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In The Catcher In The Rye by J.D. Salinger, Holden Caulfield, the protagonist of the novel, emerges as a juvenile who has a bleak outlook in life, accosted with the arduous challenges of both humanity and life as he seeks to define the meaning of existence. Holden has many obstacles being thrown at him such as the loss of his younger brother, Allie, which has him confused and trapped in recollections from the past. On his own Holden has made attempts to subside these conflicts, however, they have only left him managing with more problems: loneliness, addictions, delusions, etc. Holden is also depicted as a failure that struggles to maintain firm in one of the four schools he has been expelled from. As a result of said incapacity to remain stable, …show more content…
both academically and mentally, Holden is currently being treated at WarriorSide under supervised care. Through thorough examination it has been concluded that the most illustrious causes for Holden’s academic statistics and mental state are the many hardships he has endured through his lifetime, resulted by the diagnoses of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, Clinical Depression, and Acute Paranoia. Holden had a very traumatic childhood, due to Allie's death, for whom he persistently emanates love and admiration.
Holden manifests that often times he cannot seem to latch onto the idea that Allie is dead; it has been difficult for Holden not to embrace memories from the past. While speaking to Holden of said event he confesses, “I slept in the garage the night he died, and I broke all the goddam windows with my fist” (Salinger 21) Holden also admits that he carriers Allie’s baseball mitt “to have it with me, in my suitcase” (Salinger 39) Holden seems unable to maneuver past this stage in his life. As a result he has neglected the ideology of growing up; leaving him with a series of panic attacks, constant disinterest in his surroundings, and overwhelming feelings of hopelessness. It is evident he is unable to manage this immediate change in his life. Overall, these are symptoms that disclose posttraumatic stress …show more content…
disorder. Holden inadequately motivates himself, which he needs to do in order to properly contemplate his life.
Currently, Holden displays a serious case of unhappiness. As a result, he has grown a desire to end his life: a major symptom for depression. Holden expresses his melancholy and solitude through his dialogue; his usage of words persistently consist of depressed and lonesome claims. Holden admits, “Wished I was dead.” (Salinger 101) He does not possess any life goals; he is not concerned about his future. Holden treats life very unsignificantly, which may be the result of such thoughts for they continue to suppress his imperfect lifestyle. Holden is also unhappy due to his inability to maintain a stable relationship. He mainly tries to conceal his problems by being with someone else: a woman. Women play a big role in his life. Through Psychotherapy Holden has abruptly confessed, “In my mind, I’m probably the biggest sex maniac you ever saw” (Salinger 68) It troubles Holden to know that he might be alone forever. All he seeks is some sort of companionship, however, he has the tendency of looking in the wrong places. Once Holden has found companionship in others he will be able to decline his gloomy and unsettling
claims. Holden has the developed the incompetence to properly process his emotions. As a result, he has trust issues that affect him on a daily basis. Holden has confessed that he views everyone as a “phony”. To Holden being a “phony” means that “people are always ruining things for you.” (Salinger 94) Moreover, during the process of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) Holden has disclosed that past incidents have also altered feelings of insecurity; people have ruined experiences for him. Holden talks about one incident: Mr. Antolini being very hostile towards him once he fell asleep. Holden explains that he woke up due to Mr. Antolini “petting me or patting me on the goddam head” (Salinger 233) This really frightens Holden. He “jumped about a thousand feet” (Salinger 233) Holden was also “shaking like a madman. I was sweating, too.” (Salinger 235) Holden’s inability to properly process this has him distressed. Holden is certain this was a homosexual aggression made towards him, however, this is up for debate. Mistrust flourishes inside him, giving him the tendency to view everything as a strike against him. Holden is simply paranoid he cannot confine anything with anyone
Holden Caulfield, the teenage protagonist of Catcher In The Rye by J.D. Salinger, struggles with having to enter the adult world. Holden leaves school early and stays in New York by himself until he is ready to return home. Holden wants to be individual, yet he also wants to fit in and not grow up. The author uses symbolism to represent Holden’s internal struggle.
As Eugene McNamara stated in his essay “Holden Caulfield as Novelist”, Holden, of J.D. Salinger’s novel Catcher in the Rye, had met with long strand of betrayals since he left Pencey Prep. These disappointments led him through the adult world with increasing feelings of depression and self-doubt, leading, finally to his mental breakdown.
In J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye, the main character, Holden, cannot accept that he must move out of childhood and into adulthood. One of Holden’s most important major problems is his lack of maturity. Holden also has a negative perspective of life that makes things seem worse than they really are. In addition to Holden’s problems he is unable to accept the death of his brother at a young age. Holden’s immaturity, negative mentality, and inability to face reality hold him back from moving into adulthood.
In the novel, Catcher in the Rye by J. D. Salinger, Holden Caulfield is an example of a prosaic rich adolescent boy,with a pedestrian set of problems, but a psychoanalysis reveals that Holden has a plethora of atypical internal conflicts. Internal conflicts that other students at Pencey, such as Stradlater and Ackley, would not normally experience.
Events in Holden's life lead him to become depressed. Holden's depression centers on Allie. The manner that Holden sees himself and how he sees others leads him to be expelled from school. The speaker expresses, "One thing about packing depressed me a little," (51). Holden expresses these feelings when he packs his bags after being notified that he is expelled. Holden leaves school and heads for New York City, where he finds himself to be more lonely and depressed than ever. He is all alone and he laments, " What I really felt like doing was committing suicide. I felt like jumping out of the window," (104). Holden says this while he is all alone in his motel room. He is too ashamed of himself to return home, he knows that his mother will be upset and his father will be angry with him. He also adds that " I wasn’t feeling sleepy or anything, but I was feeling sort of lousy. Depressed and all, I almost wished I was dead," (90). Holden states this during one of the first nights that he is staying in New York. Holden expresses many thoughts of depression.
In J.D. Sallinger's Catcher in the Rye, is based on the sullen life of Holden Caulfield, a 16-year-old teen-ager is trying to find his sense of direction. Holden, a growing adult, cannot accept the responsibilities of an adult. Eventually realizing that there is no way to avoid the adult life, he can only but accept this alternative lifestyle. What Holden describes the adult world as a sinful, corrupted life, he avoids it for three important reasons: His hatred towards phonies and liars, unable to accept adult responsibilities, and thirdly to enshrine his childhood youth.
Holden Caulfield, portrayed in the J.D. Salinger novel Catcher in the Rye as an adolescent struggling to find his own identity, possesses many characteristics that easily link him to the typical teenager living today. The fact that the book was written many years ago clearly exemplifies the timeless nature of this work. Holden's actions are those that any teenager can clearly relate with. The desire for independence, the sexually related encounters, and the questioning of ones religion are issues that almost all teens have had or will have to deal with in their adolescent years. The novel and its main character's experiences can easily be related to and will forever link Holden with every member of society, because everyone in the world was or will be a teen sometime in their life.
In the novel The Catcher In The Rye by J.D. Salinger,Holden the main character tries to take on adult and mature situations but finds himself in reality not getting very far. Holden Caulfield who goes to Pencey has failed four out of five classes and gets the notice that he is being expelled from the school. He leaves the school and goes out and tries to adventure into the real world. Holden takes on many challenges and obstacles throughout the book . Although Holden wants to be independent many people perceive Holden in numerous different ways to his actions and feelings. Faith and Stradlater both perceive Holden as irritating, when in reality he tries to distract himself from being depressed. For example when Holden was in the phone
...her. Other than his sister, Phoebe, Allie was the only person that really connected with Holden. Holden feels as though he has no one anymore, and he can never find joy in activities he now does by himself. His anxiety and depression go hand-in-hand and share many of the same symptoms. Holden is not a normal teenager who experiences stress and depression from tests and friendships, but a teenager who needs help coping with the stress and depression from the death of a loved one.
Holden and the Complexity of Adult Life What was wrong with Holden, the main character in The Catcher in the Rye, by J.D.Salinger, was his moral revulsion against anything that was ugly, evil, cruel, or what he called "phoney" and his acute responsiveness to beauty and innocence, especially the innocence of the very young, in whom he saw reflected his own lost childhood. There is something wrong or lacking in the novels of despair and frustration of many writers. The sour note of bitterness and the recurring theme of sadism have become almost a convention, never thoroughly explained by the author's dependence on a psychoanalytical interpretation of a major character. The boys who are spoiled or turned into budding homosexuals by their mothers and a loveless home life are as familiar to us today as stalwart and dependable young heroes such as John Wayne were to an earlier generation. We have accepted this interpretation of the restlessness and bewilderment of our young men and boys because no one has anything better to offer.
Many young people often find themselves struggling to find their own identity and place in society. This search for self worth often leaves these young people feeling lonely and isolated because they are unsure of themselves. Holden Caulfield, J.D. Salinger's main character in the book The Catcher In the Rye, is young man on the verge of having a nervous breakdown. One contributor to this breakdown, is the loneliness that Holden experiences. His loneliness is apparent through many ways including: his lack of friends, his longing for his dead brother, and the way he attempts to gain acceptance from others.
Lies, failure, depression, and loneliness are only some of the aspects that Holden Caulfield goes through in the novel The Catcher in the Rye written by J.D. Salinger. Salinger reflects Holden’s character through his own childhood experiences. Salinger admitted in a 1953 interview that "My boyhood was very much the same as that of the boy in the book.… [I]t was a great relief telling people about it” (Wikipedia). Thus, the book is somewhat the life story of J.D. Salinger as a reckless seventeen-year-old who lives in New York City and goes through awful hardships after his expulsion and departure from an elite prep school. Holden, the protagonist in this novel, is created as a depressed, cynical, and isolated character and he expresses this attitude through his dialogue, tone, and diction.
The second time was more intense. This time a classmate from his school. “There was this one boy at Elkton Hills,named James Castle, that wouldn't take back something he said about this very conceited boy, Phil Stabile...Finally, what he did instead of taking back what he said, he jumped out the window...and there was old James Castle laying right on the stone steps and all”(188). In this moment Holden is in shock to see his classmate dead. That fits in one of the causes that lead to Post Traumatic Stress. The witnessing of a scary or shocking event. So far Holden hasn't been this descriptive of an event as this event that might have lead to his illness. Holden shows more symptoms as becoming very upset when something causes memories of the event. When “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 …” (217). Showing intense ongoing and fear to be forgotten. Holding tightly to the memory of his brother Allie. Causing him to “talk to my[his] brother Allie. I’d[he] say to him, Allie don't let me[Holden] disappear… And then when I’d[him] reach the other side of the street without disappearing, I’d[he would] thank him”(218). That why Holden keeps saying he is feeling depressed in certain occasions, because he doesn't know he has Post Traumatic
The “hidden layers of Holden’s mind” can be exposed by looking back “on his childhood” and searching for a “significant or traumatic event,” and “one of the most traumatic, formative moments” in his life “was the death of his brother Allie” (Bennett). The loss of a young, innocent family member is another likely cause of Holden’s post-traumatic stress disorder, drawing him towards the dark subjects of death and hopelessness. Notwithstanding his usual caustic outlook, Holden has brief moments of excitable mania that can catch the reader off guard, introducing the possibility of bipolar disorder. During some social time with his friend Sally, he suddenly becomes excited by unusual and crazy ideas, such as wanting to “‘drive to Massachusetts and
Most readers will not being going through the same exact circumstances, however the novel is written to teach a lesson to all. Holden may be struggling as he flunks out of his third private boarding school, yet the story remain applicable to everyone. Through the experiences detailed with “The Catcher in the Rye,” the author wants readers to understand that they are not alone with their frustrations. Every single person deals with moments of failure during their lifetime, and Holden is just dealing with it during his adolescent years of high school. Furthermore, Holden services as a mechanism to reveal that being frustrated with different aspects of you life is perfectly normal.