During class on Monday, we began to discuss Catcher in the Rye. I had never read the book in high school, though I’d heard it was a great book, and was excited to finally get to do so. Fortunately, it didn’t disappoint. It certainly lived up to its reputation of being a quality coming-of-age story.

The word “archetype” was brought up in class. Archetypes are like categories of characters that are commonly seen throughout literature, like the dumb blonde or the nerdy kid. However, Holden Caulfield, the main character of Catcher in the Rye, didn’t fit into any archetypes at the time of the book’s publication. J.D. Salinger effectively created a new archetype – the antihero. Holden was the book’s protagonist, but he wasn’t exactly a hero. He dropped out of schools left and right, stayed up late drinking and going to nightclubs while trying to act more mature than his age, and making himself look stupid at times. And yet his goal was to be “the catcher in the rye.” He wanted to stop children from losing their innocence. He did things that sometimes made him hard to root for, but at the same time it was also hard to root against him.

I think that this type of character is very interesting. One antihero that I can think of off the top of my head is Severus Snape from the Harry Potter series. He constantly antagonizes Harry throughout the series, but then we find out at the end that he had been secretly on his side, watching over him, albeit for his own selfish reason – he had been in love with Harry’s mother – rather than out of love for Harry. The fact that he loved Harry’s mother throughout the years made it so hard for many fans to hate him, even after all the abuse he put Harry through.

Before it was brought up in class, I’d seen antiheroes in literature before, but didn’t necessarily know what to classify them as. Now that I know the actual term for this archetype, I’m going to want to keep an eye out for more as I read more books in the future, because I really do like these antiheroes. They aren’t a straightforward fan favorite, and yet when it comes down to it, it’s really hard to root against them.

On Monday, we began our class with a discussion of Manhattan and then later “Catcher in the Rye”. We discussed the music in the film. The music wasn’t played much, but when it was, it represented certain milestones. In the beginning, the song “Rhapsody in Blue” was used, and it showed the typical fast life of New York. Another instance where the music was played, was when Isaac and his son spent a day together.

The next half of the class was a discussion about “Catcher in the Rye”. This was my first time reading the book, and I think it was an interesting read. However, I really didn’t see the symbolism as much until I began to discuss it with my friends. I started to see why certain objects held such an importance to Holden.   For example, I had no idea that Holden’s red hunting hat was a symbol of his alienation. After carefully rereading certain pages with this idea in mind, I started to see how this was possible. It protected him, and made him feel unique. The hat is also a symbol of Holden’s attachment to childhood—it’s the kind of goofy accessory that a proper adult wouldn’t wear. I was also fascinated to learn that Holden’s fixation on the ducks is also a symbol of his struggle with change and growing up. He wants things to stay the same, but the ducks prove that one must adapt to the environment, that one has to change in order to survive. At the same time, the duck’s offer hope: though they disappear each winter, they always reappear.

Overall, i thought that this discussion was very different from what I had in high school, and I look forward to hearing everyone’s modern day version of the book.

On Monday in class we reviewed The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger.  I read this book in Freshman year of High School and I wasn’t impressed.  At that time in my life I don’t feel that I was emotionally mature enough to fully understand the message of the novel.  Four years later I was excited to revisit this novel and examine it through my eighteen year old perspective.  After rereading this book, I can officially say that The Catcher in the Rye is one of my favorite novels.  Even though my life isn’t remotely close to Holden’s, with the exception of us both living in New York, I can relate to his questions and fears about life.  When I first read The Catcher in the Rye I was fourteen years old, and in many ways I was still a child, oblivious to the suffering around me.  Now I am eighteen years old and recently I’ve been yearning for my childhood blissful ignorance.  All of a sudden I find myself in Holden’s shoes, feeling like, I’m “…disappearing every time [I cross] a road.” (Chapter 1 page 5).

It may be because I’ve been conditioned to analyze everything, particularly pieces of literature, but I had a really fun time finding all of the extended metaphors, and symbolic messages hidden throughout the novel, which I had missed when I first read it.  My favorite metaphor that I found was about the streets.  Throughout the entire book Holden keeps talking about streets and milestones and growing up.  The street, is symbolic of his entrance to adulthood.  Every time he crosses a “road” he loses some of his childhood innocence, and that scares him more than anything. When he talks about the Museum of Natural History he says that, “The best thing, though, in that museum was that everything always stayed right were it was. Nobody’d move….Nobody’d be different.  The only thing that would be different would be you.” (Chapter 16 Page 121).  The road image returns sporadically  throughout the novel, but become very prominent in the final chapters of the novel.  This is evident when Holden says, “Then I started doing something else. Every time I’d get to the end of a block I’d make believe I was talking to my brother Allie.  I’d say to him, “Allie, don’t let me disappear…Please, Allie.” And then when I ‘d reach the other side of the street without disappearing, I’d thank him. Then it would start all over again as soon as I got to the next corner.” (Chapter 25 Page 198). Holden is afraid to grow up, he’s afraid to become an adult, to know too much, to lose all of his innocence.  Beyond all of these fears, Holden is most afraid that he has already passed the point of no return, and that he has lost all of his innocence.

Another part of this book which really resonated with me this time was Holden’s relationship with Phoebe. The name Phoebe, comes from the Greek name Phoibe which means “bright and pure”, and that is exactly what she represents for Holden.  Everything in his life is dark and ominous, his outlook on life has become very jaded and depressing, but Phoebe looks at life in a pure way.  I think that it is beautiful that, it is the innocent character, the pure one, who helps Holden finally cross the street at the end of the novel.  Phoebe is fearless, “…she ran right the hell across the street, without even looking to see if there were any cars coming.” (Chapter 25 Page 208), and the interesting thing about this, is that even after Phoebe fearlessly runs across the street, Holden still holds back.  He stays on his side of the street and the two of them walk in parallel paths on opposite sides of the street.  Finally though he crosses the street with her when they are leaving the zoo, and he accepts the reality of life and time and growing up while watching Phoebe ride the carousel.  The most heart wrenching line of book for me was when Phoebe gets off of the carousel, kisses Holden and then says, “It’s raining.  It’s starting to rain.” and Holden responds, “I know.”  He accepts it, and for the first time in the novel, he’s truly happy.

So even though I’m no Holden Caulfield, I can relate to his journey…but I may still need some help welcoming the rain.

~Naomi