The Struggle In Richard D. Salinger's Black Boy

People start off as children and get to enjoy themselves in their carefree childhoods. However, life is not all rainbows and sunshine. As these people mature into adults, they will confront difficulties in their lives. Such struggles in life can influence the coming-of-age processes by exposing the people to the harsh realities of the world. Such harsh realities and difficulties range from the death of a loved one to poverty and racism. The people who are exposed to the harsh realities of the world may be able to learn to cope with them. Life’s struggles can alter people’s perspective of the world since the knowledge acquired from the obstacles in life may cause them to reconsider their ideas and beliefs or motivate them to take action. For Richard Wright in Black Boy, life’s struggles involved racism, violence, and poverty. Richard, as an African-American, confronted racism on a daily basis. The white people that Richard encountered often behave

Instead, Holden had to confront and cope with the loss of Allie, his younger brother, and the loss of his innocence as he became an adult. The loss of a loved one certainly would certain prove traumatic for most people, including Holden, as evidenced by the fact that he “broke all the goddam windows [in the garage] with [his] fist.” (Salinger 39) What’s significant about Allie’s death is that Holden never fully recovered from Allie’s death. While Holden did carry Allie’s baseball bat as a memory, he remained depressed throughout the book. Another important obstacle that Holden had to confront is the loss of innocence. Holden doesn’t want to experience the unpleasantness of the world and wanted to retain the carefree nature of his childhood. He also wanted to act as someone who would protect other children’s innocence. However, by the end of the book, Holden learned that he needed to let children take risks and that he cannot escape from the adult