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Is ‘Catcher in the Rye’ still relevant to teens?

Zoe Miller, 16, likes J.D. Salinger's "The Catcher in the Rye" so much that her copy is dog-eared from multiple readings. And she wishes her parents had spelled her name Zooey instead of Zoe, in honor of another Salinger book, "Franny and Zooey."

But Becky Johnston-Carter, 19, hates "Catcher" so much that she made a YouTube video in which she stabbed the book with a knife, then burned it in a barbecue grill.

When Salinger died last month, "The Catcher in the Rye" was heralded as the ultimate depiction of modern teenage angst. But while "Catcher" is widely taught, do 21st-century teenagers still relate to the book's moody narrator Holden Caulfield? Or has "Catcher," first published in 1951, become just another classic shoved down kids' throats?

Passions rage on both sides.

"I'm a really big fan," said Zoe, of San Marino, Calif. "My copy is totally battered and old. Holden is such a cool kid. I think he's my favorite fictional character." She treasures her dad's red hunting cap because Holden has one just like it.

On the other side of the debate, Becky says she "could never find the teenage rebellion that was supposed to be in the book." But she came up with her own form of rebellion by destroying it in a YouTube video called "I Hate Catcher in the Rye."

Li Goldberg, a freshman at Bard College at Simon's Rock in Great Barrington, Mass., says when she read "Catcher," she could hear Holden's "voice and felt him as a friend. I understood his philosophy on phonies and why he was acting the way he was."

Li recalled standing up for Holden in her high school English class after another student dismissed him as an "emo." (Note to uninformed people over 40: UrbanDictionary.com defines "emo" as an angsty teenager.)

"That was a lively class," said Daniel Lewis, Li's teacher at Lincoln-Sudbury High School in Lincoln, Mass., where "Catcher" is taught to ninth-graders. "It was great that there was that energy and connecting with the book."

The reading ‘challenge’ Lewis says that while teenagers still relate to Holden on a visceral, emotional level, reading "Catcher" can be a challenge.

"It does feel dated and I'm surprised it works as well as it does," Lewis said. "It's hard for a 14- or 15-year-old to put themselves in a post-World War II mindset. The language is different. Holden's voice sounds really authentic, really vivid, but it's not how a teenager sounds today. There's a lot of ambiguity, and you're not quite sure how to read this person."

Lewis says teens reading "Catcher" today need a glossary for words like "crumby," "corny" and "the grippe." And they need help understanding that when Holden says his brother is "prostituting" himself in Hollywood, he means that figuratively.

"But if you can get past that, you can start to feel really protective of the guy," Lewis said. He said teens also still relate to Holden's "deep distrust of the adult world" and his "'to hell with the world'" attitude and "lack of connection to his parents."

But Jennifer Bogut, who teaches high school English at Montrose Academy in Moscow, Idaho, says she'd "rather face root canal work" than "inflict" Holden Caulfield on anyone.

"If people hadn't been so up in arms over the language and content, it wouldn't have become the cult classic that has caused high school students to have to read it over the last several decades," she said. (Among other things, Holden describes himself as a "sex maniac" and is upset about graffiti that contains obscenities.)

Rachel Mattos, a senior at Saint Joseph's University in Philadelphia, says the book retains its shock value. "I just remember being a nervous 14-year-old in my first high school English class, startled by my teacher reading curse words out loud," she said. Overall, though, she said the book "didn't really speak to me" even though it's supposed to be about "that teenage thing of not fitting in."

Future of ‘Catcher’ Corin Warden, who teaches at a Toronto high school, thinks "Catcher" will fade from reading lists as the boomers who grew up with it retire. "That generation is leaving, and there's got to be something that has been written since that speaks as eloquently to teenagers as 'Catcher in the Rye' once did," he said.

That said, Holden's older fans can still find kids young enough to be their grandchildren to share their enthusiasm.

"I highly doubt that my generation ever calls anyone 'phonies,' but the themes and emotions in the novel are timeless," said Katie Stryker, a junior at Franklin & Marshall College in Lancaster, Pa.

"Holden Caulfield was a snarky blogger before snarky bloggers existed," said Courtney Sirwatka, a literature major at the State University of New York in Purchase.

"I'm glad that they still teach it in high school," said Steve Russell, a student at Albion College in Albion, Mich., "and I hope they never stop."

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A Summary and Analysis of J. D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye

By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)

The Catcher in the Rye is one of the most influential American novels published in the mid-twentieth century. Upon its publication in 1951, J. D. Salinger’s only full-length novel became something of a cult, helping to inspire the Beat Generation and powerfully capturing a moment in American cultural history.

Salinger had worked on the manuscript for a number of years: he had drafts of The Catcher in the Rye in his backpack when he fought at D-Day in 1944.

But why did The Catcher in the Rye become such a cult classic, and why does it remain so widely revered and studied? Before we offer an analysis of the novel, here’s a brief recap of its plot.

The Catcher in the Rye : plot summary

The novel is narrated by sixteen-year-old Holden Caulfield, who has been expelled from his elite school, Pencey Prep, for not doing any work. He visits his history teacher, Mr Spencer, at his home where the teacher is unwell. However, Mr Spencer annoys Holden when he wants to go through the body’s mistakes so he can learn why he has failed.

Holden then goes back to his dorm room, where another student, Ackley, and Holden’s roommate Stradlater turn up. Holden learns that Stradlater has a date with a girl he had fallen in love with the previous year, but agrees to write an English composition for his roommate so Stradlater has his evening free to go on the date.

However, later that evening when Stradlater returns from his date, Holden grows jealous, and the two of them fight, with Holden losing.

Although he is supposed to remain at the boarding school until the end of term, Holden decides to take off immediately, travelling to New York on the train with the mother of one of his classmates; he entertains her (and himself) by making up outlandish stories about how popular her son is at school. Then he checks into a hotel in New York, because he wants to avoid going home and telling his parents he has been expelled.

He visits a nightclub, and, back at his hotel room, arranges for a prostitute named Sunny to come to his room. But when the virginal Holden reveals he just wants to talk to her, she leaves, returning with her pimp, who demands more money from him before attacking him, while Sunny takes money out of Holden’s wallet.

To cheer himself up the next day, Holden phones a girl he knows named Sally Hayes, and, even though he considers her a phoney, they arrange to see a play at the theatre. It is while he is on his way to meet Sally, while purchasing a record for his sister Phoebe, that Holden hears a boy singing ‘If a body catch a body coming through the rye’.

After the play, Holden and Sally go ice skating, but Holden scares Sally away by suggesting they go and live in the woods.

Next, Holden meets Carl Luce, an old schoolfriend, for a drink in a bar. Once again, Holden ends up annoying someone, this time by taking an unusual level of interest in Carl’s love life. Holden gets drunk and goes to Central Park, before going home to see Phoebe, avoiding alerting his parents to the fact he has returned. Phoebe works out that Holden is home because he’s been expelled from school, and Holden tells Phoebe his dream of being ‘the catcher in the rye’ (of which more below).

Holden escapes the family home when his parents arrive back at the house, and goes to visit another former teacher of his, Mr Antolini, who taught him English. Antolini is worried about Holden and, like Mr Spencer, wants Holden to focus and make something of himself. He does, however, let Holden stay the night, though things take a dark turn when Holden wakes up to discover Mr Antolini patting his head and interprets this as an inappropriate advance. He leaves, passing the rest of the night at Grand Central Station.

The next day, he decides to leave society and go and live in seclusion in a log cabin. When Phoebe hears of his plan, she wants to go with him, but Holden refuses to let her. He takes her to the zoo and buys her a ride on the carousel to make it up to her, and the two share a happy moment. The novel ends with Holden confiding to us that he has met with his parents and agreed to start at a new school in September. The brief holiday, the youthful rebellion, is over.

The Catcher in the Rye : analysis

The opening lines of the novel see Holden Caulfield, and Salinger through him, signalling a departure from and rejection of the kind of nineteenth-century Bildungsroman novel charting one young character’s journey from childhood into adulthood. Caulfield also doesn’t want to join the ranks of adulthood – he views adults as more ‘phoney’ and suspicious than most children – and instead wishes to preserve the innocence of childhood, as the novel’s title makes clear (of which more in a moment).

But if Caulfield turns away from the Victorian novel embodied by Dickens’s David Copperfield , Salinger’s novel does look back to a different nineteenth-century literary tradition – but an American one rather than British.

As critics have often remarked, The Catcher in the Rye shares some useful parallels with Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1884), the novel which Ernest Hemingway named as the start of American literature.

Like Huck Finn, Holden Caulfield (his very name containing a number of faint echoes of Twain’s character’s name) narrates his own story in his own idiom, using a colloquial and down-to-earth tone to document his retreat from the society around him.

But whereas Finn heads into the free world of nature, Caulfield retreats further into the city, burrowing into New York with its vices and dangers. He wishes to seek out the real city – not the ‘phoney’ world he has inhabited until now.

At the same time, Caulfield is more of a romantic than a realist: he dreams of escaping the modern city in favour of a simple, honest rustic life, a cabin in the woods (a very Walden -inspired dream), and the love of a good woman. Like the Romantic movement – seen in the poetry of Wordsworth and Coleridge – he privileges childhood innocence over the fallen world of adulthood, and seems to think it’s a shame that anyone has to grow up at all.

And this is the explanation behind the novel’s title: Caulfield’s (largely imaginary) take on a line from a Robert Burns poem, ‘ Comin’ thro’ the Rye ’, which prompts him to envision a field of rye near a cliff, where his job would be to catch any children playing in the field and straying too close to the cliff-edge – hence The Catcher in the Rye .

But his idyllic vision of perpetual childhood is founded on a misunderstanding: Phoebe points out to him that he has misremembered (or rather, misheard) the line from Burns’s poem, which actually asks, ‘Gin [i.e., if] a body meet a body / Comin thro’ the rye’, rather than if a body catch a body, which is how Caulfield heard the line rendered when he heard the boy singing it earlier that day.

When he visits Phoebe’s school to say goodbye, he is charmingly but also puritanically offended that a swearword has been scrawled on the walls, corrupting the innocence of childhood. The problem with Holden’s character – which, thanks to Salinger’s masterly control of the teenager’s voice, is engaging and authentic – is that he thinks all adults are somehow lesser than children, and his belief in the primacy of childhood leads him to reduce adults to ‘phonies’ and teachers who don’t understand him.

In his two encounters with his former teachers – whom, suggestively, he seeks out himself, implying that on some level he wants them to set him on the right path to maturity – he views the first as annoying and the second as a possible sex predator. His innocence is appealing but also, as innocence is always in danger of being, founded on an overly simplistic view of the world.

The late, great literary critic Frank Kermode once described The Catcher in the Rye as having a ‘built-in death wish’, and a Freudian analysis of Salinger’s novel might analyse Caulfield’s desire to flee from adult society with its responsibilities and challenges into an earlier childhood stage of innocence as symptomatic of his unconscious desire to return to the womb. He appears to envy his dead brother, Allie, to an unwholesome degree.

And that title, The Catcher in the Rye , is emblematic of the novel as a whole, since Holden’s fantasy of catching children before they fall off a cliff might be analysed as a symbol of his desire to prevent himself, and other children, from falling off the cliff off childhood into the abyss of adulthood, with all of its phoniness and, yes, responsibilities.

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6 thoughts on “A Summary and Analysis of J. D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye”

Plus Holden’s outlook is relentlessly middle class and it remains relatively unchanged by his experiences in the course of the novel. Catcher deserves some credit for being a groundbreaker, but there is not a great deal of difference between Holden and Jimmy in Robert Gover’s One Hundred Dollar Misunderstanding, and while Misunderstanding is clearly aimed at a more popular audience, I would not rate Catcher as significantly superior in literary terms.

It’s about 45 years since I read Catcher in the Rye, so probably about time I revisited it. My one strong memory is that, although Holden might be supremely irritating, he redeemed himself by his kindness to his little sister. I think most 16-year old boys would die rather than be seen out with a younger sister.

It was the first visceral novel for me–where I felt like the main character Holden did not just jump off the page but very nearly put his arms around me and tried to strangle me. Back then mostly found Holden scary or specifically disturbing in how volatile he was especially toward women. Still I liked Salinger’s master of prose and read all of his work. Cut to years later, I read the prequel via the internet “An Ocean Full of Bowling Balls.” And I know Salinger did not want it released but I think it adds a lot of context especially where the character of Kenneth/renamed Allie is concerned–I think it could have saved Salinger a lot the questions he became tired of answering/addressing re: theories about Holden–was Holden the embodiment of him–back in high school I would have said yes. After the reading the prequel I say no. And just my opinion, but I think the novel took on on a dark stigma–our class read it after the shooting of John Lennon and a lot of this that became also associated/iconic and distracting from the original story — I think that could have been avoided if he released the prequel, but again that is just my opinion.

Notwithstanding an entirely different culture I grew in, the book hit me with the force of a comet, perhaps because I was the same age as Holden’s when I read it, and that was such a long time ago. The analysis is extensive even though it is brief and I realise it has hit the core.

Fascinating to think that in reality the author, Salinger, took in a much younger, naive woman as his lover and then discarded her a short time later. Was it old JD that really didn’t want to face adulthood and all the responsibilities that go with it, including moral, legal, and ethical ones? Don’t admire him or his works at all.

Is childhood’s innocence phoniness aborning? In most cases it’s ignorance leading into experience. Hawthorne’s “Young Goodman Brown” is a much cleaner treatment of the theme and Joyce’s “Araby” much more nuanced. Holden is every bit the phony he criticizes.

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86 Catcher in the Rye Essay Topics & Ideas

🏆 best essay topics for catcher in the rye, 🎓 interesting catcher in the rye essay titles, 📌 good essay prompts for catcher in the rye, ❓ catcher in the rye essay questions.

• Hypocrisy in “The Catcher in the Rye” by J. D. Salinger Stradlater reveals to Holden that he has a date waiting and that he needs to shave. Stradley asks Holden to write an essay for him and informs him that the former is taking a girl […]
• Alcohol, Violence, and Sex Content in Salinger’s “The Catcher in the Rye” For example, The Catcher in the Rye is a book that appeals to the majority of adults while the representatives of the younger generation often turn out to be not able to come to the […]
• J.D. Salinger’s ‘The Catcher in the Rye’ – Themes and Insights This paper aims to summarize the plot of the novel, to discuss the central themes and the main characters, and to provide a personal review of the book.
• In What Way Is The Catcher in the Rye an Iconic Work We, however, do not subscribe to such point of view, because there are good reasons to believe that the actual explanation as to this novel’s iconic status is the fact that in The Catcher in […]
• The Idea of Love in The Great Gatsby and the Parallels or Contrasts That Can Be Drawn With the Presentation of Love in The Catcher in the Rye Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby and Jerome Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye, it is possible to state that the notion of love is presented there similarly even though the texts are absolutely different and […]
• Holden’s Inability to Comprehend Reality in Salinger’s “The Catcher in the Rye” This indicates Holden’s growth as future situations indicate he is aware of his age and does not perceive issues as a child, returning to school after the escapade.
• The Pain of Maturation in “The Catcher in the Rye” by J.Salinger The important literary device used to depict Holden confronting the pressure of the society and the corruption of the adult world is characterization, as the main character calls people he meets “phony” and refers to […]
• “The Catcher in the Rye” by J.D. Salinger The book’s story of escape and a search for happiness despite all the sham and drudgery in this world is the topic of this paper.
• “The Catcher in the Rye” by J.D. Salinger Review Critics admit that Salinger’s depiction of Holden Caulfield symbolizes the dilemma of the idealist in the contemporary world and shows the primary structural framework of a novel.
• Jerome Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye Thus, this paper, starting with the outline of characters and plot, discusses potential interpretations of The Catcher in the Rye and proposes the opinion of the paper’s author.
• J. D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye The reason is that the face value of the content impairs the ability of the reader to dig deep into the book and unravel some disturbing traits about Holden.
• The Theme of the Loss of Innocence in “The Catcher in the Rye” by Salinger
• The Universal Theme of Growing up and the Colorful Symbolism of “The Catcher in the Rye” by J. D. Salinger
• The Use of Defense Mechanisms in J. D. Salinger’s “The Catcher in the Rye”
• The Use of Isolation and Alienation to Idealize Innocence in Holden’s World in “The Catcher in the Rye” by J. D. Salinger
• The Search for Company and Failure of Holden in “The Catcher in the Rye” by J. D. Salinger
• The Effects of Past Experiences in the Mental Health and Relationships of Holden Caulfield in “The Catcher in the Rye”
• Transition to Adulthood in “The Catcher in the Rye” by J. D. Salinger
• The Themes of Maturity and Preserving Innocence in “The Catcher in the Rye” by J. D. Salinger
• The Tragedy of Holden Caulfield in “The Catcher in the Rye” by J. D. Salinger
• The Struggles of Holden Caulfied in “The Catcher in the Rye” by J. D. Salinger
• Universal Confusion and Evil in William Golding’s “Lord of the Flies” and J. D. Salinger’s “The Catcher in the Rye”
• An Analysis of the Sexuality in “The Catcher in the Rye” by J. D. Salinger
• The Thoughts and Feelings of a Teenager in “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” by Mark Twain and in “The Catcher in the Rye” by J. D. Salinger
• Unreachable Dreams as an Important Theme in Salinger’s “The Catcher in the Rye”
• The Use of Symbols to Demonstrate Holden’s Fear of Maturity and the Adult World in “The Catcher in the Rye” by J. D. Salinger
• The Use of Rhetorical Choices in “The Catcher in the Rye” by J. D. Salinger
• The Theme of Protecting Innocence in “The Catcher in the Rye” by J. D. Salinger
• A Theme of Road Rage in “The Catcher in the Rye” by J. D. Salinger
• The Theme of Individual and Society in “The Grapes of Wrath” by John Steinbeck and “The Catcher in the Rye” by J. D. Salinger
• The Role of Dialogue in “The Catcher in the Rye” by J. D. Salinger
• The Depression of Holden Caulfield Caused by Loneliness in “The Catcher in the Rye” by J. D. Salinger
• The Theme of Maturity in “The Catcher in the Rye” by J. D. Salinger
• An Analysis of How Men Lose Their Innocence as They Age in “The Catcher in the Rye” by J. D. Salinger
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• The Life Struggles of Holden Caulfield in “The Catcher in the Rye” by J. D. Salinger
• The Importance of Companionship in Humanity in “The Catcher in the Rye” by J. D. Salinger
• The Theme of Falsification in “The Catcher in the Rye” by J. D. Salinger
• The Themes of Maturation and the Problems a Teenager Goes Through in Maturing in “The Catcher in the Rye” by J. D. Salinger
• An Analysis of Angst in “The Catcher in the Rye” by J. D. Salinger
• The Innocence of Childhood in “The Catcher in the Rye” by J. D. Salinger
• An Analysis of the Human Condition in “The Catcher in the Rye” by J. D. Salinger
• An Overview of the Complexity of Holden Character in “The Catcher in the Rye” by J. D. Salinger
• The Meaning of the Red Hunting Hat in “The Catcher in the Rye” by J. D. Salinger
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• The Hatred of Holden Caulfield for Phonies in “The Catcher in the Rye” by J. D. Salinger
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• Compare and Contrast the Literary Device Used in “Death of a Salesman” and “The Catcher in the Rye”
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• The Portrayal of Teenage Angst in the Character of Holden Caulfield in “The Catcher in the Rye” by J. D. Salinger
• How Does Clinical Depression Affect the Main Character of “The Catcher in the Rye”?
• What About Holden’s Relationships With Teachers and Classmates Helps Us to Understand More About His Character in “The Catcher in the Rye”?
• How Does Holden Caulfield See Himself as the Catcher in the Rye?
• Why Does Holden From “The Catcher in the Rye” Love the Museum of Natural History?
• Which of Holden’s Efforts Paid Off in “The Catcher in the Rye”?
• How Does Holden Caulfield Subconcioulsy Protect the Innocence of Childhood in “The Catcher in the Rye”?
• Is Holden Honest Enough With Himself in “The Catcher in the Rye”?
• How Does Holden Deal With Death in “The Catcher in the Rye”?
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• What Does the Novel “The Catcher in the Rye” Tell About Human Nature?
• How Does New York City Represent Holden Caulfield in “The Catcher in the Rye”?
• Why Does Holden Caulfield Always Lie in “The Catcher in the Rye”?
• How Does Holden Deal With Grief in Salinger’s “The Catcher in the Rye”?
• Is “The Catcher in the Rye” a Classic Story?
• Can Clinical Depression Be Related to Holden in “The Catcher in the Rye”?
• What Are Symbols Meaning and Significance in “The Catcher in the Rye”?
• How Does Holden Caulfield Deal With Alcohol, Sex, and Violence in “The Catcher in the Rye” by J. D. Salinger?
• How Does Holden Build Relationships With People in “The Catcher in the Rye”?
• Does Mr. Antolini in “The Catcher in the Rye” Give Good Advice for Modern Teenagers?
• How Are Themes of Alienation and Loneliness Presented in “The Catcher in the Rye”?
• Is Holden an Insane Person in “The Catcher in the Rye”?
• Can Holden Be Considered a Tragic Hero in “The Catcher in the Rye”?
• How Is Alcoholism Represented in “The Catcher in the Rye”?
• Is the Novel “The Catcher in the Rye” Based on One Literary Element?
• Do All of Holden’s Problems in “The Catcher in the Rye” Come From Him Being a Spoiled Child?
• What Does “The Catcher in the Rye” Teach the Reader?
• Can Holden Be Considered as an Anti-Hero in “The Catcher in the Rye”?
• Can Holden Be Considered a Static or Dynamic Character in “The Catcher in the Rye”?
• Is “The Catcher in the Rye” a Novel About Social Protest?
• What Is the Significance of the Red Hunter’s Hat That Holden Wears in “The Catcher in the Rye”?
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• Introduction

Plot summary

Interpretation, publication and initial reception.

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The Catcher in the Rye

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• The Washington Post - J.D. Salinger at 100: Is ‘The Catcher in the Rye’ still relevant?
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• Table Of Contents

The Catcher in the Rye , novel by J.D. Salinger published in 1951. The novel details two days in the life of 16-year-old Holden Caulfield after he has been expelled from prep school . Confused and disillusioned , Holden searches for truth and rails against the “phoniness” of the adult world. He ends up exhausted and emotionally unstable. The events are related after the fact.

From what is implied to be a sanatorium, Holden, the narrator and protagonist, tells the story of his adventures before the previous Christmas. The story begins with Holden at Pencey Prep School on his way to the house of his history teacher, Spencer, so that he can say goodbye. He reveals to the reader that he has been expelled for failing most of his classes. After he visits Spencer, he encounters his roommate, Ward Stradlater, who asks Holden to write an essay for English class for him while he goes on a date with a longtime friend of Holden’s. Having agreed, Holden writes about the baseball glove of his younger brother, Allie, who died of leukemia . When Stradlater returns, he tells Holden that the essay isn’t good, and Holden gets angry when Stradlater refuses to say whether he had sex with his date. This causes Holden to storm out and leave Pencey for New York City a few days earlier than planned for Christmas break. Once he arrives in New York , he cannot go home, as his parents do not yet know that he has been expelled. Instead, he rents a room at the Edmont Hotel, where he witnesses some sexually charged scenes through the windows of other rooms. His loneliness then causes him to seek out human interaction, which he does at the Lavender Room, the hotel’s nightclub. After interacting with some women there, he goes to another nightclub, only to leave after seeing his elder brother’s ex-girlfriend. When he gets back to the hotel, he orders a prostitute to his room, only to talk to her. This situation ends in him being punched in the stomach.

The next morning, Holden calls Sally Hayes, an ex-girlfriend of his. They spend the day together until Holden makes a rude remark and she leaves crying. Holden then meets up with a former schoolmate, Carl Luce, at a bar, but Luce leaves early because he becomes annoyed by Holden’s immature comments. Holden stays behind and gets drunk by himself. After he leaves, he wanders in Central Park until the cold drives him to his family’s apartment. He sneaks in, still not prepared to face his parents, and finds his 10-year-old sister, Phoebe. She is upset when she hears that Holden has failed out and accuses him of not liking anything. It is at this time that Holden describes to his sister his fantasy of being “the catcher in the rye,” which was inspired by a song he heard a little boy singing: “If a body catch a body comin’ through the rye.” Phoebe tells him that the words are “If a body meet a body coming through the rye,” from a poem by Robert Burns . (Burns’s poem, “Comin thro’ the Rye,” exists in several versions, but most render the lines as “Gin a body meet a body / Comin thro’ the rye.”) Soon they hear their parents come home after a night out, and Holden sneaks away. He calls his former English teacher, Mr. Antolini, who tells Holden he can come stay at his apartment. Holden falls asleep on Antolini’s couch and awakes to Antolini stroking his forehead, which Holden interprets as a sexual advance. He immediately excuses himself and heads to Grand Central Station , where he spends the rest of the night. When he awakes, he goes to Phoebe’s school and leaves a note telling her that he plans to run away and asking her to meet him at a museum during lunch. She arrives with a packed bag and insists on going with him. He tells her no and instead takes her to the zoo, where he watches her ride the carousel in the pouring rain. This is where the flashback ends. The novel closes with Holden explaining that he has fallen “sick” but is expected to go to a new school in the fall.

The Catcher in the Rye takes the loss of innocence as its primary concern. Holden wants to be the “catcher in the rye”—someone who saves children from falling off a cliff, which can be understood as a metaphor for entering adulthood. As Holden watches Phoebe on the carousel, engaging in childlike behaviour, he is so overcome with happiness that he is, as he puts it, “damn near bawling.” By taking her to the zoo, he allows her to maintain her childlike state, thus being a successful “catcher in the rye.” During this time, however, watching her and the other children on the carousel, he has also come to accept that he cannot save everyone: “If they want to grab for the gold ring, you have to let them do it, and not say anything. If they fall off, they fall off.”

Holden’s name is also significant: Holden can be read as “hold on,” and Caulfield can be separated into caul and field . Holden’s desire is to “hold on” to the protective covering (the caul ) that encloses the field of innocence (the same field he wishes to keep the children from leaving). Holden desperately wants to remain true and innocent in a world full of, as he puts it, “phonies.” Salinger once admitted in an interview that the novel was semi-autobiographical.

The Caulfield family was one Salinger had already explored in a number of stories that had been published by different magazines. Holden appeared in some of those stories, even narrating one, but he was not as richly fleshed out in them as he would be in The Catcher in the Rye . The novel, unlike the other stories of the Caulfield family, had difficulties getting published. Originally solicited by Harcourt, Brace and Company, the manuscript was rejected after the head of the trade division asked whether Holden was supposed to be crazy. It was then that Salinger’s agent, Dorothy Olding, approached Little, Brown and Company, which published the novel in 1951. After Little, Brown bought the manuscript, Salinger showed it to The New Yorker , assuming that the magazine, which had published several of his short stories, would want to print excerpts from the novel. The New Yorker rejected it, however, as the editors found the Caulfield children too precocious to be plausible and Salinger’s writing style exhibitionistic.

The Catcher in the Rye ’s reception was lukewarm at first. Many critics were impressed by Holden as a character and, specifically, by his style of narration. Salinger was able to create a character whose relatability stemmed from his unreliability—something that resonated with many readers. Others, however, felt that the novel was amateur and unnecessarily coarse.

After publishing The Catcher in the Rye , Salinger became a recluse. When asked for the rights to adapt it for Broadway or Hollywood , he emphatically declined. Despite Holden’s never having appeared in any form subsequent to that in Salinger’s novel, the character has had a long-lasting influence, reaching millions of readers, including two particularly notorious ones. In 1980 Mark David Chapman identified so wholly with Holden that he became convinced that murdering John Lennon would turn him into the novel’s protagonist. The Catcher in the Rye was also linked to John W. Hinckley, Jr. ’s attempted assassination of U.S. Pres. Ronald Reagan in 1981. The novel remained influential into the 21st century; indeed, many American high schools included it in their curriculum. The novel has been banned numerous times because of its salty language and sexual content.

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Is JD Salinger’s Catcher In The Rye Still Relevant?

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Sixty-eight years ago, JD Salinger’s fabled, and only, novel was published by Little Brown and Company and it remains a byword for teenage angst and rebellion to this day. The question is, why?

Almost from the get-go, its 17-year-old protagonist, Holden Caulfield, became the poster boy for many a disenfranchised American youth, and things only spiralled from there.

Perhaps it’s all about reputation? That the reclusive author never published another book has given Catcher a retrospective aura beyond perhaps its merit, while the fact this was also the most censored book in the US between 1961 and ’82 only adds to its allure. Finally, that it also has famed links to John Lennon’s Killer, Mark David Chapman, and Ronald Reagan’s shooter John Hinckley Jr. has added an extra layer of macabre to the whole thing.

While undoubtedly a great of its time, reading Catcher in the Rye today reveals a story that has, in truth, not necessarily stood the test of time. The themes of alienation remain of course, and will always touch a nerve for people of a certain generation. But it’s hard to imagine the world-weary, social media-wielding teenagers of today being similarly moved by Caulfield’s trials.

Here are another three, instantly recognisable titles that have continued to – to varying degrees – be culturally relevant to this day.

Animal Farm (George Orwell)

Few books are lauded, or referenced, as much as Orwell’s 1984. And yet Animal Farm remains Orwell’s true masterpiece, as relevant today as when it was written in the politically dark European days of the 1940s.

Essentially a satire of the Russian revolution of 1917, its cultural relevance is unquestioned. Released months after the end of World War II, Animal Farm, is a peerless parable on the corruptive effect of power, has not suffered due to the passage of years in the way Catcher in The Rye has.

Read it today, and you will recognise modern day parallels everywhere you look.

Not all books are equal.

Brave New World (Aldus Huxley)

Published in 1932, Huxley’s Brave New World predates George Orwell’s 1984, and its themes of a dystopian future, by 17 years.

Set in a futuristic London and tackling the then novel concepts of genetic engineering and social divisions based on intelligence, among others, it proved to be book truly ahead of its time.

If anything, its themes are perhaps more relevant than ever today as we stand on the edge of a future of artificial intelligence, climate change and social unrest.

Many Sci-Fi films, from Blade Runner to The Matrix, owe a debt of gratitude to Huxley’s vision.

On The Road (Jack Kerouac)

Kerouac’s semi-autobiographical novel idealised the concept of the road trip. The account of his travels across America with a group of friends perfectly captured the lives of the jazz-loving Beat Generation of that era.

Kerouac famously wrote this book in 1951 on one continuous roll of paper, before publishing it six years later.

As Sal Paradise, the author narrates the adventures he encounters along the way with Dean Moriarty, a carefree character based on Kerouac’s friend and jazz aficionado Neal Cassady.

First time readers might well feel let down, however. While its hipster themes will resonate with many, it is very often meandering with long stretches of ennui.

Just like a road trip.

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Catcher in The Rye Ending Analysis

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The Catcher in the Rye Enigma Revisited

The 1951 J.D. Salinger novel The Catcher in the Rye has long been one of the most controversial literary tomes, inspiring films and criminal conspiracies. John Lennon’s murderer, Marc David Chapman, carried the book at the murder and continued reading it while Lennon lay bleeding at his feet. He has said that he wished to model his life after the novel's protagonist, Holden Caulfield, identifying with Holden’s misanthropic world view.

John Hinckley, after his attack on President Ronald Reagan, was found to have a copy of Rye , but the book did not have anything to do with his psychosis. Nevertheless, his attack has been lumped with the many conspiracy theories that emerged after Lennon’s murder.

The 1997 Mel Gibson film, Conspiracy Theory, introduced the possibility that a secret code in the novel triggered political assassins who are compelled to buy the novel to complete missions.

“ The allegation directed at Salinger is that he (and/or his publisher) craftily implanted into the book neurolinguistic passages, or coded messages, that act as post-hypnotic suggestions or mind control "triggers." In turn, these triggers enabled CIA handlers to activate Manchurian Candidates for assassinations. Some conspiracy theorists also believe the novel was part of the CIA's now mostly-declassified mind control program MK-Ultra, and that while assassins were being brainwashed they were forced to read the book over and over until it was embedded in their minds.” ( The Catcher in the Rye Enigma: by James Morcan ,  Lance Morcan

There have been numerous books, podcasts, and lectures positing even more outlandish schemes emanating from the pen of Jerome David Salinger. One of the most amusing was a three part video on YouTube showing the hidden ‘Catcher’ symbols in Stanley Kubrick’s film The Shining . 

When I was 16, I read The Catcher in the Rye and loved it for all the wrong reasons. After a discussion about the book with my husband who wasn’t a fan,  I decided to reread it as an adult and found it overwhelmingly relevant to today and understood finally why it’s a classic.

As a teenager, I could not identify with the protagonist, Holden Caulfield, and his angst-driven search for life’s answers. I was in my 12 th year of  an all-girls Catholic education and had all the tools I needed to deal with trauma and the vicissitudes of urban strife. Poor Holden had nothing to stop his depression and painful search for relevance in his scary impending adulthood. What we did have in common was the fact that  we were native New Yorkers and what I loved about Catcher was the description of Holden’s trek into the Manhattan sites I had also escaped to from life in the barrio.  I lived in the museums of Art and Natural History. I rode the carousel in my beloved playground of Central Park.

Reading the novel now as a mother and grandmother, I was struck with the overwhelming epiphany of what Salinger meant to convey. Catcher in the Rye , I believe, is a cautionary tale warning us that we must guard the innocence of children.

Many of the reviewers, pundits and educators have expressed the opinion that J.D. Salinger is Holden Caulfield, but I disagree. Holden is a fictional character created by Salinger with some similar traits, but one must remember that Holden is a teenager and Salinger was in his thirties when Catcher was published. The impetus behind their behavior, however, was a form of post-traumatic stress syndrome in both lives.

The death from leukemia of his brother Allie when Holden was 13 exacerbated his feelings of alienation and loneliness. Salinger, on the other hand, had been on a boat on D-Day and witnessed the slaughter of the first troops landing on Omaha Beach. He had seen the horror of  the concentration camps and had also been involved with the interrogation of Nazis.  Salinger once told his daughter, "You never really get the smell of burning flesh out of your nose entirely, no matter how long you live."

The horror of war can, at times, stir the souls of the creative witness to it, and Salinger was not the only one to produce works of artistic merit. A.A. Milne served in both WWI and WWII and from his tortured mind sprung Winnie the Pooh. More recently, singer James Blunt, a British captain in the Bosnian war, wrote haunting songs of his experiences.

The war probably confirmed Salinger’s conclusion that the world was a bad place for the young and innocent. Holden believes fervently that the adult world will corrupt the innocence of children, In the novel, it is Holden’s growing sexual urges that he represses that has him equate sex and adulthood as the enemy. He sees profane writings on a bathroom wall and erases it so that children won’t see it, but he also realizes that he can’t erase the filthy words that will be written on more walls.

He, not Salinger, mistakes the words of Robert Burns poem Coming through the Rye . The actual first words are: "When a body meets a body coming through the rye." Holden remembers the words as: "When a body catches a body." He tells his beloved sister Phoebe that he imagines seeing children in a field of rye playing too close to a cliff and if they fall off, he will be the catcher in the rye. 

This, I believe, is the theme behind the novel. A warning to protect the innocence of children by not exposing them to the sins of adults. I may be wrong, but considering how today’s children are being groomed to be sexualized as young as kindergarten age, with drag queens reading to them in libraries or Netflix and Disney cartoons showcasing what was once considered deviance, Salinger must be turning over in his grave.

 aliciav.colon [at] gmail.com

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