Holden Dialectical Journal

Much later in the book, Holden meets up with an old friend, Carl Luce, to catch up on each other’s lives. Holden attempts to talk with him about sex because it’s the only thing they did talk about when they both went to Whooton, which Holden flunked out of a few years back. Holden tries to connect with Luce by talking about their sex lives and how Holden wants it to be like anything Luce is talking about, but he ends up disappointing Luce into the expectation that he has grown. He reminds him of what Holden needed last time they saw each other, and Holden remembers: “‘You mean go to a psychoanalyst and all?’ I said … ‘What would he do to me? I mean that would he do to me?’ ‘He wouldn’t do a goddam thing to you He’d simply talk to you, and you’d talk to him, for God’s sake. For one thing, he’d help recognize the patterns of your mind.’ … Old Luce. He was strictly a pain in the ass …” (Salinger 192-193). Holden once again shows a lack of wanting to accept and listen to people who are trying to give him advice. He doesn’t want to go to a psychoanalyst and be told what is wrong with him because he cannot accept the painful truth that he is not able to grow up and change how he is, which Luce did do. When Holden says to himself “He was strictly a pain in the ass”, he shows that he doesn’t care what Luce had to say to help Holden. He only cared about staying the way he is and

The thought had entered his mind out of the blue, it was unwelcome at first, frowned upon, but it had burgeoned, bloomed into something detrimental. Ogden Hall was a kind natured and senile man, if it hadn’t been for that one idea that slithered its way past his cranium and poisoned his brain, like a serpent searching for its last supper and finally striking. He knew it wasn’t right, hell, he hated that he was obsessed with something so destructive and cruel, but he couldn’t help himself. He needed to do it, desperately.

Do people ever like to be lonely? Depressed? Feeling like no one cares or likes them? According to www.dascot.org one out of every four people struggle with depression. Not having friends can cause and lead to depression. All human beings are disconnected and they need to work at relating to others. Jim Stark from “Rebel Without a Cause” and Holden Caulfield from the The Catcher in the Rye are teenagers who struggle with connecting themselves to human beings.

Holden loves all the small things about Jane, however, his memories are too idealistic and slightly immature, I think he fails to realize that people grow up.

His infatuation with girls is portrayed before the date begins, as after describing how they looked, Holden states how it “was really nice sightseeing, if you know what I mean. In a way, it was sort of depressing, too, because you kept wondering what the hell would happen to all of them” (123). Not only can Holden’s obsession with girls be seen, as well as his overall mindset when it comes to how he feels about them, claiming how it was enjoyable seeing them but it also caused him to feel depressed. Later when Sally walks in, Holden expresses that he “felt like marrying her the minute [he] saw her,” although he “didn’t even like her much,” Holden is conflicted and decides that “all of a sudden, [he] felt like [he] was in love with her and wanted to marry her” (124).

Holden and Jane were good friends and Holden liked her undoubtedly. However, they are out of touch with each other now since Holden moved away.

However, he admits that while the couple’s actions are “crumby” (Salinger 81) and crude, he is still aroused and “wouldn’t mind” (Salinger 81) doing it, especially to a girl he is attracted to. While Holden wants to preserve his innocence by not thinking about sex at all, he agrees that he is a “sex maniac” (Salinger 81), and is a fiend about losing his virginity. Holden even goes as far as to make rules for himself. On page 82, he recounts, “I made a rule that I was going to quit horsing around with girls that, deep down, gave me a pain in the ass. I broke it, though, the same week I made it-the same night, as a matter of fact” (Salinger). He is slowly losing his innocence, and while he hates to admit it, Holden’s constant thoughts about sexuality is a sign of adulthood. To him, one should only have sex with someone they truly love. Holden is almost proud of himself for having such a morally correct view of sex. This is why he is so riled when he discovers that Stradlater had sex with Jane Gallagher. Holden realized that Jane barely knew Stradlater and felt that he, if anyone, should be dating Jane. His increasing thoughts on sexuality and loss of a conventional or shielded view of sex show that his loss of innocence is apparent.

Many of Holden's experiences parallel the experiences of teenagers today, showing how the people of the 20th century have grown and affected us, a century later. For example, most teens will help others with an assignment if someone needs help, this parallels Holden helping Stradlater with an assignment, " 'Are ya gonna write that composition for me?' [...] 'I will' " (29). In the 21th century, dealing with different "clicks" is something all teenagers have to deal with. There are the popular kids and the kids who think they are big shots, and are better than the rest of the student body. Holden's experience with both Stradlater and Ernest Morrow parallel these experiences of modern teenagers, "You take a very handsome guy, or a guy that thinks he's a real hot- shot, and they're always asking you to do them a favor," (27) " 'He's one of the most popular boys at Pencey," (56). But, Holden also has positive experiences that are similar to modern teenagers. Having feelings for someone else and going out on dates encompasses a bulk of both Holden's and today's teenage experiences. Between Jane Gallagher always being on his mind and his double dating experiences with Stradlater, Holden's experiences are very similar to teenagers today, "I got old Jane Gallagher on the brain again,"

Jane was on Holden’s mind so often it became a danger for

Though we never meet Jane Gallagher, she still plays a prominent role in The Catcher in the Rye. While Holden's relationship with her exists mainly in his head as he reminisces about their childhood, his memory of her is significant and his thoughts keep coming back to her. When Stradlater first mentions Jane, Holden “near[ly] [drops] dead,” admitting he “was pretty excited” (Salinger 31). Then when he finds out about Stradlater’s date plan, Holden suddenly grows protective. It’s likely Holden still sees her as the young girl from his memories as he recalls how “She used to practice [ballet]” and “play checkers with [him] all the time” (31). He doesn't stop to think about how she might've changed, and grown. Maybe he doesn't want to. Holden's

Jane starts the novel as a young, innocent character that Holden associates with his childhood. Jane is symbolic of Holden's innocence and past memories. Although she started as a real person, Jane slowly becomes a figment of his imagination as time goes on. Holden imagines Jane throughout the novel, but never meets up with her in real life, using details like the way she played checkers and the type of dog she owned to keep her concrete in his mind. Since the death of Allie, Holden has lacked a significant relationship in his life, and attempts to bridge that gap with a fantasy by maintaining an imaginary version of someone

In one particular scene, Stradlater, Holden’s roommate from Pensey asked Holden to write a composition for him for his English class. Holden had selected to write about his late brother’s baseball glove. A picture-perfect song for this particular scene would be “See You Again” by Wiz Khalifa (Ft. Charlie Puth). The tempo and melody would be played softly in the background as he thought of his little brother. In the bridge of the song is sung “So let the light guide your way, yeah, hold every memory as you go” and that is exactly what Holden does. Holden is trying to hold on to every memory of his brother, Allie. “See You Again” would definitely set the tone of how we feel about Holden during the story also. Holden longs for a time where he

J.D Salinger used a lot of flashbacks and foreshadowing in The Catcher in the Rye. There were a lot of flashbacks in the story but I am only going to talk about the events that made Holden depressed. In one of the flashbacks, Holden recalls the death of one of his former classmate James Castle who jumped off the window to escape some bullies. I think this is the reason why he is disgusted by the

Jane now is as close to an explanation as Holden can devise for his hesitation, his real problem is that Jane represents for him an ease of communication that he no longer feels with anyone.

It is known that a flashback technique means that the author starts at the end of the story and then looks back as to how the character got to that end point. In this novel Holden informs us as the readers that he is at some place not to his liking. We can assume that it is a home or hostel establishment of some sort. He gives us the setting and what his current situation is. The flashback technique begins here. This is where the story is told of how the character got to where he is. It gives us all the information we need to understand his situation. This is a successful technique in a novel as it keeps the reader intrigued as they want to know how, why and when. It also allows the reader to try and guess what is to come before they are told. This can assist in making reading more enjoyable. In result this encourages the reader to finish the novel.