When people think about baseball mitts, they often think about catching baseballs during a game. However, in The Catcher in the Rye, a novel by J.D. Salinger, a baseball mitt is used to represent many abstract ideas. Holden Caulfield, a sixteen year old teenager, narrates the novel and tells the story from the day that he got kicked out of Pencey Prep. Holden frequently recalls his little brother, Allie, who died of leukemia when he was eleven years old. Holden carries Allie’s baseball mitt around in his suitcase wherever he goes because it is Holden’s only possession that used to belong to Allie. Through examining the recurrent image of Allie’s baseball mitt throughout the text, it is revealed that the glove represents emotions, isolation …show more content…
and the understanding of the innocence of children. A baseball mitt is used to catch balls, however, for Holden, it is used to hold on to his emotions. While his friend was getting ready, Holden opens a window and packs a snowball. Holden thinks about throwing it but he changes his mind a few times. He keeps on packing the snowball harder while walking around the room, but eventually, he doesn’t throw it at anything. “I went over to the window and opened it and packed a snowball with my bare hands. I didn’t throw it at anyone though” (36). The image of throwing the snowball and the snowball smashing signifies his emotions being let out. However, Holden is unable to let these emotions out and instead packs the snowball tighter, just as he packs his emotions. Holden goes back to the dorms and remembers the day of Allie’s death. “I broke all the windows in the garage. I slept in the garage the night he died, and I broke all the goddam windows with my fist, just for the hell of it” (39). Since Allie’s death is one of Holden’s most traumatic experiences in his life, Holden avoids expressing his feelings to other people that resulted from Allie’s death. Instead, Holden spends the night in the garage by himself and takes out his anger on the garage windows. Holden’s depression and underlying emotions causes him to isolate himself from his peers. Allie’s mitt represents isolation from other people for Holden.
When Holden’s roommate, Stradlater, goes on a date with a girl named Jane, Stradlater tells Holden to do his composition for him. Stradlater says that the composition has to be about something descriptive such as a house. However, instead of writing about a house, Holden wrote about something else. “Anyway, that’s what I wrote Stradlater’s composition about. Old Allie’s baseball mitt” (39). Holden thought Allie’s mitt was a descriptive subject because it had poems written all over it in green ink. When Stradlater goes on a date, Holden is by himself working on somebody else’s homework. Holden writes about Allie’s mitt because it helps him cope with Allie’s death. When Stradlater reads the essay that Holden wrote, he gets mad at Holden because Holden didn’t write about a house, but instead wrote about a baseball mitt. “‘All right, give it back to me, then,’ I said. I went over and pulled it right out of his goddam hand. Then I tore it up” (39). Since Allie’s death made a lasting impression on Holden, the baseball mitt is Holden’s only physical object that allows him to remember Allie. Stradlater’s frustration and anger at the composition and Holden’s ripping up of the work serves as a reminder of Holden’s isolation and loss of innocence. Allie’s glove is Holden’s connection to his feelings and emotions, which he holds on to and doesn’t
share. The baseball mitt is also used to represent the innocence of children. Holden tells his sister, Phoebe, that he wants to be the catcher in the rye when he grows up. "Anyway, I keep picturing all these little kids playing some game in this big field of rye and all. 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 . That's all I'd do all day. I'd just be the catcher in the rye and all” (173). Holden wants to be the catcher in the rye and catch all the children from falling into the phoniness of the adult world. Holden attempts to protect kids from growing up and represents his desire to avoid the harshness of adult life. This alludes to the fact that a baseball glove is used to catch balls, and Holden wants to catch the children. Since Holden believes that all the children are innocent, Allie will forever be innocent. Allie’s mitt will always stay the same just like how Allie will forever be a child. “The best thing, though, in that museum was that everything always stayed right where it was. Nobody'd move. You could go there a hundred thousand times, and… Nobody'd be different” (121). Holden likes the museum because no matter what changed in life, the museum will stay the same. Allie died when he was young, so he was still innocent. By dying young, Allie stayed out of the “phony” adult world. The mitt is so important to Holden because Allie’s innocence is preserved in the mitt. Isolation, emotion and innocence are represented through the mitt in this novel. Holden realizes that isolation is not the key to solving his mental problems. Instead, he has to show his emotions and express them in a truthfully. Through analyzing the image of the mitt it is revealed that Holden eventually learns to let go of his emotions and understands that he cannot prevent children from growing up.
In his fight with Stradlater, Holden’s character is shown as a defender of innocence. He defends the memory of his brother through the report he writes for Stradlater. Because of Stradlater’s criticism on his brother’s death, Holden destroys the essay and says “All right, give it back to me, then,’ I said. I went over and pulled it right out of his goddamn hand. Then I tore it up.” Holden is tormented by the memory of his brother throughout the novel, and in this fight he defends his brothers memory by protecting the baseball glove. Later in this scene Holden is upset with Stradlater’s relationship with Jane. Holden explains, “If you knew Stradlater, you 'd have been worried, too. I 'd double-dated with the bastard a couple of times, and I know what I 'm talking about. He was unscrupulous.” Holden tries to defend Jane’s innocence and the reader is able to see Holden’s ethical code to protect the innocence and memory of others. In Holden’s confrontation with Maurice, Holden displays his detestation of the evil phony. “All of a sudden I started to cry. I 'd give anything if I hadn 't, but I did. 'No, you 're no crooks, ' I said. 'You 're just steeling five ' 'Shut up, ' old Maurice said and gave me a shove.” The scene between Maurice and Holden over the prostitute Sunny shows his emotions when it comes to fake people. In this scene he
The baseball mitt was significant to Holden as it displayed how emotionally attached that he was towards his brother, Allie. Holden carries this glove everywhere that he goes, as this glove is a symbol of his late brother. With this glove, Holden is reminded of Allie’s personality, intelligence, and his spirits which are with Holden. This mitt is significant to Holden as it was Allie’s favorite to write his poem with green ink so that he could read them on the field when he was bored. For Stradlater’s composition assignment, Holden wrote about his bothers left-handed fielder’s mitt as it meant allot to him. This shows how deeply connected that he was towards his brother, therefore when he died he broke all the garage windows, which caused him
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. While in New York with the fencing team, Holden loses all of their equipment, then buys a red hunting hat.
Allie's mitt was a very important symbol in Catcher In The Rye, the mitt had poems written all over it. Allie was Holden's little brother, he got leukemia and died in Maine. Allie's mitt symbolizes the innocence that Holden yearns for , Allie's innocence was preserved in the mitt. Allie died when he was young, he was still innocent. By dying young Allie stayed out of the phony, adult world. In some ways Holden wants to be Allie. Holden wanted to preserve his own innocence but he could not. A baseball mitt is a common part of childhood, so it has the "power" to preserve innocence. The most interesting part about Allie's mitt are the poems, a grown up would not be writing poems and reading them during the game, he would be competitive, and all he would want is to win. Allie was to innocent he did not care about winning he just wanted to play baseball.
Allie’s baseball mitt is a very important symbol in the novel. It is connected to the novel, because the heart of the novel is Holden's grief over his brother's death and his inability to accept it. When Holden finds out that his brother Allie died, he is in denial because he refuses to accept Allie’s death. Holden is in denial because he thinks why his innocent brother had to die and not him. Because Holden needs help dealing with this grief he must always take out the mitt, and acknowledge his feelings over Allie in order to release himself from the guilt he feels. When Holden’s roommate at Pencey, Stradlater, asks him to write a descriptive essay, Holden writes about Allie’s baseball mitt. Holden treats the mitt differentially, taking it with him to Pencey and copying “down the poems that were written on it” (Salinger 38). For Holden, t...
When Holden remembers incidents from his past involving Allie, his attitude changes, such as when he writes the composition about Allie's baseball glove or when Holden broke his hand after punching all of the windows after Allie died. "I slept in the garage the night he died, and I broke all the goddam windows with my fist, just for the hell of it". He feels that Allie was one of the few people who were not phony in a world full of phonies. More importantly, Allie represents the innocence and childhood that Holden strives to find throughout his three-day journey. In Holden's opinion, Allie represents the purity that Holden looks for in the world.
The novel “The Catcher in the Rye,” revolves around the protagonist Holden Caulfield as the story is told from his perspective. J.D. Salinger constructed Holden Caulfield as a cynical person who cannot accept to grow up. Throughout “The Catcher in the Rye,” J.D. Salinger uses symbolism to reveal and reinforce critical aspects of the protagonist Holden Caulfield. Three important aspects Holden acquired through Salinger’s use of symbolism are: his stubborn, uncompromising mentality; his softer, more caring respectful side; Holden’s cowardly way of acting and thinking.
Holden views children ethically because they are sympathetic toward him, modest, and intelligent, unlike adults who are false-faced, hypocritical, and selfish. Holden’s dead brother Allie exemplifies his thinking process. Holden seems to remember Allie when he is feeling down about the world. The first memory of Allie that Holden shares to the audience was about Allie’s baseball mitt. Holden describes this mitt as a left-handed fielder's mitt, but there is something unique about it. It has poems written all over it, so “he’d [Allie] have something to read when he was in the field.” (Salinger, 38) Simply by writing these poems, the audience gets a good look at Allie’s character. He is very pure and simple-minded, unlike adults. He finds pleasure in the simplest of things, like little poems on his mitt. Allie’s mitt symbolizes how pure Allie was while he was alive and his death. Since Holden still treasures this object, one could infer that he still hasn't gotten over the fact that his inspiration in life is no longer living. Holden repents “back into the family” (“Either/Or”) and remembers the pure memory of his brother, which gives him the strength to go on in life. Holden wants to save children for a living. Holden claims that he will, “catch everybody if they started going over the cliff.” (Salinger, 173) Now, this occupation is strictly hypothetical, but the imagery that
J.D. Salinger’s Catcher in the Rye tells an unforgettable story of teenage angst by highlighting the life of Holden Caulfield, a young boy who commences a journey of self-discovery after being expelled from his private boarding school. Throughout the novel, Holden struggles with issues such as self-identity, loss, and a wavering sense of belonging. Holden’s red hunting hat is consistently used throughout the story as a symbol of his independence and his attachment to his childhood. From the very moment he receives it, Holden’s red hunting hat becomes a symbol of his own alienation. After traveling to New York for a fencing match and losing the team’s equipment on the subway, Holden is outcast by his teammates, who are angry that he hindered their ability to compete in the match.
Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye follows the journey of a young boy, Holden Caulfield, from adolescence to adulthood. There are a number of symbols that Salinger uses to help to portray the various stages that Holden goes through as he matures into adulthood. The snowball incident, his sense of fulfillment when at the museum, and his run in with a pimp, are all representations of how Holden is deeply obsessed with innocence thoughts and how reluctant he is to give them up.
In the Catcher in The Rye, the baseball glove represents Holden's anxiety about remembering Allies death. Before Holden begins writing Stradlater’s composition, he put on his “pajamas and bathrobe and my old hunting hat” (37), the clothes represent being comfortable, this helps Holden to channel his memories of Allie without being nervous or uncomfortable. Holden was hiding Allie's baseball glove in a “suitcase”(44) because he himself is hiding his feelings like he is hiding the baseball glove. In this scene Holden describes Allie’s glove like as if it were Allie himself. Stradlater later ignores Holden’s silent cry for comfort, and says “For Chrissake, Holden. This is about a goddam baseball glove”(41). This especially hurts Holden because
Allie, Holden’s young brother who died several years earlier, was a key symbol throughout the story. When Holden remembers incidents from his past involving Allie, his attitude changes, such as when he writes the composition about Allie’s baseball glove or when Holden broke his hand after punching all of the windows after Allie died. He feels that Allie was one of the few people who were not phony in a world full of phonies. More importantly, Allie represents the innocence and childhood that Holden strives to find throughout his multi-day journey. In Holden’s opinion, Allie represents the purity that Holden looks for in the world. Holden admits that he admires Allie more than he admires Jesus, and even prays to Allie at one point, rather than Jesus. Allie is Holden’s role model, whom he judges the rest of the world according to. When Allie dies, it creates turbulence in Holden’s life.
“I was crying and all, I don’t know why, but I guess it was because I was feeling so damn depressed and lonesome” (53), Holden says. As humans, we have a hard time belonging in society. This is the same case for Holden Caulfield, the main character from the Catcher in the Rye. The Catcher in the rye, a novel by J.D Salinger, is about Holden, a lost boy in desperate need of help. Throughout the novel, Holden seems to be excluded by the world around him. He continually attempts to try and belong in a world in which he is isolating from. In this novel, Salinger uses symbols such as the red hunting hat, the ducks and Allie’s glove to support the theme, belonging and isolation.
“Catcher in the Rye”, written by J.D Salinger, is a coming-of-age novel. Narrated by the main character, Holden Caulfield, he recounts the days following his expulsion from his school. This novel feels like the unedited thoughts and feelings of a teenage boy, as Holden narrates as if he is talking directly to readers like me.
Holden has a near obsession with the death of his younger brother Allie, who died at age thirteen due to leukemia. Holden had punched and broke all the windows in the garage out of anger; he says that his hands still hurt from the incident. Throughout the novel, Holden dwells on Allies’ death. From Holden's thoughts, it is obvious that he loves and misses Allie. In order to hold on to his brother and to minimize the pain of his loss, Holden brings Allie's baseball mitt along with him where ever he goes. The mitt has additional meaning and significance for Holden because Allie had written poetry, which Holden reads, from the baseball mitt. Towards the end of the book, Holden proves again that he can’t cope with death. Phoebe, his younger sister, is putting him on the spot by asking him what he likes, but Holden can only think of two nuns and a boy, James W. Castle. James W. Castle was a boy who Holden had lent his sweater to, Castle died unfortunately by being thrown out of a window wearing Holden’s sweater. Another thing that haunts Holden is the fact that during roll call in class, his last name always is called after Castles’ last name. After the brief moment of reminiscing, Holden irritates Phoebe by saying, “I like Allie…”. He has trouble acknowledging the death of his brother.