How has Holden Caufield developed? Think about Holden’s vision of the nature of childhood and adulthood. Are the two realms as separate as Holden believes them to be? Where does he fit in? How does his psychological problems show in his actions?
His relationship to family and friends and their symbolic meaning. Does any pattern seem to emerge, or does anything change in his interactions as the novel progresses? How do Holden’s encounters with adults, children, women, and his peers evolve as the novel progresses?
What is it that the author wants to show us with Holden Caufield as a character and as a narrator?
- Here we are going to discuss the different narrative levels.
What is the symbolic meaning of the carousel?
What is the symbolic meaning of the book?
Why has the book become so popular and created such a stir?
City
ReplyDeleteHolden goes back to the city before xmas. He feels alone. It is rainy, dark and late at night. And that made him even more depressed. He describes his mood all the time. His parents live in the city but he doesn’t want to see them, as he has flunked school. His parents send him away to boarding school. He feels that he is abandoned. He goes around the city contacting old acquaintances, trying to find someone familiar to him, hoping to find someone who cares for him. He finally sees Pheobe who cares for him and she wants to run away with him but he sees that it isn’t a good idea for her.
Every experience he has with different people in the city seems to have a bad outcome. The city is confusing and overwhelming and this mirrors his state of mind. The ducks in the park are like him - without a home and having no roots. Nobody cares about the ducks, i.e. he feels that no-one cares about him.
“There was a boy who was singing just for the hell of it, you could tell. The cars zoomed by, brakes screeched all over the place, his parents paid no attention to him, and he kept on walking next to the curb and singing ‘If a body catch a body coming through the rye’ It made him feel better. It made me feel not so depressed anymore.” He feels like this little boy and can sympathize with him. Hence the reason he likes the song.
Group: Maria, Malene and Julie
ReplyDeleteIdentity and language
Appearance:
He has low self esteem, and is negative about his looks. He talks about his gray hair (Maybe he got it when Allie died, cause by chock). Still can’t find it in the book… could use some help.
Personality:
Holden is negative, arrogant, talks down to people and being patronizing. He is very direct, and often embarrasses the people he is with. He gets jealous easily. He lies and exaggerates to sound more popular and social than he really is.
Page 58, when he is talking to a class mate’s mother on the train, he is trying to be smart by lying to her.
Page 76, when he dances with Bernice: “You’re a very good conversationalist”… I let it drop, it was over her head. He is being patronizing and this also shows us his jealousy, when he doesn’t get attention.
Page 150, he is very direct when he talks to Luce: “How is your sex life?”. He is missing the “filter” of what is appropriate and what is not appropriate (typical teenager/immature).
Page 150, he is immature and arrogant: “You could tell he didn’t feel like discussing anything serious with me, that is the trouble with these intellectual guys, they never want to discuss anything serious unless they feel like it”.
He doesn’t like when people touch him. (In the beginning with his old teacher, in the end with Mr. Antolini)
He uses irony towards everyone. He is trying to keep a distance to both the reader and also his “friends”.
Family:
Proud of Phoebe. Holden talks about how she is great in school and that she is a terrific dancer.
Page 76: “I have a kid sister… …and she can dance better than anybody living or dead”.
Proud of Allie. Holden thinks back to when Allie was alive, how everybody liked him. He missed him.
Page 42: “God, he was a nice kid”. He also talks about how he was good in school and at baseball.
Jealous of D.B.’s success. Both in the beginning of the book and in the end Holden talks about D.B. It is portrayed as envy, also that D.B. managed to get away from the life Holden lives. He is jealous that he lives life the way he wants to, and that he has found the path he wishes to follow. D.B. has the Jaguar, the job and the girl. Holden doesn’t have anything.
Negative about the parents. Page 5: “They’re nice and all –I’m not saying that – but they’re also touchy as hell”. Holden feels guilt about Allie dying and also about disappointing his parents by dropping out school after school.
Psyche:
He refers to things he knows /that are familiar/things in his past as “Old”.
He wishes to change his life. Page 220: “Don’t ever tell anybody anything. If you do, you start missing everybody”. There are two ways of looking at this. One: He misses all the people, and regrets what he has done. He wishes that he had done differently. Two: He wants to leave the past behind him, and start over.
He thinks a lot about death.
Feel free to add more...