Analysis: The Bell Jar And The Catcher In The Rye

The loss of a loved one at a young age can cause disruption and irreparable damage to the mind. A child’s mind is pure and innocent and after a tragedy of losing a loved one, the mind is not equipped to deal with the loss, which can cause it to spiral out of control. In both the The Bell Jar and The Catcher in the Rye, each author creates a protagonist who loses a family member at an early age which results in a mental illness for each protagonist. The authors want the reader to understand that mental illness stems from exposure to traumatic experiences in early childhood. Throughout The Bell Jar and The Catcher in the Rye, Plath and Salinger use their protagonists’ to demonstrate the motif of loss of innocence, caused by tragic events in their youth, to teach the reader that buried childhood trauma can have a negative impact on mental health. In The Bell Jar, Plath uses loss of innocence to depict Esther’s declining mental health, through her …show more content…
After Holden returns from a night out with his friends, Ackley and Brossard, he starts to write a composition for his roommate, Stradlater. While he writes about a baseball mitt that belonged to his brother, Allie, Holden reflects on the time he destroyed his garage after Allie’s death and realizes “My hand still hurts me once in a while when it rains and all” (Salinger 39). Enraged by his brother’s death, Holden destroys his garage and seriously damages his hand. Salinger reveals the pain in Holden’s heart over Allie’s death and that on rainy days, his hand hurts which symbolizes anguish and misery for Holden. At the age of 13, the death of his brother shatters Holden’s world and depression takes over his mind which causes him to struggle to live a normal life from this point