Holden Caulfield's Family

Family. Arguably the most important entity in a person’s life, defined by the Cambridge Dictionary as “a group of people who are related to each other, such as a mother, a father, and their children”. An ideal family is supposed to have a close attachment bond with each other, to care for each other, siblings for siblings, and especially the parents for their children. Clearly this is not the family that Holden thinks he has. This type of family is something that Holden Caulfield doesn’t get a lot of during the events of the novel, and it comes back to haunt him. Much of the difficulty that Holden Caulfield faces throughout his life can be attributed to his family’s negligence and abandonment. “And what my lousy childhood was like, and how

They live in mid-town Manhattan. His father is a wealthy corporation lawyer who is always investing money in Broadway shows that always flop, which his mother doesn’t like. His father was a catholic, but left the church when he got married. His mother doesn’t appear to have a job. According to Holden “my parents would have about two hemorrhages apiece if I told anything pretty personal about them” (Salinger 1), his parents are strict, but they might not be so, knowing how his mother reacts to catching Phoebe smoking cigarettes and the many times Holden has been given the ax. Because they have money for private schools, they send Holden to one, and can’t be bothered to properly raise him themselves. When his younger brother, Allie dies of leukemia at age eleven, Holden in a state of rage, breaks all the windows of his garage with his fists, leading to his hospitalization. His parents wanted him to be psychoanalyzed because of this, instead of taking their time and trying to help him personally and each other through their

Most probably because he’s worried about her mother reaction when she finds out he has been kicked, because she seems to get hysterical. She gets frequent headaches, smokes most nights and doesn’t get much sleep, being so nervous. This is blamed on her not getting over the death of Allie, her younger son (Salinger 201). And is another reason why Holden doesn’t want them to know he got kicked from school. According to Gerald Rosen, “Holden sorely misses being able to turn to his parents in his time of trouble. He doesn't say this, but he reveals it obliquely in his movie- fantasies of being shot by the mob” This is where he shouts, “Mother darling, everything’s getting so dark in here.” And “Mother darling, give me your hand, why won’t you give me your hand?” (554). He says this to Ackley in what appears to be a jokingly matter, but it can be interpreted as Holden literally asking those questions to his mother because he feels abandoned, isolated and that no one is coming to save him from his