21 days ago, I wrote a brief, very brief thought on this book by J.D Salinger (find here : @difred/catcher-on-the-rye)
Catcher in the Rye is a book of many fronts, exploring very relatable themes in our modern world, through the eyes and experiences of Holden Caulfield we see narcissism (subtle kind), massive self doubt, fragility, grief, loss, the spill effect of improper grief, family, love, childishness, confusion, maturity, honestly, the themes explored are too many.
Holden Caulfield is a frequent drop out from various learning institutions, he is from a rich family, so money was in no way the constraint, rather Holden is someone who lacks interest in life, learning and commitment, all of these responses could be traced back to the loss of his younger brother, Allie, to leukemia. Holden never grieved properly over Allie, resorting to destructive behaviour to come to terms with his loss. On surface glance, Holden seems very sarcastic, narcissistic, pessimistic and cowardly, however underneath that he showed the quality of equity, fairness, love for cleanliness and purity, these qualities were felt only towards individuals who seemed lowly in economic standards and were prejudiced against due to that or those he had familial relationship with (excluding his parents).
Holden's character showed clearly how a lackluster approach to life can have a ripple effect across all aspects of life, it highlighted the essence of grieving, proper grief, Holden constantly had reflections about his younger brother Allie, his intelligence and mannerisms and we could feel how much he missed him and tried to see Allie in his younger sister, Phoebe. When it came to family, Holden only cherished his relationship with his younger sister first, then D.B his elder brother, it can not be said that he had a relationship with his parents as there was little mention of them, it is perceived there is a heavily strained relationship among them, one time when Holden came home and Phoebe discerned he had left school, she was distraught and kept exclaiming "Daddy will kill you, he really will" .
Outside family relationship, Holden has eyes for only Jane as she seemed to be intelligent based on his description and bias and he had a connection (could be because he felt she was broken like him) with her because there seemed to be an indication that she suffered sexual abuse at the hands of her stepfather.
When asked what he wanted to do in life, Holden imagined that his fulfilment in life will be to catch little kids from the edge of the rye fields. Holden loved innocence, he appreciated it and wanted to preserve it from all the dirtiness and rottenness of the world, for instance, when he saw an offensive word on the wall of Phoebe's school, he was so enraged that he would have beat up the kid who was responsible 😅, if found.
All in all, Holden was a pitiable character to discover, watching him have bouts of depression and self doubts was sincerely sobering. He was thoroughly depressed in and out (isn't that the reality before all of us today 🙂). Maybe if Holden was given proper help, his story might have been different 🫠🙂.
Like every relation of perspective, I will only say things from my view, hence I would love to hear your thought provoking and engaging contributions.
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