Theme is the subject, or topic, of a piece of writing, consisting of the main idea of the story. Authors will usually make the theme of text clear and consistent throughout the story. In the book “The Catcher in the Rye” by J. D. Salinger, there are a couple of different themes throughout the book. The two main themes in this novel are the feeling of exclusion and dealing with the reality of having to grow up, both in relation to depression. The feeling of exclusion is that Holden is feeling…
A Comparison of the Narrators of The Catcher in the Rye and “A & P” Both The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger and “A & P” by John Updike use careful choices of language and details that aid in the characterization of their narrators. Salinger’s narrator, Holden, is a seventeen year old boy who is telling presumably a therapist the events that occurred after he was expelled from Pencey Prep. He tells the story in a first person “stream of consciousness” style and often goes off on…
Number One The main idea of the story is basically Holden Caulfield's motivation throughout the story. Holden goes to New York City and spends most of his time looking for something, but he never tells the reader exactly what he is looking for, I don’t even think he knows exactly what it is he is looking for. He seems to be looking for friendship or just genuine communication, but he is looking for it in the wrong place. Nobody else is concerned with friendship or honesty, besides his little…
J.D. Salinger’s character, Holden Caulfield, in the controversial novel, Catcher in the Rye, struggles with alienation, drugs, and alcohol due to his tragic past. Growing up, Holden lived a pretty normal life, until his brother’s tragic death. His brother, Allie, even though he was younger than Holden, was Holden’s inspiration in life. When Holden discovered that Allie was dead, he slept in the garage, and at one point during that night, Holden managed to break all of the windows in his garage…
Holden Caulfield is a 16 year old boy, who is can be childish at times and skeptical of the world around him, however, this is because of his hard and troubling past that lead him to become who he is now. Holden has a unique way of looking at things, he thinks that practically anyone and anything can be phony, always saying things like ‘I found it phony,’ or ‘they were being phony’ and even, ‘it was all phony as hell’. He seems to use a lot of the same words over and over again, this could be…
J.D Salinger's work was influenced heavily by his life because of the things that happened to him, he connected his books to his life by his experiences. His work was his life. J.D Salinger’s books went with how he was feeling and the way his life was going. The Catcher in the Rye’s main character Holden Caulfield was based off of J.D Salinger's young life, Salinger not being a good student had been kicked out of his school which happened to Holden Caulfield. Both of these books have a…
In Catcher in the Rye, Holden decides to leave New York to head out West after he experiences a frightening feeling of “just go[ing] down, down, down, and nobody’d ever see [him] again” (217). Yet, Holden decides to visit Phoebe one last time before leaving, so he pays a visit to her school. Holden’s experience of “go[ing] down, down, down” mirrors the image of someone falling off a cliff like in Holden’s imagination as a “catcher in the rye” (191). In a way, Holden himself is a child in the rye…
“He’s dead now. He got Leukemia and died when we where up in Maine, on July 18, 1946. You would have liked him” (Salinger 43). In the novel, The Catcher In the Rye, by J.D. Salinger: Holden’s younger brother dies of Leukemia. Holden never full recovers from the family loss and is affected by this through the rest of his childhood and as he continues to grow up. In the novel, the death of Allie, Holden’s brother, causes Holden expresses multiple symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder.…
“Certain things, they should stay the way they are. You ought to be able to stick them in one of those big glass cases and just leave them alone.” - J.D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye. The Catcher in The Rye is a novel about a 17 year old boy living in a “phony” world who ventures throughout the streets of New York to possibly find purity. J.D. Salinger’s reason for writing such a controversial novel was to appeal to the teenage mind. Holden is sexually confused and struggles expressing his…
‘The catcher in the rye’, written by ‘J. D. Salinger’ narrates the psychological and physical troubles of Holden Caulfield, a mentally unstable, teenage boy seeking approval in an ever-changing world. Throughout the novel, the author uses a variety of stylistic and language techniques are used to intrigue the audience into reading the text, which include the use of imagery, symbolism and metaphors. It is the different themes and techniques like this that are used throughout the text to pull the…