Franny And Zooey Character Analysis

In the novel, Franny and Zooey written by J.D. Salinger, Franny Glass experiences a mental breakdown while out with her boyfriend Lane. This causes her to go back to stay with her mother, Bessie, and her brother, Zooey, who try to get her to talk about her problems and why she is acting the way she is. In talking with her brother, Zooey, she goes on about “egos” and how she is “just sick of ego, ego, ego. My own and everybody else’s” (29). Admitting that she herself, a person who hates egos, especially big egos, has an ego musters up the question of, Where did she get her ego from? Being on the show “It’s a Wise Child” from a young age until it was cancelled and getting all types of fame from the show can cause a person to develop a large ego such as Franny’s. In doing this, it can make Franny feel as though she has to be perfect all the time. Having a big ego at a young age and being thought of as this perfect child prodigy for years, into adulthood can cause someone to have a mental breakdown, such as Franny did.
Now, someone who understands this is Zooey. “We’ve got ‘Wise Child’ complexes” (139), Zooey says. This …show more content…
It’s not to say that had she not been on the show she would be the exact way she is although it is not as likely. Being in the eyes of the public especially when Franny was being advertised or let of off as this genius and grew up to not be like how the public saw her when she was younger took a toll on her mental health. When she finally cracks Lane, Bessie, and Zooey all start to worry about her and how she is starting to go bonkers, but in reality she is doing what “normal” people do all time. It’s just because she was upholding the “It’s a Wise Child” image of herself for so long that when she finally breaks that image her loved ones thinks she is crazy, when maybe she is actually being her “normal”