Holden Caulfield Research Papers

The whole book is set as a flashback of Holden's past year. When he starts narrating the story, he mentions that he got "pretty run-down and had to come out here and take it easy". This says that Holden has had a tough year, with a breakdown, he is in some kind of place where he's taking it easy. His previous diction/word choice gives us hints that he might actually be in a mental hospital(words like madman). He describes the place as 'crumby' and also says that his brother, D.B., visits him every weekend. And, at the very end of the book, last chapter (26), Holden says, "...this one psychoanalyst guy they have here, keeps asking me if I'm going to apply myself when I go back to school next September." 'Psychoanalysis' is, according to FreeDictionary, " The method of

Holden’s immaturity causes him many problems throughout the story. Although he is physically mature, he acts more like a child. “All of a sudden I

He hides under a visage of a cool ‘bad boy’ trope, seeing the world through a heavy filter- to him, anyone who's anyone is a phony, a liar, or just plain bad, despite him judging many things he later goes on to do himself. Over the course of the book we come to see Holden has built an opinion of the world that shields him from the pains and complexities of life. The author displays Holden’s traits quite prominently, especially through his use of language; he writes as Holden speaks- vulgar, rambling, and easily derailed, jumping from idea to idea infinitely

During the novel Holden lies to cover up his real feelings or as an excuse to not tell the truth. In Chapter 3 Holden says, “I’m the most terrific liar…” he continues by saying how frequently he lies to get himself out of trouble (Salinger, 2010:17). After Holden is expelled he decides to leave Pency and life it up for three days in New York because he cannot stay longer. Holden cannot go home sooner because he’s not feel like telling the truth to his parents (Salinger, 2010: 54). Holden choses to do the wrong thing because it is easier than to stay at Pency till Wednesday or to face his parents. Holden is contradictory he says, “I’m quite illiterate but I read a lot.” (Salinger, 2010:19). One cannot be illiterate if you read a lot. Holden is even more contradictory when he speaks of Allie in heaven but admitted that he is an atheist (Salinger, 2010:107). It is clear that Holden’s words and actions are contradictory when he says that the movies are phony but attends the movies a few times during the three days (Salinger, 2010:30).Holden’s character is riddled with dishonesty, wrong choices, and contradictions and true to an

All of us have issues, but when it comes to Holden Caulfield, he is on a different level of problems. Throughout Catcher in the Rye, Holden shows signs of many different mental health issues. For example things like depression, bipolar disorder, PTSD, etc. These disorders are not uncommon; symptoms include mood swings, fast talking, abuse of rules, and deceitfulness. Holden shows us many signs of a mental disorder, but which one?

He had remembered his body at the bottom and how bloody and broken he had been. "You never saw such gore in your life....It partly scared me and it partly fascinated me." Chapter 6, pp. 45-46 The only time he eery remembered having a conversation with him was when the kid had asked him if he could borrow Holden’s red sweater. This is one of Holden’s most traumatic event that has ever happened to him. Which seem to be involved in his chronic trauma. Seemed like after this event instead of being kicked out like all of his other schools he had actually left the school. Which may be because of James that kid that had been killed and Holden may have thought to himself that that could have been him. "Don't ever tell anybody anything. If you do, you start missing everybody." Chapter 25, pg.

Holden starts his story from a mental hospital. “Im not going to tell you my whole goddamn autobiography or anything. Just this madman stuff that happened to me last christmas” says Holden. Holden is a sixteen-year-old junior who has just been expelled for academic failure from a school called Pencey Prep. After being expelled from your school every kid in america must feel pretty bad about themselves he was like all. Holden dint really fit in well with the other kids. He always though of the world as a bunch of phonies. The amount of criticism he gave the school was high class. He hated everyone except a handful of people. Holden's condition starts of alright, somewhere in the middle he hits rockbottom but fortunately by the end everything is good for him. Holden is literally about to crash. Near the beginning as well as the end of the novel, he feels that he will disappear or fall into an abyss when he steps off a curb to cross a street. Sometimes when this happens, he calls on his dead brother, Allie, for help. Part of Holden’s collapse is due to his inability to come to get over his brothers death.

Holden ignores his history teacher, who is his friend. Even though his friend consoles him and the school expels him, Holden does not care that he fails all his subjects and school. When the psychiatrist and Holden’s family ask him whether he is going to apply himself at school, he answers, “I swear it’s a stupid question… to know the truth, I don’t know what I think about it”(213-214). Regardless his family worries for his well-being, he is indifferent to failing school because he understands he will go back to school despite being expelled three times. He also does not take school seriously since he does not feel in control to make the decision to go back to school.

Holden never going to Allie’s funeral gives us insight into why Holden is still holding onto Allie. After Allie’s death, Holden still went through experiences that caused his BPD, neglect and separation. During the time following Allie’s death, Holden’s family was in great grieving, making Holden feel isolated and not getting the attention he needed to fully grow mentally as a child (“National Allegiance on Mental Health”). Holden also expresses twice, that his mother is still grieving over Allie’s death by stating his mother, “still isn’t over my brother Allie yet” (Salinger 155). Holden is also never close to anyone. He meets with his family a limited amount of time throughout the year, and is kicked out of schools, giving him no permanent guidance in his life. Holden constantly describes his expulsion as, getting “the ax” (107). He shows a continuous changing in guardians, because of his attachment to both Mr. Spencer and Mr. Antolini, both old school teachers from schools he flunked out of. He also dealt with the separation from D.B. his other brother, who moved to Hollywood, Holden seems to be very inspired by him throughout the novel, but is mad that he left (1).

“26% that felt rejected also often became agressive” (Harsh printing linked to aggressive youth behaviour). This is clearly shown through Holden life because he always had reason to believe that his life was worthless and he was not important, despite the fact that e is loved by his sister she his always happy to see him and helps him when he is in times of need. For example wens gives Holden her christmas money he begins to cry (number). His parents made him feel worthless and ashamed of who he was so he became violent. When parents are neglectful of their children the child will do everything to get attention. This involves screaming and crying and having a temper tantrum. This happened to holden after his brothers death. He goes into

[This is a vague topic sentence.] In many parts, I cannot help but feel sorry for him. Although he mentions his little sister, Phoebe a lot and she still talks to him, I feel that he still lacked that kind of emotional support and is still stuck onto the past. For example, when the talked about his late brother, Allie. Holden mentions before writing his roommate, Stradlater’s, paper, “I slept in the garage the night he died, and I broke all the goddamn windows with my fist, just for the hell of it” (Salinger 39). This shows completely that he was very heartbroken over his brother’s death but also cannot let go of his death because he is even writing the roommate’s paper over Allie’s baseball mitt. I think because of Allie’s death and Holden’s remarks about being dumb on page 67 “As a matter of fact, I’m the only dumb one in the family. My brother D.B.’s a writer and all, and my brother Allie, the one that died, I told you about, was a wizard. I’m the only really dumb one. But you ought to see old Phoebe” shows that he’s lacked emotional support to even talk about himself like

Holden seems to be a very troubled soul. The point of view has brought me in very close to Holden, because it feels like we as the reader are in his mind and thought process. This of course gives us a limited and biased perception of the people and places Holden talks about and interacts with. Despite Holden being a student that doesn’t apply himself, his success in english proves that he is more intelligent than he may be perceived. Holden walking around the campus of Pencey and having some of his memories revealed to the reader shows us that Holden has many negative feeling about the school particular the other boys at the school, claiming they are phonies. There is definitely a sense that Holden isn’t widely liked and not a huge socializer, he seems like a screw up that 's just always messing it up. Holden going up to the top of the hill and going off to say his goodbyes to Mr. Spenser gives a sliver of positivity to Holden’s time there.

In J. D Salinger’s novel “Catcher in the Rye” Salinger lets the reader view life through the eyes of our main character, Holden Caulfeild. Holden shares excerpts of his life on how he was admitted into a mental care facility and expresses himself through this journal like novel. As the reader, I wasn’t sure what to expect because the title does not match how the book begins. Immediately within the first chapter the reader experiences grief for Holden. He explains that he hasn’t always been the way he is and won’t tell about the “madman stuff” that happened to him.

be sent to him he just doesn’t think of her as a person. But, when he

Holden grows throughout the book from a somewhat immature kid to a mature, wise, grownup boy who realizes that taking care of his sister is more important than getting yelled at by his parents for getting kicked out of another school. We see lots of character traits expressed and they show up between different events that