Holden Caulfield and You
The Catcher in the Rye's unique narrative style creates a connection between the reader and Holden Caulfield. The fourth wall is broken in the very first sentence of the book. The first sentence reads: "If you really want to hear about it." From the beginning, Holden is speaking directly to you. The tone of The Catcher in the Rye is very informal. Holden tells his story through swear words and sentence fragments, which was odd to see from a book written in 1951. These choices make it feel less like reading a book and more like hearing Holden tell you his story. Salinger also uses italics to indicate stressed words syllables in Holden's retelling of the book's events. When he is talking about the boarding school's reputation for turning out clear-thinking boys, he says, "They probably came to Pencey that way." The stress on the word "came" indicates Holden's disgust with the idea that boys are made more mature by going to Pencey. And, these tone indicators add to the sense that the book is a conversation with Holden, as if you can hear his voice in your head.
Catcher in the Rye encourages you to see the world from Holden's perspective. Whenever new characters are introduced, he makes little, judgmental asides to the reader that give us his views on the other characters in the story before we have the chance to judge them for ourselves. This is exemplified by the introduction of Robert Ackley, who Holden described as an unpleasant person with messed up teeth and a face full of pimples. He gives this treatment to almost all of the people we meet in the book. He tends to sort people into an "in" group and an "out" group. People like Ackley, Stradlater, and most of the folks Holden meets throughout The Catcher in the Rye are part of his "out" group. They are described as stupid, disingenuous, and conceited. Meanwhile, people like Jane, Allie, and Phoebe are included in Holden's "in" group. They are the people that he sees as smart, genuine, and thoughtful. Importantly, Holden assumes us to be a part of his "in" group, which is why he so comfortably shares his unfiltered thoughts with us. He creates an "us vs. them" dynamic where we are on one side, and the rest of the world is on the other.
As the book goes on, this connection between us and Holden makes the book increasingly tough to read. As Holden isolates himself against the world, the reader is isolated with him. This is what makes Holden's increasingly erratic and self-destructive behavior so uncomfortable to witness. The opening chapters tie us to Holden, before he spends the back half of the book threatening to jump off a cliff with us still tied to him. These stylistic choices, such as the use of the second person and the conversational tone, make the book's narrative much more impactful because they make us feel connected to Holden as he goes through this very difficult time in his life.
Throughout the book I too made the mental categories of an "in" group and an "out" group of Holden's circle. I choose to believe that we were inside the circle, but unlike Phoebe who could see through him the whole time, we were forced to see the ongoings of the book from his perspective. I didn't completely mind that we were getting Holden's recollections, but I did wonder how biased of a story we really were getting. Way to nail the analysis of the "us vs. them" dynamic.
ReplyDeleteI really like that you mentioned the way Holden seems to sort everyone in his life into an "in" group and an "out" group. I think its interesting that Holden continuously forces us into his circle. Throughout the book, he says things to the reader like, "you would hate this," reinforcing his decision that we as readers are part of his "in" group.
ReplyDeleteHey Will! I just wanted to start off by saying that the name of your actual blog site is so interesting, it really did catch my eye! I really liked your connections between how he talks about others vs the way in which he talks to us. Holden really does treat us like we agree with everything he says, and we would be doing the same in his position. Overall, your blog really pointed at that clearly. Great job, Will!
ReplyDeleteHi Will, great blog! I really enjoyed the subject you chose. I think it is interesting that the reader is treated as a part of Holden's "in" group, and, as a result, are subject to be isolated in the same way he is. Your blog raised an interesting question for me: when exactly does Holden's viewpoint start to deteriorate to the point that he becomes a completely unreliable narrator?
ReplyDeleteHello Will,
ReplyDeleteNice commentary on the use of second-person narration in The Catcher in the Rye, one of the book's most defining characteristics. I like how you pointed out some of the more negative consequences of being so close to Holden as a reader. The idea of being "trapped" in Holden's rapidly spiraling mind adds a neat little twist to the second person, since that writing style otherwise allows us to connect with Holden at a deeper level. Like you were saying, Holden's speech-style writing is another way that he connects with the reader in a deeper way. And as a side note, I have noticed that Salinger uses italics for emphasis in a way I've never seen before; he italicizes only the stressed syllable within the word rather than the whole word. I don't know if other books written around that time did the same thing, but in any case I think that's pretty interesting.
I really like how you connect these distinctive qualities of Holden's narration to the larger downward-spiral arc of the narrative--the image of the reader as "tied to" Holden as he threatens to jump off a cliff is striking and apt. At first, he might seem like a "cool" narrator to a younger reader--irreverent, fearless, confident, shooting down everything and anything around him that is even slightly annoying. There IS something oddly attractive about his posture at the start of the novel, and that has everything to do with the fact that he includes "us" in his very exclusive in-group (it's us, Jane, Allie, and Phoebe, with a provisional membership for Antolini!).
ReplyDeleteI also like that you point out Salinger's unique use of italics--I don't think this came up in class, but it's one of the most characteristic elements of his style. He doesn't use italics to emphasize the word or phrase, as in writing, but to reflect something of the TONE, the attitude behind certain statement. The trick that I'm pretty sure Salinger invented (I've never seen it in printed dialogue before his books) is the italicization of one syllable, to emphasize the sarcastic way the word would be spoken: so the word "impossible" is rendered as "imPOSSible" (Blogger doesn't let me do italics in a comment!). You can HEAR the eyeroll he inserts into the middle of certain words--"it's not PARadise or anything . . ." I like this method better than the "/s" that people insist on using to indicate sarcasm online.