Please respond to the following question by the start of class on Monday. Your responses should be around 350 words, you should cite the text, use proper grammar, however, you are free to use the "I." Your responses can be personal in style but should be professional/academic in tone and substance.
At the start of chapter 3, page 18, Holden says: "I read a lot of war books and mysteries and all, but they don't knock me out too much. What really knocks me out is a book that, when you're all done reading it, you wish wish the author that wrote it was a terrific friend of yours and you could call him up on the phone whenever you felt like it."
In The Catcher in the Rye, what is one passage (paragraph) or idea that has 'knocked you out,' that has inspired or provoked you?
Please clearly state what this idea or passage is, articulate what you believe the purpose of this passage/idea is in regards to Holden's narrative, and then discuss why you are personally drawn to it.
As always please let me know if you have any questions--but I would encourage you to try and work through this assignment on your own and see what you come up with.
I look forward to reading your responses and learning from your ideas.
Best,
AK
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“Old Jane. Every time I got to the part about her out with Stradlater in that damn Ed Bank’s car, it almost drove me crazy. I know she wouldn’t let him get to first base with her, but it drove me crazy anyway. I don’t even like to talk about it, if you want to know the truth(Chapter 11 pg 80).”
I believe that this passage is used to show the relationship Jane has with both Holden and Stradlater. Jane’s relationship with Stradlater is definitely physical and not emotional. Yet Jane’s relationship with Holden is more emotional, but it is also physical in a way. The way that Holden and Jane’s relationship is physical is because although they aren’t doing things in the back of a car, they show their physical relationship through holding hands. The emotional relationship between Holden and Jane is shown in many areas in the book. For instance when they are playing checkers and Jane starts to cry, Holden holds her hand and sits next to her for emotional support. There physical emotion is shown when they attended the movies and Jane puts her hand behind Holden’s neck. I believe that these narrations of Jane and Holden’s relationship show how much Holden is looking for someone for him to care for, and someone to care for him. I think that in all the characters we have read about in the book Jane is the only character that Holden feels safe around. I know this as a reader because she is the only person outside of Holden’s family to see Allie’s baseball mitt. Jane going out with Stradlater makes Holden feel almost guilty, because Holden knows how Stradlater can be, and Holden wants to protect Jane from Stradlater’s use. I am drawn to this passage and the relationships between Holden, Jane, and Stradlater because I feel as if it is a repeating problem that keeps coming up every time Holden gets depressed. It also seems to me as though Holden has a hard time letting things go that were once very important to him, like the baseball mitt, and Jane.
One idea that has really caught my attention is Holden’s unwillingness to accomplish anything. When he went to Pencey prep school, he failed four out of the five classes he was taking. He never tried to get good grades and it just looked like he wanted to get out of the school. He is unable to acquire any good friends. The fencing team failed because of Holden. Holden is a character who fails to achieve anything like grades and athletics because of his lethargic behavior in life.
The way I choose to live my life is through hard work and dedication to school and athletics. Holden’s view differs immensely to mine. This contrast is what draws me so much to his perception of life. I remember when I failed my first class at my old school; I went to get extra help every day so that I could make up work and help understand the material. Holden would just not care and store it away in his head as to say nothing to worry about. “It is all right with me if you flunk me though I am flunking everything else except English anyway.” Holden uses an absurd excuse to say why he is ultimately failing the class. This reveals Holden as someone who tries to take the easy way out, instead of somebody who works through the difficulty. Whenever he says he is going to do something, he never does. At first, the idea somewhat humored me. As the book went on however and Holden started to make ridiculous decisions like not calling anyone when he felt depressed and when he was giving away money at clubs, it escalated to sheer annoyance. When is Holden ever going to notice what he is doing and stop? To actually attempt at school and to try and accept people for whom they are. Then, he will start to become healthier in what he chooses to do with his life.
J.D. Salinger chose to reveal this idea in Holden’s narrative to show why Holden’s present life is so unsuccessful. The divulging of this purpose will than show us that Holden’s future will be determined by his decision making in the present.
One of the parts in Catcher in the Rye that I liked is when Holden is talking to the second taxi driver about where the ducks go in the winter when it gets cold. After he asks him the question the taxi driver get annoyed and responds “The fish don’t go no place. They stay right where they are, the fish. Right in the goddam lake” Pg 82. Holden says that that is different and he is talking about the ducks, who leave when it gets cold. The taxi driver still responds by talking about the fish. “It’s tougher for the fish, the winter and all, than it is for the ducks for Chrissake” Pg 82. I think that in this passage the ducks represent Holden, and other people like him. Whenever his life gets difficult or he doesn’t like it he leaves, just like the ducks leave the pond when its gets too cold for them. The only difference is when spring comes and it gets warmer the ducks come back. Holden is still stuck in winter waiting for spring. I think that the fish represent the other half which is the people that stay and tough it out when life gets hard. The reason the taxi driver got a little mad was because he was one of those fish people. He might not like his job as a taxi driver, or maybe he’s unhappy with his life in general, but he’s not running away from it. He sticks with it through the winter. Maybe because the fish have no choice but to stay in the pond they are jealous of the ducks, who have the freedom to fly away and that’s why the driver got annoyed at Holden. I don’t think that one group, the fish or the ducks, is more brave our cowardly than the other. I think that constantly leaving can be just as difficult as staying through something. I think that the reason Holden wants to know where the ducks so badly is so that he will also know where to go and how to find spring.
On page 56, Holden is talking to the mother classmate named Ernest Morrow. He describes Ernest Morrow as “The biggest bastard that ever went to Pencey.” Holden is talking to his mother as though he not only likes Ernest, but that the whole school likes him. When in reality, he is a really weird kid. The passage that really caught my eye was when Holden says. “You take somebody’s mother, all they want to hear about is how much of a hot - shot their son is.” I believe that this statement is completely true. When your talking to a parent, you never want to tell them their son is a bastard, you talk to them as though their child is the greatest kid in the world. This is exactly what Holden did, he tells Mrs. Morrow that Ernest almost won the class elections but he didn’t because he was too modest to be nominated. When he actually is a jerk who rattails people in the hallway. This is an example of what Holden calls “shooting the bull”. When he starts to shoot the bull he can’t stop and it gets more and more farfetched. Another statement of Holden’s that I liked was on page 55 when he says, “She looked like she might have a pretty good idea what a bastard she was the mother of. But you can’t always tell with somebody’s mother, Mothers are slightly insane.” Even though he thinks this, and suspects that she knows about her son, he still tells her lies about her son for his own entertainment. What is even worse, is that she probably knows that he is lying, and Holden is just making a fool of himself. He thinks that he can’t get caught because he gave her the phony name of Rudolf Schmidt, and so he feels so safe and secure that he lies to a random stranger, who he is strangely attracted too.
Something that I took interest in was Holden’s letter to Old Spencer. “It’s alright if you flunk me though as I am flunking everything else except English anyway.” Holden tries to make it seem like he doesn’t care about anything. I, however, have a very hard time believing that. If Holden didn’t care he would be able to go straight home and tell his mother that he had been expelled by yet another school. Holden can’t do that because he cares enough that he’s unable to see his mother disappointed in him. Holden has convinced himself that he doesn’t want Old Spencer to put faith in him. Because of this Holden knows he’ll disappoint him. That’s why Holden writes that letter, because he doesn’t want Old Spencer to feel bad about giving up on him. I don’t think that Holden really wants Old Spencer to give up on him. In Holden’s head he’s saying I don’t need Old Spencer to be a foil for me. However, in his heart, he knows he really does. That’s why he needs to leave Old Spencer and Pencey, because Old Spencer’s starting to get to him. “Boy, I couldn’t have sat there another ten minutes to save my life.” Holden never stays long enough to let everything sink in. He leaves before he can let someone else’s opinion take effect. He doesn’t want to care. Holden is trying to prove to himself that he doesn’t care. I think this is because he has been let down so many times; he doesn’t even want to bother trying anymore. His parents send him off to boarding schools. I have a hard time believing that this was Holden’s decision. I think that it’s very likely that Holden’s parents forced him to go. If Holden’s parents can’t finish their job and raise Holden till he’s eighteen, how can they expect Holden to finish anything? Holden always seems to find something to care about, but then he asks himself, why? Caring isn’t good enough for him. He always finds a way to make himself depressed. Holden needs to find something that he realizes is okay to care and keep caring about.
The Catcher in the Rye
Passage:
“Life is a game boy. Life is a game that one plays according to the rules.”
“Yes, sir. I know it is. I know it.”
Game my ass. Some game. If you get on the side where all the hot-shots are, then it’s a game, all right-I’ll admit that. But if you get on the other side, where there aren’t any hot-shots, then what’s a game about it? Nothing. No game.
Opinion:
I enjoy this passage because it shows how syndical and straight forward Holden is about life and people. In the passage there it is discussion between Holden and his history professor, Mr. Spencer about ‘the game.’ In the passage the game is a metaphor for life. Holden explains that if you are on a successful team you will have a better time, just like if you are a successful person you will have a better life. He also talks about how if you are on the unsuccessful team the game is not that great because you are losing. Holden considers himself to be on the losing team because he is not athletic, not that flirtatious and that good looking. He claims not care about the game but you can tell that he does from how harshly he reacts when he and Mr. Spencer speaks about the game. One of the reasons that Holden hates the game is because he believes that he is stuck on the losing team, the side where the ‘hot-shots’ are not. Holden realizes that when people have connections and special skills they have more options and more ‘plays’ to win the game. For example Stradlater is successful at playing the game. Holden considers Stradlater a ‘hot-shot’, or a better way of saying this would be that Stradlater considers himself to be a ‘hot-shot.’ The reason why Holden would label Stradlater as a ‘hot-shot’ is because he is good looking, gets girls to fall for him, is an athletic guy and has year book good looks. Stradlater could take Jane Gallenger, an old friend of Holden, on a proper date because he had his coach’s car which he was able to use because he was the star of the basketball team. Holden would not be able to use the car because he did was not a basketball star, in fact he was not that athletic at all. I believe that Holden reflected about this to explain how his game worked. He knows that different people get better treatment than others but he also understands; deep down, that he is not one of the people that deserve better treatment because he has not done anything to earn it. Although Holden knows that this is true he does not want to accept it, he just wants to continue believing that life is unfair.
“At First he only used to be kidding when he called my stuff bourgeois, and I didn’t give a damn- it was sort of funny, in fact. Then, after awhile, you could tell he wasn’t kidding anymore. The thing is it’s really hard to be roommates with people if your suitcases are much better than theirs-if yours are really good ones and theirs aren’t. You think if they’re intelligent and all, the other person, and have a good sense of humor, that they don’t give a damn whose suitcases are better, but they do. They really do. It’s one of the reasons why I roomed with a stupid bastard like Stradlater. At least his suitcases were as good as mine”(109).
This passage made me question if Holden was really talking about suitcases or something else. Could it have been people? Status, wealth? Intelligence? It could have been a number of things, but it fits in with Holden’s narrative throughout the story. He repeatedly compares life to a game, and says there are two sides to it. The side that always wins and the side that is always losing. The reason the same side is always winning is because all of the bastards that have the upper hand stick together. So maybe that’s what he is comparing suitcases to as well. A bigger and better suitcase can fit more inside it and is more efficient for going places, while a smaller and slightly older suitcase probably isn’t as big, and you might have more trouble traveling with it. The nicer suitcase is like the bastards with the upper hand. It comes with more luxeries, which make it easier to go places with. If you were standing in an airport it would be more envied and acceptable than the other suitcase. However when it comes down to it both suitcases are made the same way and probably made of the same or similar material. So why is the nicer looking one more accepted? Is it because of it’s exterior? What if it didn’t even have the better interior? What if the smaller, crappier suitcase did? We have see a situation like this before with Stradlater, and how even though he looked like a top notch guy he still had an ugly secret. This seems to be a re- occuring theme. Holden spends the entire time telling us how he hates phonies, so is that why he moved his suitcases under the bed? Did he just want to fit in with the norm and not be a phony? However isn’t it being phony if you try to hide yourself from who you truly are? So would that make Holden a phony?
“At First he only used to be kidding when he called my stuff bourgeois, and I didn’t give a damn- it was sort of funny, in fact. Then, after awhile, you could tell he wasn’t kidding anymore. The thing is it’s really hard to be roommates with people if your suitcases are much better than theirs-if yours are really good ones and theirs aren’t. You think if they’re intelligent and all, the other person, and have a good sense of humor, that they don’t give a damn whose suitcases are better, but they do. They really do. It’s one of the reasons why I roomed with a stupid bastard like Stradlater. At least his suitcases were as good as mine”(109).
This passage made me question if Holden was really talking about suitcases or something else. Could it have been people? Status, wealth? Intelligence? It could have been a number of things, but it fits in with Holden’s narrative throughout the story. He repeatedly compares life to a game, and says there are two sides to it. The side that always wins and the side that is always losing. The reason the same side is always winning is because all of the bastards that have the upper hand stick together. So maybe that’s what he is comparing suitcases to as well. A bigger and better suitcase can fit more inside it and is more efficient for going places, while a smaller and slightly older suitcase probably isn’t as big, and you might have more trouble traveling with it. The nicer suitcase is like the bastards with the upper hand. It comes with more luxeries, which make it easier to go places with. If you were standing in an airport it would be more envied and acceptable than the other suitcase. However when it comes down to it both suitcases are made the same way and probably made of the same or similar material. So why is the nicer looking one more accepted? Is it because of it’s exterior? What if it didn’t even have the better interior? What if the smaller, crappier suitcase did? We have see a situation like this before with Stradlater, and how even though he looked like a top notch guy he still had an ugly secret. This seems to be a reoccuring theme. Holden spends the entire time telling us how he hates phonies, so is that why he moved his suitcases under the bed? Did he just want to fit in with the norm and not be a phony? However isn’t it being phony if you try to hide yourself from who you truly are? So would that make Holden a phony?
One passage from The Catcher in the Rye the ‘knocked me out’ was from chapter 6. “When I really worry about something, I don’t just fool around. I even have to go to the bathroom when I worry about something. Only, I don’t go. I’m too worried to go” (40.) This passage spoke to me because of how truthful it was for my own life. It was the first passage that I really saw some of Holden inside of me. Like Holden, I worry about the smallest things. Everything that happens and everything I do worries me. I fear consequences for my actions most of all. If I do something that is has the slightest of risks of turning out bad, I become worried. While in a worried state, I have trouble doing anything productive. Holden, worries to the point of no production, like me. He is worrying about Stradlater and Jane going on a date. Holden says he knows Jane very well. Since he knows her, he guesses what she would and would not do with Stradlater. Holden convinces himself that his estimated picture is true yet he still worries. There is still a glimmer of doubt in his mind. This small bit of doubt turns him into a worrying wreck. Even though he knows that Jane would not do anything with Stradlater, he worries she would. Day to day, the same happens to me. I worry greatly about something even though I know the situation will turn out all right. When the situation turns out well, I feel relieved, however, when it does not, I worry even more the next time. Holden is also caught in this perpetual worrying. One may think that Holden does not care about anything or anyone when he flunks out of Pencey Prep with no remorse. However, Holden does care and he shows this in his worry. By worrying about Jane he shows his carrying for her and her well being. Holden cares, he just doesn't know how to show it.
A passage of Catcher In The Rye that 'knocks me out' is, "I was only thirteen, and they were going to have me psychoanalyzed and all, because I broke all the windows in the garage. I don't blame them. I really don't. I slept in the garage the night he died, and I broke all the goddam windows with my fist, just for the hell of it" (Ch. 5, pg. 38-39).
I am drawn to this passage because it shows a different side of Holden that we, the readers, have not seen before. Before this moment all we have seen of Holden is a boy who is confused, acts irrationally, and is getting the axe from yet another school. In this passage we see that Holden actually cares about something. I am drawn to this passage because we finally see Holden may be some sort of normal. It is obvious that he loved his brother Allie and his baseball mitt is the only thing he has to remember him by.
But Holden also remembers breaking the windows when his brother died. In class we often talk about different meanings for windows. In class we discussed how windows can mean windows into our own souls. So when Allie died Holden broke all the windows into his own soul, so he is now incapable of introspection. This also explains why Holden enjoys going into the museum. Holden explains that the museum does not change, no matter how long you leave it, if you come back to it, it is still the same. Holden also makes the point that it is the person viewing it who is different, never the displays. I believe Holden enjoys the museum. He has something to compare himself to that is unchanging. He cannot examine himself, because he broke all of his windows, so he compares himself to a building that is not changing. He can see how he has changed when he views the museum.
The passage in Cather in the Rye that jumps out at me and I see fairly often is when Holden states that he is never in the mood to do anything. “You really have to be in the mood for that stuff” (116). Holden uses this as an excuse to not complete a task that is on his mind. Just because he is not in the mood to do something does not mean that he can put everything to the side and not worry about it and save it for later. Using this excuse, Holden is able to avoid everything that he wants/has to do until he is in the right mood to do it. Will that mood ever come where Holden will finally take responsibility and do what is on his mind and what he has been waiting to do for a long time? Only Holden can change that. Some examples are Holden always talks about giving his old friend Jane Gallagher a call, or his younger sister, but he is too scared because he does not want to speak to Jane’s parents if they pick up the phone or his own parents if they pick up the phone. Holden has to decide and realize that he needs to man up and do the difficult things in life, even though they are hard. Another is when Holden says he would have gone to the museum but he was not in the right mood for it. I don’t see why Holden has to be in a certain mood to do something that everybody else does daily. Holden is waiting for that perfect moment when he is in the right mood to do something I that time will probably never come for him. If Holden wants to talk to Jane and his sister I don’t see why he has to be in a certain mood that allows him to make these calls. All Holden is saying when he talks about not being in the right mood is that he is too nervous and scared to do whatever he has thought of.
"It’s no fun to be yellow. Maybe I'm not all yellow. I don't know. I think maybe I'm just partly yellow and partly the type that doesn't give much of a damn if they lose their gloves. One of my troubles is, I never care too much when I lose something... I never seem to have anything that if I lost it I’d care too much."
The purpose of this passage is to show that Holden doesn’t care about much of anything. He really doesn’t care that he’s been expelled from Pencey Prep. Nothing fazes Holden. He isn’t surprised by anything. The fact that he doesn’t have anything worth losing is important. Holden doesn’t put much value in worldly possessions. I am not sure what he values instead and this is one of my biggest questions about the book so far. I am not even sure whether he values anything. His lack of direction suggests to me that there isn’t anything that he aspires towards. Another incident that shows how little Holden cares is when he decides to sell his typewriter for significantly less than he bought it for. The smart way to go would have been to hold onto it until he found somewhere or someone who would take it off his hands for a little more money. Instead, he simply sells it to the boy who he was lending it to despite the fact that he didn’t really want to buy it. Holden doesn’t feel like carrying it around and he doesn’t want to put out the effort to find another buyer so he agrees to the deal. He simply doesn’t care how much money he loses. He understands the value of money and certainly appreciates having it, however, he is still willing to “throw his money around” and lose a lot of money in order to get a small gain. I am personally drawn to this passage because sometimes I too don’t really care if I lose something. My Mom once got really angry with me because I left a pair of pants at school. She had bought them just a few days before and I had worn them once by the time I lost them. The thing I didn’t understand was why she was so mad. I didn’t care at all that I had lost the pants. It didn’t mean anything to me. I just thought that she should go out and buy me another pair. I, like Holden, sometimes don’t appreciate the fact that money doesn’t grow on trees.
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