand it.” (pg. 104) My interpretation of this event is not the superficial account given to us by Holden (in fact I think this a subtly brilliant use of an unreliable narrator), I suspect Salinger mounted Mr. Antolini as a symbol of human connection, another person genuinely reaching out to Holden not what Holden believes the teacher to be (a pervy pedophile petting Holden while he sleeps, rather he was comforting an obviously misguided child…). As holden says “That kind of stuff's happened to me about twenty times since I was a kid.” Subsequently he’s always had trouble with adults/people trying to reach out and connect with him to which then “I can't stand it.” Confirms Holden’s adamant disbelief that people can authentically care for anyone aside from themselves, care for him. Deep.

·         “I thought about all that stuff. And the more I thought about it, the more depressed I got. I mean I started thinking maybe I should've gone back to his house. Maybe he was only patting my head just for the hell of it. The more I thought about it, though, the more depressed and screwed up about it I got.” (pg. 105) Salinger begins to convey the idea that Holden is indeed maturing, realizing he is “screwed up.” And maybe misinterpreted Mr. Antolini’s actions. Dynamic characterization is portrayed here as Holden is puncturing his otherwise statically-cynical tunnel vision blinds that he has worn over his eyes for so long; Salinger shows that Holden is coming of age in thought.

·         “If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you'll probably want to know is where I was born, an what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don't feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth.”  (pg. 1) Throughout the course of the novel, hell, in the beginning, Salinger crafts his satirical/sarcastically cynical tone, voice of Holden Caulfield, using hyperboles, colloquialisms, euphemisms, obscenities etc. and so forth JD Salinger’s Holden Caulfield of The Catcher in the Rye is the voice of not just teens, but all who have struggled to perceive the world as neither pure good nor evil, black or white, unable to see the world as it is in reality, grey. Holden is the manifestation, the monument to those have refused to fall, take the plunge off the rye-cropped cliff-top, into the adult world, these individuals becoming the “catcher’s” in their own self-tailored, curtailed crops of rye, reality, not realizing that in order to rise, realize that world is truly in the eye of the beholder not simply black or white but grey, realize that in order to rise you must first fall, come of age.