Grief For Allie in The Catcher In The Rye by J.D Salinger

Grief is difficult thing to have to go through alone. In “The Catcher In The Rye” Holden experiences many of the stages of grief after the loss of his brother. Holden’s journey through the seven stages of grief were shown over the course of a few days.

Holden can’t get over the loss of his brother’s death, Allie, and even blames himself partially for his death. Holen in the book says “Anyway, that’s what I wrote about Stradlater’s composition about. Old Allie's baseball mitt. ”(Salinger 39). These two quotes both explain how Holden feels on the inside and the outside.

Grief is a dominant emotional force that masses of people who suffer losses succumb to. How do people deal with grief? In 1969, the psychologist Elizabeth Kübler-Ross construed five possible stages of grief that people undergo to explain the emotions one feels during grief (Gregory). These stages, in chronological order, are denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. Kübler-Ross acknowledged that not all people experience the stages in a linear way, as well as noting that grief can be a “rollercoaster”, with a person In the novel The Catcher in the Rye, Holden Caulfield suffers the loss of his younger brother Allie to leukemia before the plot begins. This raises the question of how Holden deals with his loss. Throughout the Catcher in the Rye, Holden exhibits the characteristics of the five stages of grief.

J.D. Salinger 's "The Catcher in the Rye" portrays a troubled teen in New York City. Over the few days the novel depicts, the boy displays his critical and unhealthy mindset. Eventually he has a mental breakdown. Through psychoanalysis of Holden Caulfield, one may suggest that Allie 's death, social development, and an identity crisis are large contributing factors in Holden 's mental breakdown.

The hat makes Holden feel protected as if he does not need anyone. It is like the way a pacifier or a teddy bear works to comfort a child. Holden says, “After he left, I put on my pajamas and bathrobe and my old hunting hat, and started writing the composition” (49). Holden writes this intricate composition about his brother’s baseball mitt. He waits until his roommate leaves in order to wear the hat and it makes him feel protected. It is odd that he wears his hat inside, but it just reinforces the fact that the hat symbolizes the will to describe his emotions. He manages to write a heartfelt paper in which his brother’s memory becomes a vivid reality for him. Holden remains attached to the image of his brother. He cares about his siblings immensely and he finds a way to always carry them along with him. His red hunting hat is a representation of his brother Allie that died of leukemia in his innocence. Both of his siblings have red hair and the color of his hunting hat is red. Holden reflects that, “People with red hair are supposed to get mad very easily, but Allie never did and he had very red hair” (50). He buys this hat to remember the memories of innocence and love he shared with his brother. The hat is also a reminder that the only sibling he has left is Phoebe and she is dear to his heart because of her innocence and

When he first brought Allie up he also “wrote about […] Allie’s baseball glove.” (Pg.38) This symbolizes how Holden also wanted to hold onto innocence in a way with the glove indicating holding onto things and how he is also holding onto the past and his childhood and does not want anything to change. When he thought about the glove, he also thought of Allie and the memories that came with it. With the baseball glove which is used to catch, it also shows how he wants to save the innocence. In the book, Holden talks about what he wanted to do, which was to be the catcher in the rye and catch the children from falling off a cliff and into adulthood to save their innocence. With the glove relating to purity and saving others from corruption, this shows how Holden is trying to hold onto innocence instead of growing up.

Allie is first introduced when Holden writes an english composition for his roommate, Stradlater. Allie's old baseball mitt had poetry written all inside of it, therefore Holden decided to write the composition on it due to it's details. Holden's brother had passed away from luekimia while they were in Maine on July 18, 1946 when Holden was just

How would the death of a loved one affect you? Coming to terms is a difficult process for everyone, especially for Holden Caulfield, in The Catcher in the Rye. Holden Caulfield, 13, lost his brother, Allie, at 11 to leukemia in Maine in July 18 of 1946. Holden now 17 finds himself coming to terms to young Allie’s death, along with his own problems. After analyzing J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye, Holden Caulfield’s characterization matures and develops after acknowledging Allie’s death through reflection and this affects the plot by helping Holden come to terms with his own emotional problems.

In J. D Salinger 's novel, The Catcher in the Rye, the protagonist, Holden, goes through many hardships in his journey to self-knowledge. In the beginning, Holden has to deal with being kicked out of school and not having any place to call home. He is also struggling with the unfortunate tragedy of the death of his beloved younger brother Allie. At the same time, Holden is trying to deal with growing up and accepting the adult world. Throughout the novel Salinger addresses the conflicts faced by a young man struggling with the trials and tribulations of growing up while also confronting personal loss and loneliness along the way.

Holden remembers everything about the mitt from being left handed to the poems all over the fingers of the glove. Allie would write them on the fingers of the glove “so that he’d have something to read when he was on the field and nobody was up at bat” (38). Holden tears up the composition because he gets upset that his roommate, Stradlater, says that Holden’s writing about his brothers glove is not related to the assignment. The glove is valued by Holden because it is a constant reminder of his brother and how much Holden cared about him.

The baseball mit, Holden has from his dead brother Allie, keeps Holden tranquil. The baseball mit first appears in the story when Holden’s roommate Stradlater, asks Holden to write a composition about a room for his english class. Instead, of Holden writing about a room Holden writes about the baseball mit. He describes the poems on the glove that were wrote in

Holden’s little brother, Allie, had died and Holden is still not over his death. “I get very depressed, I keep saying to him, Holden says, “Okay. Go home and get your bike and meet me in front of Bobby’s house. Hurry up.” (Salinger, 99). There is many moments where Holden thinks of Allie, and even talks to him. Whenever Holden thinks about Allie he gets very upset and doesn’t want to do anything.

The psychoanalytic lens discusses an individual's actions based on their conscious and unconscious mind. The novel “The Catcher in the Rye”, written by J.D. Salinger, focuses on the life of a depressed protagonist, Holden Caulfield. Holden experiences the death of his young brother Allie and struggles with transition from his innocent childhood to his sophisticated adulthood. This transition eventually influences his mental state of mind, which causes him to suffer from loneliness, frustration and alienation. The novel is better understood from a psychoanalytic lens rather than an existentialism perspective because of Holden’s conscious actions and unconscious desires which are portrayed throughout the novel. The transition from an innocent

It seems as though Holden never had the chance to grieve over Allie in a proper way. He uses every opportunity he has to talk about Allie. For instance, Holden was suppose to write a essay about a descriptive room or a house, but instead he chose to write about Allie’s descriptive baseball mitt. He chose to ignore the main prompt of the essay and instead wrote about an object that was descriptive and meaningful for him. Due to Holden’s high regard for the glove, he viewed Stradlater’s little

Holden deals with his younger brother Allie’s death with both negative and positive memories. For instance, when Holden is writing Stradlater’s report for him, he chooses the main topic on Allie’s baseball mitt and even goes on about what a good person Allie was.