I wanted my painting to resemble everything that is happening inside of Holden’s mind. As he is standing in the middle of New York City, his eyes are closed, showing that the whole painting is a dream. He imagines both the good and bad parts of his life in this painting. On the left side, the colors are very dark, including a palette of black, brown, white and dark blue. This side of the painting displays the bad things in his life such as Pencey Prep in the background and the ducks flying over his head, displaying his fear of people leaving him. I decided to make the sky on the left side black to represent the storm that is Holden’s life. Also, the left side of the canvas is painted to be winter, the same time that this novel takes place. As the viewer's eyes follow the path …show more content…
of the ducks from the smoke of the cigarette, the color of the sky fades from black to light blue. I wanted the left side to signify Holden’s past and present, while the right signifies both his hopes and fears for the future after the “storm” is over. On the right side of the painting, I used a palette of greens, yellows, and blues to portray a more positive and hopeful side to Holden’s life. One of the major symbols that I included was the Museum in the bottom right-hand corner. The museum is a very important place for Holden. It represents youth and happiness for him. The museum deals with the motif in the novel about being frozen in time. Holden loves the fact that every time you go to the museum, it is the same. However, the only thing that is different is the people visiting. He wishes that the real world would stay the same just like this and is unable to face the responsibilities that his future holds being an adult. The museum represents a place of comfort for Holden, but also a place of fear for the future. Also on the right side of the painting, I show Vermont in the summer, another one of his dreams. Holden, using one of his many coping mechanisms, asked Sally in the novel if she wanted to run away with him and live in a log cabin in Vermont. I believe that Vermont serves as Holden’s happy place, somewhere that will always be a place of solitude and hope amidst all his other troubles. Holden is in the middle of his painting with his signature red cap on, smoking a cigarette.
The color of Holden’s cap is very important. I believe that Holden chose a bright color hat in order to distract people and not let them see who he really is, which is one of his greatest fears in life. On the brim of his hat, Holden imagines children running carelessly through the rye field, into the darkness and uncertainty of adulthood. Holden relates to the children who join adulthood too early, so is there to catch them with Allie's baseball mitt. He wants to protect them and not let them feel the pain he has in his life. One of the other major symbols that I decided to include in my painting was the carousel with the Golden Ring. In the novel, Holden stood and watched his little sister Phoebe on the carousel as she tried to reach for the gold ring. The Gold Ring symbolizes maturity and that the children on the carousel are attempting to grow up too soon. In my painting, this fear of Phoebe turning into an adult is always looming, literally, in the back of his mind. He is even more afraid because he worries that he will not always be there to catch her if she falls off the cliff into
adulthood. Throughout my process as an artist, this assignment helped me to tap into the creative side of my brain. I wanted to try a different way to express my thoughts that were not an essay, like many others I have done this year. I started out with a blank canvas and used a pencil to sketch in the major symbols. I knew Holden would always be in the center, but it was difficult for me to place the other elements that I wanted to include so that it would make sense. Once I got the idea that this was all a dream, and that the painting would be split into two perspectives, I was able to finalize my painting. Also, realizing that the brim of Holden’s hat would be a symbol of a cliff, helped me to incorporate the baseball mitt catching the falling children. Overall, I not only really enjoyed the process, but painting also helped me to de-stress before finals.
Foster’s characteristics of the QUEST are the quester, the destination, the purpose, the challenges along the way, and the reason behind going to the destination. In The Catcher in the Rye Holden is the quester who begins his journey by being kicked out of Pencey Prep. He decides to go on a trip instead of going home and revealing to his parents that he has been expelled. Staying around New York is a challenge in itself, and by the end of his trip Holden realizes more about himself. Some of the challenges he faces are his immaturity levels getting in the way of certain tasks and his loneliness. At the end of his trip Holden begins to have a new sense of maturity, and is ready to grow up.
While in New York with the fencing team, Holden loses all of their equipment, then buys a red hunting hat. Holden describes the hat as a, “red hunting hat, with one of those very, very, very long peaks… The way I wore it, I swung the old peak way around back - very corny, I’ll admit, but I liked it that way.”(Salinger, 24) The hat makes him stand out and seem like a unique person.
In today's world many people do not show their true self to people that they do not feel comfortable around. Readers can see this in J.D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye. Holden only shows his true authentic self to women and girls. Although Holden seems that he does not like to talk to anyone, when he is around women he pays attention to them, is comfortable, and expresses his true feelings.
The Catcher in the Rye revolves around Holden Caulfield, the protagonist of the novel, and his disillusionment. Holden’s disillusionment illustrates that he has a problem accepting such. Aforesaid is based upon multiple factors, most which have brought Holden lasting traumas. A remedy is required for Holden to accept his disillusionment and enable an improvement of his situation. For Holden’s remedy, the consultation of psychologists, and additional specialized health professionals would be the core of an apt remedy for Holden’s psychological and physiological state based upon the numerous causes of such and the everlasting trauma of some of the determinants of aforesaid situation. The origins of Holden’s disillusionment revolved mainly around the death of his younger brother Allie three years ago, of which he still experiences the trauma to this day. His disillusionment is caused by both
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...
I would like to discuss how Holden’s misinterpretation of the Robert Burns poem, “Coming Through the Rye”, sums up his deepest desires by taking a journey through his troubled adolescence and his journey to self–discovery that results in his breakdown. According to Phoebe, the original line in the poem is “if a body meet a body”. However, Holden’s misinterpretation of “if a body catch a body” removes all sexual connotations from the original poem. Holden is a deeply disturbed adolescent in search of a way to preserve his childhood innocence. His “red hunting cap” is a symbol of his uniqueness and his rejection to conform to society.
The overwhelming pain that Holden had suffered during the past was nonetheless an impact, which stained his future life. Some evidence that implies Holden’s characteristic is how he grudgingly criticizes and scorns at almost everyone he knows. After he leaves Pencey Prep School, he falls into a dilemma where he faces loneliness and depression. More so, he desperately seeks company from clubs, bars, and hotels to have someone to accompany him. The factors that affect this isolation of him are mostly because of the tragic death of his younger brother Allie and the life he has in school. He was an important person to Holden. He mentions how great and smart Allie was out of the entire family. When Stradlater told Holden to write an essay for him Holden decided that he wanted to write a paper about Allies baseball mitt, which had poems written on it and Holden still carries with him the mitt at school (38). The life he has in school is very miserable to him because he has already failed two other schools and it is happening to him again. He says that he did not mean to disappoint and hurt his parents’ feelings so he takes a few days out to Edmont Hotel (59).
Holden is also aware of the image the hat projects to others, and he often takes it off when he is around someone familiar. This functioned as a metaphor for Holden’s struggle between his need for independence and his need for companionship. Holden doesn’t want people he knows to see him with the hat on because he wants them to continue to be friends with him, and he fears loneliness. However, when nobody is around, Holden has no problem wearing the hat and embracing its quirkiness, because he feels a strong connection to the hat. As he walks down the street in the middle of the night, Holden states that “It was freezing cold, and I took my red hunting hat out of my pocket and put it on—I didn’t give a damn how I looked.
Holden Caulfield can be analyzed through his thoughts, actions and circumstances which surround his everyday life. Holden acts like a careless teenager. Holden has been to several prep-schools, all of which he got kicked out of for failing classes. After being kicked out of the latest, Pency Prep, he went off to New York on his own. Holden seems to have a motivation problem which apparently affects his reasoning. The basis of his reasoning comes from his thoughts. Holden thinks the world is full of a bunch of phonies. All his toughs about people he meets are negative. The only good thoughts he has are about his sister Phoebe and his dead brother Alley. Holden, perhaps, wishes that everyone, including himself, should be like his brother and sister. That is to be intelligent, real and loving. Holden’s problem is with his heart. It was broken when his brother died. Now Holden goes around the world as his fake self, wearing his mask. Holden is looking for love, peace and understanding. He is scared to love because he is afraid he might lose it like he did with his brother. That is the reason for Holden's love of the museum, he feels safe because it never changes it always stays the same. Holden is troubled with the pain of death, it effects every aspect of his life causing him to not care about the future, himself or anyone, except Phoebe and Alley.
The Catcher in the Rye Holden Gets Influenced Everyone gets influenced by someone, even heroes do. The Catcher in the Rye, a novel written by J. D. Salinger, talks about Holden Caulfield, a 16 year old boy that is trying to live through his problems. Holden tries to learn from his experiences as well as from the ones of others. He goes through many hard times, but he always takes them as a chance to imagine how it could have ended if he had done something about them or what cold had happened if he was not so “yellow”.
J.D. Salinger's novel Catcher in the Rye revolves around Holden's encounters with other people. He divides all people into two different categories, the "phonies" and the authentics. Holden refers to a "phony" as someone who discriminates against others, is a hypocrite, or has manifestations of conformity. A person's age, gender, and occupation, play a key role in how Holden interacts with them.
The “green ink” that Allie read when “nobody was at bat” symbolizes the effect his death has on Holden today (Salinger 38). At first Holden is engulfed with depression and loneliness and decides to isolate himself from the world. Later, towards the end of the novel, we can see a sense of hope and a change in mindset in the life of Holden. Holden now realizes that he can not feel depressed, but instead he has to step up and be an anchor in his sister, Phoebe's, life. Just like the carousel, Holden remains constant for Phoebe even when the world around him is moving and changing. The death of his brother causes Holden to go through a time of depression, but it also enables him to understand that his life has tremendous worth in terms of his sister. Despite the death of Asher’s uncle, he does not go into a stage of depression, but instead he begins to find the darkness in the world. The darkness behind the death and the painting of the crucifixion causes him to lose things that are of great value to him. Each boy is affected by death differently, but death itself causes great darkness in their lives
in all but one of his subjects. He does not like to talk about his
In The Catcher in the Rye Holden fears growing up he will get uncomfortable when talking about adult situations, he would avoid seeing people just to avoid an adult predicament. Whether it will be a confrontation with his sister, or talking about a racy book with an adult he always seems to get timid. He is not quite yet ready for adulthood. This is something he needs to get ready for soon. He is 16 going on 17 and before he knows it he will be a grown up and will have to support himself and have a steady job. That involves communication.
To begin with, J.D. Salinger’s style of creating symbols is artistic. In The Catcher in the Rye, Salinger creates symbols mainly regarding Holden as a character including: Holden’s red hunting hat, the ducks in the lagoon, and the Museum of Natural History. Holden’s red hunting hat plays a prominent role in this novel, as it is continuously mentioned and involved. The reader can infer the red hunting hat symbolizes Holden’s individuality and his attempt to break free from the ‘phonies’ around him. The reader discovers Holden’s extreme dislike of phonies when learning about why Holden drops out/ quits Elkton Hills. Holden explains to Old Spencer, ‘“One of the biggest reasons I left Elkton Hills was because I was surrounded by phonies”’ (19). By wearing this red hat Holden is attempting to stand out and be different. He is not trying to ‘be like everyone else’ or ‘phony’ instead he is displaying his true personality. However throughout this story, Holden struggles to discover his path in life, which leads to the second symbol, the ducks in the lagoon. Holden wonders to himself, “I was wondering if it would be frozen over when I got home, and if it...