Catcher in the rye

hey, so anyway this is what we are reading in my gcse english class and i was wondering if any of you guys have some abstract/interesting interperetations of Salingers book. I know some of the cliche ones like Holdens attachment to innocence and childhood because he ceased to emotionally mature after the death of his brother allie and all that stuff. i was just wondering if any of you guys had some wierd ones which i could impress my teacher with (woop woop) ??

 

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yeah Summation of the book: poor black people in the South suffered and were beaten by evil evil evil white males, whereas some white females helped these black folks by educating them.

And thats the full summary...everything else is just drama.

 

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The poet Theodore Roethke once pointed out that adolescence is an "ill-defined dying, a longing for another place and time, another condition." Without realizing it, he has described precisely what makes Holden tick and why he is perhaps the one literary character who can successfully compete with film, music videos, computer games and the assorted junk that teen-agers encounter when they go "mailing."

When we last see Holden, he is resting up from his "madman" week end in Manhattan. Things do not look especially encouraging, but at least a part of Holden is willing to "apply himself" as his parents shop around for yet another prep school. Given the realities of college admissions, then and now, one suspects that Holden will land a seat in some college classroom. After all, money speaks very loudly in such matters, and Holden's parents are loaded.

But Antollini, the only teacher Holden remembers with any fondness, has other worries about Holden's future. He can imagine him, at the age of 30, sitting in some bar "hating everybody who comes in looking as if he might have played football in college." Or he wonders if Holden will pick up just enough education "to hate people who say, 'It's a secret between he and I.'" Finally, he can envision Holden in some business office, "throwing paper clips at the nearest stenographer." Not very attractive possibilities, to be sure, but entirely consistent with the priggish, pain-in-the-rear aspect of Holden.

And more.......

http://www.dogpile.com/info.dogpl/c....com/p/articles/mi_m1571/is_13_17/ai_72328687

 

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Well, it seems to be the book favored by 3 out of four serial killers.

 

i think you have wrong book

 

yeah...it seems...

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ooopsy doopsy

 

Holden was a huge pussy who couldn't handle real life because he was raised by wussy, upper middle class biatches and never had to work. Also, Salinger's characterizations are trite and the book is really boring.

 

And there we have it. Safe to say that all the genuine teenage rebels are out drinking vodka and waving knives at each other - not sitting at home reading schoolbooks.

 

There's rebellion and there's nihilistic self-destruction.
Society eventually incorporates all rebels, anyway.

 

Pah. What's rebellion without a bit of nihilistic self-destruction. If you're only 'rebelling' because you want the keys to the car then get out of my face, I want blood.

Socety only incorporates those rebels who get greedy and take the devil's dollar, or who get too old and weak and pathetic to fight any more. On one level. On the other, rebels are all part of society from the off - assuming that they haven't gone off to live in a tree - so they're all completely wasting their time and mine anyway, in that sense.

 

This novel is one of the most over rated pieces of 'doo doo' foisted upon teens in high school. I'm a prolific reader but this book had me YAWNING and gnashing my adolescent teeth. Why does the education system tryso desperately to turn kids off of reading? The only other novel rivaling it for mind numbing tedium is 'the Great Gatsby'....good god....please tell me kids aren't still tortured by this piece of melodomatic crap.

Americans are lucky that unlike Canadians and Brits they werent subject to Dicken's 'Great Expectations': 'Gee, of all of his novels, which one is the least interesting..oh, yes..Great Expectations...let's have them read that one!'...YAWN.

We did, however, get to study some great novels in High School:
On the Beach, 1984, Animal Farm, the time Machine, Funeral in Berlin, White Fang, Brave New world, Catch 22, Kidnapped, Captains Corageous...

 

And the ones who don't get old and greedy and weak and pathetic generally are the ones who burn out young.
So it goes.

 

The scene at the museum summarizes the whole of Catcher in the Rye.

Trivia time!

Q: Can you recite the very beginning of Twain's Adventures of Huckleberry Finn?​

Once you answer that question, apply said answer to Catcher in the Rye.

 

I found it to be boring as well. It just seems like a book you're 'supposed' to read, so everyone does. The Outsiders was better.

 

oh yes now I remember, the Catcher In the Rye:

here is my summary: lazy ass boy runs away from school, lies to everyone, acts like he is a retard, goes to NY (or was it NY?)...becomes a bum, gets drunk, gets into sex deal, and finally draws his sister to moral collapse with him.

 

You've captured the essence!

Same with movies. Look at most lists of 'greatest movies' and what's the top or in the top 3? ..always 'Citizen Caine'...it was 'OK' ... there are a thousand worse movies but also a thousand better movies.

 

I think it's a brilliant novel, though I tend to enjoy some of Salinger's short stories more.

 

I thinkthats slightly harsh. Havuing recently finished readint it I will agree that the basic plot / storyline is hardly very stimulating. I think the ideas that come with this book and the tools Salinger uses to demonstrate his views fascinating.

 

I thought Catcher in the Rye was a bit of a bore, and Holden a bit too self-absorbed and loopy to be interesting, but i loved The Great Gatsby. Not for the story which was meh, but I thought it was great prose.

"This is a valley of ashes—a fantastic farm where ashes grow like wheat into ridges and hills and grotesque gardens; where ashes take the forms of houses and chimneys and rising smoke and, finally, with a transcendent effort, of men who move dimly and already crumbling through the powdery air."

"With a reluctant backward glance the well-disciplined child held to her nurse’s hand and was pulled out the door, just as Tom came back, preceding four gin rickeys that clicked full of ice."

"Daisy, gleaming like silver, safe and proud above the hot struggles of the poor..."

"They were careless people, Tom and Daisy — they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness, or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made..."

Not necessarily deep thoughts, just words that flow well together.

 

Wow.

Quite the overall thrashing people seem to be giving this excellent, though admittedly often overrated novel.

I must say I have to agree with cosmictraveler's position here:

And this is particularly insightful...

... which is exactly why I like to think of Holden as the 'early years' version of Ellis' Patrick Bateman.

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