Holden Caulfield is an adolescent male. He is sixteen years old, and is very pessimistic. He is tall and scrawny. Holden’s hair is graying at his young age which he wears in a crew cut. Holden is constantly shows symptoms of depression such as poor appetite, a pessimistic outlook, and physical headaches. He is very malnourished as he skips many meals. He claims his poor diet is a byproduct of his lack of money. Additionally, Holden has a very negative outlook on life which may be a side-effect of depression. This may be associated with his brother dieing. Thirdly, Holden may be suffering from migraines because of his depression. Holden can be seen around New York suffering from migraines and even feeling
The purpose of my essay is to explore how different social backgrounds and the social norms that follow affect the personality of two fictive characters and encourage them to break out of their station to find an identity. The protagonists Holden Caulfield in J.D. Salinger’s novel The Catcher in the Rye and Tambudzai in Tsitsi Dangarembga’s novel Nervous Conditions are both victims of social norms. Therefore, the foundation of this essay was to analyze the character’s social background, which has influenced their personalities, behavior and aspirations, and consequently their opposing actions against society. Holden Caulfield is an American adolescent during the period after the Second World War.
Both Holden Caulfield from J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye and Huckleberry Finn from Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn are the main protagonists of their respective texts. Both Caulfield and Huck undertake a journey in their text, in which the character learns from their experiences and meet new people, who alter their outlook on life. Both these characters are still not mature, and this is shown throughout the two books, but the boys have to mature soon, as they are becoming adults.
“I like to be somewhere at least where you can see a few girls around once in a while, even if they’re only scratching their arms or blowing their noses or even just giggling or something” (3). The narrator, Holden Caulfield, describes an aspect of his character through this confession. Obviously, he is interested in girls and desires them at all times. During the 1950s when this novel was published, having such desires would not have been approved of by the parents of the time due to the increasing social pressures of society. A majority of these adults would have considered Caulfield a terrible role model and would not have wanted the youth to read about him wanting to look at girls.
Holden represents the typical teenager. He demands his independence and refuses to view himself as anything but invincible. In his mind, he has life figured out and everyone around him is simply stupid. He fails out of multiple schools and cannot manage to find friends because he is looking for his environment to cater to him. He does not want to put in the time or effort required to succeed.
Holden’s younger brother, Allie, died of leukemia when he was eleven years old and Holden was thirteen years old. Another tragic thing that Holden had to face was the suicide of one of his classmates by jumping out of a window. This impacted Holden’s character in a major way, from not being able to trust people because they were “phonies'' to having a mental breakdown in the park. Major events that lead me to believe that he was not okay mentally are when he punched all the windows out of the garage, he imagines he sees Allie, he fantasizes about committing suicide, made a rash decision to go live in the west as a deaf/mute, and gets drunk many, many times. All of these instances show Holden has a lot of grief in his life.
Family isolation can cause depression and sadness for a teenager. In the novel Catcher in the Rye, the author makes the reader follow the main character, Holden Caulfield around New York. Holden has just gotten kicked out of another school and decides to go around New York without telling his parents. Over the course of his journey, he tries to find himself and where he is going in life. He starts to go downhill as is past starts to haunt him and he starts to think about the future.
22659 Mrs. Murawski American Lit Honors - Period 2 Sunday, December 14th, 2015 Influences of unreliability and reliability There is always that one friend that can never tell a story straight, There’s always loopholes, missing pieces and biases within the stories. These people are unreliable narrators. The unreliable narrators that we encounter day to day are ones that can’t be trusted. In The Catcher in the Rye, Holden Caulfield has many influences that make him unreliable narrator throughout his journey in the story such as his profanity, his immaturity and the way he speaks the readers. To begin, Holden Caulfield in the story uses many different ways to express his feeling to us specifically in profanity.
As many readers read “Catcher In The Rye” many will agree that Holden exemplifies depression, feelings of worthless and lack of sleep. Although shows the symptoms of bipolar disorder: feeling confident, lack of concentration, switching on topics and a desire for sex. Holden Caulfield is an adolescent who shows various symptoms of sickness. Through the book he shows symptoms of bipolar disorder and depression: sleep disorder, feeling worthless, and no care which are all aspects of both. But one symptom that only bipolar disorder has, is the feeling of confidence, which isn't an aspect of depression.
He describes his won suicidal thoughts. The second of many emotions Holden goes through is depression. “I can’t stand that stuff. It drives me crazy.
Holden is depressed, but instead of expressing himself, he hides from it by attempting to act casual. Almost the entire time Holden spends in New York City avoiding his family, is a part of the depression stage. Holden becomes uncontrollably drunk multiple times, and hallucinates at other times. He recalls “getting drunk as a bastard… I started that stupid business with the bullet in my guts again…I was concealing the fact that I was wounded sonuvabitch” (Salinger 150).
These problems he is having are not normal and should be addressed immediately. I think that this advanced stage of depressions may have been worsened by his parents. Holden undoubtedly believes that he was abandoned by his parents by them sending him to boarding schools instead of bringing him home to confront his actually problems. Also the separation of him form the rest of his family for the most part has made him miss his brother more which has worsened his
Throughout the story we see Holden that suffers from a lot of illnesses like Post traumatic stress disorder, detachment, agitation, depression, denial, acceptance, sleep deprivation, and loneliness. Post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a disorder characterized by failure to recover after experiencing or witnessing a terrifying event. I believe Holden was diagnosed with this disorder after the death of his younger brother Allie. Like any other human being losing a younger sibling is a life changing event especially the way Holden lost his brother. After Holden found out his brother died he was so angry that he punched the windows out of his old summer home and broke his hand.
Factors that led me to this diagnosis are Holdens constant state of depression, the loss of his brother, and him expressing both feelings of loneliness and suicidal thoughts. Numerous times throughout The Catcher in the Rye Holden displays both depressive and suicidal thoughts such as “What I really felt like though was commiting suicide. I felt like jumping out the window” (Salinger 136) and “Please. I’m lonesome as hell. No kidding.
Although Holden is a very intelligent character he finds the hypocrisy and ugliness in the world around him and quickly associates it with the adult world. Holden is a very introverted character who hesitates throughout the book to share information about his life . J.D Salinger makes sure to portray Holden that way to
Throughout the novel, The Catcher in the Rye, Holden Caulfield is a deep character that shows(possesses) many personality traits. His character is what connects many readers to him and helps in understanding him. Some character traits Holden possesses are that he is generous, kindhearted, usually honest, very intelligent, makes quick judgements, speaks his mind, is anxious about change, and likes kids. Considering his many character traits, it is easy for the reader to understand and relate to Holden. There are many character traits that I share with him.