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Holden's Attitude To Saying Goodbye To Pencey Prep

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Holden’s attitude to saying goodbye to Pencey Prep At the start of the book Holden says: Chapter 1:“What I was really hanging around for, I was trying to feel some kind of a good-by. I mean I've left schools and places I didn't even know I was leaving them. I hate that. I don't care if it's a sad good-by or a bad good-by, but when I leave a place I like to know I'm leaving it. If you don't, you feel even worse.” (Salinger 2010: 4) Holden is angry and disappointed with the people around him, but even with this feeling of anger and disappointment towards these people, he wants a good bye from these people. Deep down he wants to know that people acknowledges him, that they care enough to say good bye at least. It would make him feel better if people would at least say good bye to him, whether it is a sad or happy goodbye, any would do. Even though Holden made a mess of his time at Pencey Prep, failing classes, angered his friends from the fencing club, and was asked to leave the school, he does have a few fond memories. Chapter 1: “I suddenly remembered his time, in around October, that I and Robert Tichener and Paul Campbell were chucking a football around, in front of the academic buildings. They were nice guys, especially Tichener. It was just before dinner ant it was getting pretty dark …show more content…

Throughout the book, he does not want to make any real grown-up decisions or set any goals for himself. He shows a lack of ambition and motivation and therefore is a constant failure at school. He refuses to associate himself with mature ways of living, and this is all because Holden his hanging onto the picture-perfect image he has of his childhood where he could be careless and free. He sees this particular period of his life as the only good thing that has happened to him so far in his life. He wants to hold on to it for as long as he can. Holden feels that moving into adulthood would taint and ruin his childhood

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