Catcher In The Rye

Holden Caulfield, the protagonist and the narrator of Catcher in the Rye, begins his story by ranting about how he’s not going to talk about where he was born or any personal thing about his life. Instead, he wants to talk about a crazy event that happened to him last Christmas. That crazy event of his began after leaving his school, Pencey Prep, and decides to go to New York City. As Holden travels around New York City, he talks in a very cynical mood about the people, places, and the things he encounters.

The story starts at a preparatory school at Agerstown, Pennsylvania. The school is called Pencey Prep. But Holden leaves Pencey Prep on a Saturday night, the location, and then changes to New York City. Holden moves around New York City. The places Holden visits are Edmond Hotel, Ernie’s Jazz Club, Lavender Room (located at Edmond Hotel), Central Park, Radio City, his home, Phoebe’s school, Grand Central Station, and a museum. There is no particular date or year specified in the story. But of course, the month is quite obvious because it was around near Christmas time and that would mean it’s in December. The era would be around 1940's to 1950's.

Catcher In The Rye is written in a first-person point of view, which means you only got to read Holden’s dialogues with himself and with other people, his own emotions, his own thoughts, his own opinions, and his own personal stories or encounters. If you were to read this story, you would feel that you were the main character itself - it was written that well. Holden’s thoughts and opinions were particularly cynical and often times, quite depressing. The atmosphere mostly dealt with self-conflict, depression, and towards the ending - happiness.

The main character or protagonist goes by the name Holden Caulfield. He is a tall, sixteen year old. He has a buzz cut and defines himself as a pretty-good looking fellow. Holden is an over-analyzing, sarcastic, self-conflicting, and rarely likes things. Holden may be sixteen, but in the story he moderately smokes and tries to score drinks at clubs. He doesn’t like adults because he thinks they’re all phony. Holden Caulfield is a smart kid; he excels at English, but fails other subjects at school. Pencey Prep was the fourth school he had been expelled from because of his failing grades.

The other characters are the following: D.B. Caulfield, his oldest brother; Phoebe Caulfield, his youngest sister; his parents; Sally Hayes, a girl he dates quite often; Maurice, the elevator man at Edmond Hotel that offers him a prostitute; Sunny, the prostitute that Holden had encountered; Jane Gallagher, the girl Holden misses and mentions every few pages or so; Mr. Antolini, a teacher he visits after the visit from his parent’s home; Ward Stradlater, his roommate; Robert Ackley, the unhygienic guy who lives in the other dorm next to Holden and Ward’s dorm; Allie Caulfield, Holden’s little brother who had died three years ago of leukemia; and Mr. Spencer, Holden’s history teacher- Holden visits him before he leave Pencey Prep.

The major conflict happens throughout the whole story because it’s Holden vs. Society. In the story, Holden calls everyone phonies and always find the worst of flaws in humans he encounters. The only person Holden can actually relate to is his younger sister, Phoebe. Holden couldn’t have normal relationship because of the conflict he has with society because of his opinion of them as phonies, which he thinks of as everybody. And with this conflict, it has caused Holden to go through a mental breakdown because of the conflict he had going within in his thoughts to turn against him.

The theme of this book is, "Going against society in the form of a solo work." This means that Holden, throughout the story, acted quite rebellious against society because he didn’t like the way society worked. He called everyone he met ‘phonies’ and found flaws amongst them all. Because of this, Holden couldn’t hold onto relationships with people quite well because of the negative opinions he had of them. It was wrong because society is already set with everyone and a man alone cannot change its way. Holden may have had his opinions, but he took it too far to the point it gave him a mental breakdown.

Catcher In The Rye is a particularly interesting book. The history of this book is that it is banned among several communities, but it’s quite popular among young readers. J.D. Salinger’s writing style is quite amazing and there were rarely parts that bore you. Holden Caulfield is a complex character, but he is well-developed by the author. His opinions or his personal experiences in the three day adventure he had was a quite a great read. I do recommend it to people, even though it has that depressing or cynical feel to it. And reading it would probably make you question human society today.