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How Is Holden Caulfield Alike

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In the novel, The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger, Holden Caulfield, is a troubled teenage boy. In both the novel and the article, Holden’s behavior reflects off of Salinger’s behavior and actions as well, which is what makes them so similar. In the article, the author expresses Salinger’s dislike for school and how he also drops out and is shipped off to military school. Once involved with war, Salinger develops PTSD, which is post-traumatic stress disorder and Holden begins to dislike the war, which helps readers understand the relationship between the two. In the article, the author compares both Salinger’s and Holden’s school days. The author presents numerous examples of their similarities based off of the fact that they both were …show more content…

The article states, “Despite his apparent intellect, Salinger — or Sonny as he was known as a child — wasn’t much of a student”. Salinger had never been much of a good student, as he was always switching schools and universities, which also caused him to struggle with fitting in. JD Salinger was very similar to Holden in this case because Holden was also not a very great student and also moved around a lot. Another example of a similarity between J.D. Salinger and Holden Caulfield was that they both dropped out of school. Salinger and Holden’s parents were very similar as they both knew that their parents would have severe consequences for dropping out of the school they were attending. For Salinger, he had flunked out of school and was eventually sent away. The article states, “After flunking out of the McBurney School Side, he was shipped off by his parents to Valley Forge Military Academy in Wayne, Pennsylvania”. Salinger had failed to apply himself and fully committed to doing the work needed to graduate. Similar to Salinger, Holden was almost the …show more content…

If there’s ever another war, I’m going to sit right the hell on top of it. I’ll volunteer for it, I swear to God I will” (156). Holden expresses his honest opinions on war, which is that he does not ever want to be involved with war and he does not know what he would do if it ever came down to him being forced to go. JD Salinger expresses, “I don’t think I could stand it if I had to go to war. I really couldn’t”(154). Salinger’s trauma from the war was a major factor in Holden’s opinions and how he spoke about the war. JD Salinger experienced a variety of trauma and this reflects off of Salinger and becomes a part of who Holden is. Holden Caulfield is a clear reflection of JD Salinger. In the novel, The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger, Holden Caulfield, is a troubled teenage boy. In both the article and the novel, Holden is a clear reflection of J.D. Salinger because of both his actions and overall behavior, which is what makes both of them very similar. In the article, the author expresses Salinger’s dislike for school and how he also drops out of his school and is shipped off to a military

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Holden would similarly be denied the freedom to be a “slacker”. He wouldn’t be able to be “the only dumb one in the family” (Salinger 23), he couldn’t just wander through life aimlessly from school to school. He’d have to study hard or drop out in order to help

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The postwar setting in J. D. Salinger The Catcher in the Rye influenced the main character Holden Caulfield feelings of disillusionment during a time when conformity left many postwar adults fearing communism in a growing postwar economy. The novel illustrates the main characters’ experiences from the time he is expelled from boarding school over a period of three days. Upon his premature departure from the school, due to a fight with his roommate, Holden makes his way to New York City, where he meets various people in hopes of gaining a form of acceptance and understanding from them to help his troubles (Kirkwood 29). As a result, his needs are deprived, as Holden feels he does not fit anywhere; believing that all the people around him are

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J.D Salinger’s, The Catcher in the Rye, follows the main character, Holden Caulfield, and his experiences that lead him to be talking to a mental therapist. Told through Holden’s eyes, his profane and blunt explanations of major moments in his life allow readers to see that Holden is not crazy but is actually struggling with transitioning from child to adult. Throughout the story, he fondly remembers his early childhood and is trying the best he can to run from adulthood. He fears that he, like so many around him, may become phony when he becomes an adult. This fear drives his actions and gives him a feeling of hatred toward phony adults and a feeling of obligation to shield children from the harsh adult world.

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In The Catcher in the Rye, J.D. Salinger illustrates how children mature through their exposure to trauma. Salinger uses character interactions to show the effects of a child's mindset when experiencing childhood trauma. Holden experiments with many different illegal activities including drugs and alcohol, which connects back to his childhood home experience. Holden grew up in a very intense childhood home situation.

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The Catcher in the Rye In the novel The Catcher in the Rye J.D Salinger writes about a teenager struggling to find his place within the existence of the reality of others. Salinger creates shocking events that lay out the foundation of the the main character Holden Caulfield’s life in the novel. Salinger uses Holden’s characteristics throughout the novel such as Holden’s stubbornness to establish a much bigger theme in the book along with many other symbols.

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In The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger, Holden Caulfield is a peculiar character portrayed as a skeptic living in “a world of phonies” in circa 1950. These personality traits can be seen through his doubts of society as well as his way of thinking and acting toward others. He also demonstrates a lack of responsibility adding to his role as a slacker. Holden flunks out of school repeatedly and has no desire to confront his parents. He mopes around the city for days, delaying the inevitable punishments he’s sure to get.

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Jennifer Schuessler writes it as the character of Holden is supposed to be relatable, but “we don’t really speak this way or talk about these things,” (Schuessler, 6). Schuessler is right in this, since teens really are no longer going to bars, and I know that 66 years is a huge time gap. But the topics that Salinger hit are hard to convey into modern day society without getting a book that seems over dramatic and is seen as a stereotypical teen romance novel. If you look over the decades old phrases, you are able to get to the deeper meaning of coming of age in a society that leaves you feeling lonely and wants you to conform to a certain

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Salinger: Holden Caulfield is a character with intricate layers of personality and experience. Within the novel, Holden mirrors the complexities of my own life and struggles, creating a sense of identification and resonance between his story and my own. I hold the novel close to me not only because it was my main success, but because of the comfort I

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Rejected Truth: the psychoanalysis of Holden Caulfield The novel The Catcher in the Rye, written by J.D. Salinger, follows the life of Holden Caulfield as he recounts the events and circumstances that led him into being admitted into a mental institution. After being expelled from his preparatory school, Holden embarks on a hiatus from reality to relieve built up stress. Over the course of a few days, Holden’s solitude allows him to reflect and ponder on life, eventually resulting in his psyche becoming even more distressed. As the novel offers vast insight into Holden’s troubled mind one is able to psychoanalyze him with ease.

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The Catcher in the Rye Thematic Essay Imagine living a lonesome life, full of fear and little hope of better days to come. Imagine the toll this would take on a person’s life and how they develop as a person. For Holden Caulfield, the main character of J.D Salinger’s classic The Catcher in the Rye this, is his reality. Holden is a sixteen year old troubled boy suffering through major mental issues and living a rather a depressing life for a teenager. Throughout the novel he goes through many hardships that only worsen his depression making him feel hatred towards his seemingly hellish world.

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1181 Words | 5 Pages

In the novel, “The Catcher in the Rye,” Salinger addressed several issues. Most importantly that of youth innocence in which his main character, Holden Caulfield faces this realization that youth is not permanent and instead of acknowledging that adulthood scares him, he invents a fantasy that adulthood is a world of superficial and full of hypocrisy, while childhood is a world of innocence, curiosity, and honesty. Salinger expresses Holden’s belief with using a significant amount of symbolism using objects, places, and interpreted symbolic meaning such as death. Did you know that Holden Caulfield was originally first introduced in another book by J.D. Salinger? Holden’s character was introduced in the story “Slight Rebellion.”

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His military career was short, only serving from 1942-44. He found himself at Utah Beach in France during the Normandy Invasion to be apart of the action at the Battle of the Bulge. During this time Salinger continued to write and began creating a new novel whose main character was a deeply unsatisfied young man named Holden Caulfield. Leaving the war Salinger was faced with some trauma. He was hospitalized after suffering nervous breakdowns.

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As students analyze The Catcher in the Rye, they gain insight into the cultural environment at the time when it was written. J.D. Salinger was a soldier in WWII that saw some of the most combat, most notably fighting at the Battle of the Bulge, invading Utah Beach on D-Day, and liberating prisoners at Dachau. As a young man, Salinger saw the destructiveness of adult society. However, Salinger did not return from combat and write about war, he wrote about an adolescent wandering around New York City for a few days trying to cope with the “phoniness” of the adult world. Near the beginning of the novel, Holden states, “The one side of my head- the right side – if filled with millions of grey hairs…

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From the outset, I have to say that “The Catcher in the Rye” by J.D. Salinger has been one of the most important and influential pieces of literature I have ever read. At its core, the book is a superb coming of age novel which discusses several extremely powerful themes such as the difficulties of growing up, teenage angst and alienation and the superficiality, hypocrisy and pretension of the adult world. These themes resonated deeply with me and were portrayed excellently through the use of powerful symbolism and the creation of highly relatable and likable characters. One such character is Holden Caulfield whom the story both revolves around and is narrated by.

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“Then I lit another cigarette… I must’ve smoked about three cartons that day” (161). Catcher in the rye book by J.D Salinger is about a teenager named Holden Caulfield and is based on Holden failing college (Pencey) and having a rough time living around New York City until his parents find out that he failed at his fourth college. This book is written from the perspective of J.D Salinger and counters many issues regarding adolescence such as freedom and responsibility that Holden can’t handle leading to nervousness and depression. This is shown through topics such as drug usage, smoking, drinking, prostitution and J.D Salinger’s meaning to Catcher in the rye though it contradicts with the idea that he is nice towards Phoebe (Holden’s younger

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