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Holden caulfield a rebellious character
Character analysis of Holden Caulfield
Analysis of holden caufield character
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Psychological Problems in Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye Jerome David Salinger was a very famous American author who wrote several books. One of his most successful books was The Catcher in the Rye. Other works by Salinger include the short story collection Nine Stories, Franny and Zooey, and Raise High The Beam, Carpenter and Seymour. In the book The Catcher in the Rye Holden Caulfield, became a model of the rebellious and confused adolescent who detected the “phoniness” of the adult world. (Microsoft Encyclopedia 98). This showed that he had a serious psychological problem. He never wanted to grow up and, he also never wanted his sister to face the world. He thought that the world was too bad for her to go out to because of the problems he faced in his own life. Psychology of a person determines that person’s personality. This research paper will attempt to tell why Holden suffered from psychological problems.
Holden is a teenage character who has suffered a lot in his life. He has suffered a lot. He doesn?t care about anybody other than his sister, Phoebe. He did not like the adulthood because he thought that every adult was a phony. Holden thinks that when people lie, they are being phony.
Holden doesn?t like people who are phony but he acts phony himself all the time.
In J.D. Salinger’s novel The Catcher in The Rye Salinger writes about the main character Holden Caulfield and his life. Holden is a teenager who comes from a wealthy family, he loves his family and lives very happy until the death of his brother Allie. After his brother died Holden becomes troubled, being kicked out of school again and again developing a negative view of the world. Holden throughout the book shows anger,denial, and acceptance over the loss of his brother.
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.
Immaturity of Holden in J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye 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.
The catcher in the rye by J.D. Salinger is about a boy named Holden Caulfield and his struggles in one part of his life. Holden seem very normal to people around him and those he interacts with. However, Holden is showing many sighs of depression. A couple of those signs that are shown are: trouble sleeping, drinking, smoking, not eating right, and he talk about committing suicide a couple times during the book. On top of that Holden feel alienated plus the death of Holden’s brother Allie left Holden thinking he and no where to go in life.
Holden's idealism is first brought forth when he describes his life at Pency Prep. It is full of phonies, morons and bastards. His roommate, Stradlater, " was at least a pretty friendly guy, It was partly a phony kind of friendly..." (26) and his other roommate, Ackley is "a very nosy bastard" (33). Holden can't stand to be around either one of them for a very long time. Later, he gets into a fight with Stradlater over his date with Jane. Holden is upset because he thinks that Stradlater "gave her the time" and that he doesn't care about her; 'the reason he didn't care was because he was a goddam stupid moron. All morons hate it when you call them a moron' (44). Holden not only sees his roommates as phonies and bastards, but he also sees his headmaster at Pency Prep as a "phony slob" (3). This type of person is exactly what Holden doesn't want to be. He strives to be a mature adult; caring, compassionate, and sensitive.
In summary, Holden Caulfield is a troubled adolescent whose personality, improper feelings and habit of running from his problems prevent him from receiving sympathy. Since his personality includes being lazy and insincere, it is difficult to feel sympathy for him when he fails to try or tells lies. His improper feelings depress him over nothing or leave him lonely and isolated. His habit of running away from his problems make it difficult for him to receive sympathy because he chooses not to face his problems. Holden is a character that causes his own sadness. His actions prevent sympathy from being felt for him because most circumstances are all avoidable. Sympathy will be felt for the distraught protagonist when he fixes his personality or makes better decisions. Until then, Holden Caulfield is a character that it will be difficult to feel sympathy for.
In the novel Thirteen Reasons Why, Jay Asher writes about the depression of Hannah, a teenager, who faced depression until the effects took her life. Hannah is dead from the beginning of the novel, but she sends tape recordings to 13 people before she died. Each recording has a message for the listener explaining how one of them helped in the cause for her depression/death. Since each recording is in chronological order, it is clearly noticeable how Hannah’s depression increases as the novel proceeds. Similarly, in J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye, the main character Holden is suffering from depression just as Hannah was before she took her life. In the novel The Catcher in the Rye, the main theme is depression’s occurrence in a teenager’s life.
According to the National Institute of Mental Health, about one in four American adults suffer from a mental disorder. This means that 57.7 out of 217.8 million people over the age of 18 are ill; never mind that mental illnesses are the leading cause of disability in Canada and the United States. Holden Caulfield, the controversial main character of J.D Salinger’s novel Catcher in the Rye, spends much of the book wandering through the streets of New York City. Kicked out of boarding school for the umpteenth time, he does many odd things: he calls a prostitute, tries to befriend a taxi driver, drinks with middle aged women, and sneaks into his own house in the middle of the night. While many of these things seem outré, some may even go as far as to say that he is mentally disturbed. From a psychiatric standpoint, main character Holden Caulfield exhibits the symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder, bipolar disorder (manic depression), and psychosis throughout the infamous novel Catcher in the Rye.
The Catcher in the Rye by J.D Salinger is a coming-of-age novel set in New York during the 1940’s. Holden Caulfield, the protagonist of the story, is a detached seventeen-year old boy harboring feelings of isolation and disillusionment. He emphasizes a general dislike for society, referring to people as “phonies.” His lack of will to socialize prompts him to find nearly everything depressing. He’s alone most of the time and it’s apparent that he is very reclusive. This often leads him to pondering about his own death and other personal issues that plague him without immediate resolution. Holden possesses a strong deficit of affection – platonic and sexual – that hinders and cripples his views toward people, his attitude, and his ability to progressively solve his problems without inflicting pain on himself. The absence of significant figures in his life revert him to a childlike dependency and initiate his morbid fascination with sexuality. In this novel, Salinger uses Sunny, Sally Hayes, and Carl Luce to incorporate the hardships of discovering sexual identity and how these events affect adolescents as they try to understand their own sexuality.
Holden Caulfield, he is a person who feels the need to be in control. of everything in his life, but the problem comes when he finds himself. in the transition between childhood and adulthood. Holden wants and tries to act like an adult, but is unable to accept the fact he is. becoming one, perhaps because of his association with adulthood.
that he is trying to hide his true identity. He does not want people to know who he really is or that he was kicked out of his fourth school. Holden is always using fake names and tries speaking in a tone to persuade someone to think a cretin way. He does this when he talks to women. While he is talking to the psychiatrist he explains peoples reactions to his lies like they really believe him, when it is very possible that he is a horrible liar and they are looking at him with a “what are you talking a bout?” expression. Holden often lies to the point where he is lying to him self.
Each year in the United States depression affects over 17 million people of all ages, races, and economic backgrounds. One in every eight teens are affected by depression (“Understanding Depression”). Depression can be defined as a mental illness where the person affected feels very sad and melancholy. Most people have passed through a stage or a short period of time where they have felt downhearted. In The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger, Holden Caulfield, a 16-year old boy, can be viewed as insane in the eyes of many readers because of his behavior and actions. Despite this common belief, Holden most likely suffered from depression. Some symptoms which convey Holden was depressed was his mood, lack of sleep, and his suicidal
J.D Salinger’s novel, Catcher In The Rye is about a teen, Holden Caulfield, the protagonist of the narrative. Holden is full of unique problems and most of the time lost in his own world, that can’t face reality. The psychoanalytic theory arranges a lens of definition when working at Holden Caulfield. Holden is seen as a lonely, rebellious teen who flunked out of an all boys private school, Pencey Prep. Failing school exemplifies how Holden controls his own decisions in the real world. As stubborn Holden is, opening up his persona and experiences to people is very hard for him, “I’ll just tell you about this madman stuff that happened to me…” (Salinger 1). From a Freudian psychoanalytical perspective Holden would seem to keep all his thoughts all bottled up, not speaking, and opening up to people. “The preconscious holds information we’ve stored from past experience or learning. This information can be retrieved from memory and brought into awareness at any time.” (Nevid 469). Holden is one step closer to becoming a better changed person by speaking to his psychiatrist, and there is only way to find out if he did.
To Holden, everyone is either corny of phony. He uses these terms to describe what a person is if they do not act naturally and follow other people?s manners and grace. Holden dislikes phonies and thinks of them as people who try to be something they are not. He loathes people who showed off because it seems unnatural every time they do not act like themselves. Holden does not allow himself to have friendship because of his dull attitude. In the beginning of the book, the reader knows that Holden is lonely when he separates himself from the rest of the Pencey students by watching the football game from Thomsen Hill and not the grand stands. Holden is not a very sociable person partly because he finds himself better than many others. He dislikes his roommate because of his generic leather luggage. His next door roommate Ackley does not seem to want a friendship with him either. Holden finds Ackely?s zit crusted face ridiculous and doesn?t want him in his room at first. This shows the reader that Holden is a lonely person because he chooses to be lonely and does not want anything to do with people who do not fit into his perception of normal.
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.