1. AJR- Turning Out - This song is about growing up. The singer feels like he is still discovering himself, but other people keep telling him he’s turned out fine. Holden could relate to this because he is still finding out who he is. Other people are always disappointed in him, and determine that he hasn’t turned out well. However, Holden is still turning out. In addition, there are lyrics about romantic relationships. “Am I ready for love? Or maybe just a best friend? Should there be a difference? Do you have instructions?” Holden deep down wants a romantic relationship and even seeks an old friend for sex advice. 2. My Chemical Romance- Welcome to the Black Parade - There are a couple lyrics that relate to Holden in this song. First, there are the lyrics “Would you be the savior of the broken, the beaten and the damned?” Holden is broken, but he wants to be the one who saves the innocent children from falling off the cliff. Next, there …show more content…
Teenagers- My Chemical Romance - This song is essentially about how teenagers are mean. Holden sees everyone as a phony, and this song essentially describes his views on other people. There is the line “You’re never gonna fit in much, kid.” This is Holden in a nutshell because he doesn’t fit in. 4. Eagles- Hotel California - This correlates with Holden’s experience between leaving Pencey and going home. He stays at a hotel and has many adventures. In “Hotel California,” the Eagles describe their journey to a hotel that they cannot escape. There is also a line in the song about dancing. “Some dance to remember. Some dance to forget.” This is like Holden’s encounter with the women at the hotel. 5. Eagles- Take it Easy - This song is about taking it easy, just like the title says. Don’t put too much pressure on yourself. The lyrics, “Don’t even try to understand. Just find a place to make your stand and take it easy.” This is a message for Holden because he needs to take a step back and not let other people get into his
phonies and all he hates. By being in the stage where he is, he manages to avoid change, control his world with his own hands, yet. creates a paradox between what he is, and what he wants to be. Possibly the main reason why Holden doesn’t want to become an adult. is his perception of ”phoniness” and hypocrisy surrounding adult.
A dream Holden has shows that he want to be a guardian for children: “Anyway I kept picturing all these little kids playing some game in this big field of rye... And I’m standing on the edge of some crazy cliff. What I have to do, I have to catch everybody if they start to go over the cliff” (173). This dream displays his desire to be a hero for all children because they are guilt-free and do not deserve any harm. He wants to save the children.
Holden’s childhood was far from ideal, with Allie dying, his dysfunctional parents and the revelation that he had some “perverty” stuff happen to him when he was a kid. Due to this, he isn't ready to step into adulthood and leave his childhood behind. This is why Holden is mostly alienated from adults and connects more to the innocence of children like the girl at the park and his sister, Phoebe. However, Holden is disillusioned with both adulthood and childhood. He already knows how it feels to be an adult; drinking alcohol, being independent, living by himself and caring for Phoebe, but isn’t ready to immerse himself in it.
Holden’s apparent desire to be separated from the majority of his family and friends appears to have been triggered by the death of his younger brother Allie. From Allie’s there has been a downward spiral in Holden’s relationships, as he begins to avoid contact with others and isolate himself more. The reason I believe this is because we can see how immense his anger is after Allie’s death, ‘I slept in the garage the night he died, and I broke all the goddam windows with my fist’. The death of Allie has become like an awakening to Holden, and has alerted him how precious childhood innocence is, when Holden comes to this realisation he convinces himself to do everything within his power to protect the innocence of himself and those around him, to protect them from what he sees as a false adult world. Although Holden clearly fails to protect himself, as he falls into all sorts of situations which hardly boasts of innocence and virt... ...
This first song goes well with Holden because we see throughout the whole book, how Holden experiences loneliness. Holden says, “The first thing I did when I got off at Penn Station, I went into this phone booth. I felt like giving somebody a buzz” (Salinger 59) This is just one example of Holden’s loneliness. At this time he is just getting of the train realizing he has nobody to go to and nobody to talk to so he feeling like calling someone even if it’s just to talk to. n the song Talking To Myself, The lyrics say “Is anybody out there?/It feels like I'm talkin' to myself/No one seems to know my struggle/And everything I come from/Can anybody hear me?”(Eminem) This song by Eminem is a good example of Holden’s loneliness because throughout the song it
When Phoebe asks Holden what he wants to do with his life he replied. 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 he
However, his feelings suggest that the true reason for his depression is his loss of Innocence. When he was 13 years old, he lost his little brother Allie to leukemia. Allie meant a lot to Holden. He even becomes a symbol in the book. Allie is the one who keeps Holden from falling of the cliff, he’s the reason that he hasn’t lost his innocence yet. “Every time I came to the end of a block and stepped off the goddam curb, I had this feeling that I'd never get to the other side of the street. I thought I'd just go down, down, down, and nobody'd ever see me again. Boy, did it scare me. You can't imagine. I started sweating like a bastard—my whole shirt and underwear and everything. Then I started doing something else. Every time I'd get to the end of a block I'd make believe I was talking to my brother Allie. I'd say to him, "Allie, don't let me disappear. Allie, don't let me disappear. Allie, don't let me disappear. Please, Allie." And then when I'd reach the other side of the street without disappearing, I'd thank him.” (Sallinger) In this part, Allie plays the role as the Catcher in the Rye and keeps Holden from falling of the cliff. This is why i believe that Holden wants to become a “ Catcher in the Rye”. He wants to help people like Allie has helped him. He feels that it's what he’d meant to do with his
Throughout the novel, Holden leaves hints insinuating that he is distancing himself from people and society through his actions and decisions. Holden shows his hate towards the adult world by mentioning “phoniness” throughout the book, insinuating that he will never be like this, even though it’s impossible. His constant failing at school evidences that he isn’t planning to have a common future by having a job like most people would. It was evidently explained that Holden doesn’t fit in because he doesn’t want to be part of humans’ corrupted society. Regardless of how one feels about society, it is evident that its flaws made a teenager retract from accepting humans’ adult world, and instead negated to be a part of it.
I guess you can say he is trying to transition from adult hood but he can’t. He believes childhood is a beautiful and innocent thing where as adulthood is evil and corrupted. In the text Holden says “That's the whole trouble. You can't ever find a place that's nice and peaceful, because there isn't any. You may think there is, but once you get there, when you're not looking, somebody'll sneak up and write "Fuck you" right under your nose” Pg. 204 Another reason why Holden is stuck between adult hood and childhood is because he doesn’t understand the concept of sex. He doesn’t get how two adults can have sex without loving each other. Holden tells Luce "You know what the trouble with me is? I can never get really sexy—I mean really sexy with a girl I don’t like a lot. I mean I have to like her a lot. If I don’t, I sort of lose my goddam desire for her and all.”Pg148 Luce then later says “When are you going to grow up?"Pg. 144. This is another example how Holden can’t really grow up. Mr. Antolini brings up an examples that goes “this fall I think you’re riding for – it’s a special kind of fall, a horrible kind. The man falling isn’t permitted to feel or hear himself hit bottom. He just keeps falling and falling."Pg. 187. This quote is illustrating that Holden doesn’t know where to go, he’s lost and confused from the transition from childhood to
...ut the exact flaw in his life that is holding him back from realizing his true potential in life. “you don't like anything thats happening” (p.g 169). At this point in the book Holden has been kicked out of Pencey prep, and comes home to phoebe while his parents aren't there hoping to find something he can carry on his journey out. Before he does anything he sees phoebe. Holden tells Phoebe that the school is full of “phoneys” and that the teachers are where he mostly got the idea of them being phoney. This quote from phoebe is basically telling Holden that he has a negative attitude towards life and basically everything he hasent experienced such as adulthood. Holden has a negative towards adult hood just because of the negative things he hears and has seen. Although Holden has never really given the thought of adulthood a chance, much less even experience adulthood.
The negative light that Holden views the world under is a key contribution to his unhappiness. He is unable to see even a glint of sincerity in people’s actions which allows him to experience feelings of severe despondency and dejection. “People never give your message to anybody,” (pg. 166) shows how Holden no longer feels let down by people but instead expects the worst from them instead. He struggles to find genuinity in people’s actions, and in turn feels “lousy and depressed,” by nearly everything. Holden is constantly seen bringing down the adult world. It is shown he has an inner conflict between his adult and child self, leading him to feeling lost and without a place. He is disgusted by the adult world describing it as a place filled with “phonies” but, views adolescence as a source of happiness. He shows a direct fear of change by stating, “The best thing...was that everything always stayed right where it was.” (pg. 135). As Holden is being pushed out of his childhood and into an area where he feels out of place, it is only inevitable that this would be a source of his depression. Both of these internal conflicts add to Holden Caulfield’s
The song “Catcher in the Rye” by Guns N’ Roses is a perfect representation of the novel, not only by the title, but also throughout the lyrics. The lyrics include, “The Catcher in the Rye again ooh/ Won't let ya get away from him/ It's just another day like today.” These are apt words because it references the “job” Holden wants later in life, which is being a catcher in the rye. The song overall talks about being crazy and lonesome, which is what Holden feels in most of the book. In The Catcher in the Rye, by J.D. Salinger, Holden Caulfield’s New York odyssey leads to his dark fall.
Holden is not just abnormal, he has problems that other teenagers, including the students at Pencey, experience going through adolescence. An example of this is Holden's jealousy towards Stradlater when he finds out he is going on a date with Jane Gallagher, “Boy,was I getting nervous” (42). Every teenager has bouts of jealously especially about the opposite sex, and Holden is no different. Holden's rebellious nature, to an extent, is typical for a teenage boy. His rebellious nature of smoking when it is not allowed, “You weren't allowed to smoke in the dorm...I went right on smoking like a madman.” (41-42). Holden is also anxious about change, which again to an extent is normal, “Do you happen to know where they go, the ducks...”(60), and he has the right to be; change,especially during adolescence, is a terrifying but exciting ride into the unknown, and similar to other adolescents Holden is afraid but intrigued about the unknown.
He doesn’t feel like he really belongs anywhere and also feels he doesn’t fit in with anyone. “Anyway, it was the Saturday of the football game…I remember around three o'clock that afternoon I was standing way the hell up on top of Thomsen Hill…You could see the whole field from there, and you could see the two teams bashing each other all over the place… You could hear them all yelling.”(Salinger 2). Holden isolates himself from everyone at the big football game because he feels like he doesn’t belong. He also isolates himself because he doesn’t want to be around all of the fake people in the world. He feels he should separate himself from all the liars in the world. Lots of teenagers feel like they don’t belong in there school for many reasons, like there social class, there friends, or just because they are new. Holden portrays this same feelings of being isolated because he is constantly changing schools and has very low
Holden is the main character of the book. He is a complicated boy how seems to get thrown out of boarding schools left and right. He is constantly thinking about depressive thoughts of his past, like times he was with his brother, who is dead. His thoughts of his brother bring serious rage for some reason. In one instance he tells about the day after his brothers death, and Holden was filled with such anger and loneliness, he punched through all the glass doors in his garage. This required him to go to the hospital, and unfortunately his stay at the hospital forced him to miss his brothers funeral. He also keeps thinking about his old girl friend Jane. Holden is reminded of past times with her, where her father upset her, and Holden was the only one there to console her. So with that in mind, he thinks he still may have a place with her, and Holden believes that all his happiness will rest with her. Holden is just a guy who is searching for something to get him out of his depression, but he has no idea what it is, and above all how to get it.