To avoid unwanted pressure of growing up, in J.D. Salinger’s “The Catcher in the Rye” and P.J. Hogan’s “Peter Pan,” the main characters Holden Caulfield and Peter Pan identify and evade their main source of stress, their parents. In Salinger’s “The Catcher in the Rye,” Holden Caulfield struggles to move on with his life, he stops trying and drops out of the schooling that his parents put him in. His parents hoped for him to succeed and would be disappointed to find out that he had not met their expectations. Because of this, Holden avoids his parents and the unwanted pressure, he's not ready to grow up and decides to stay in New York City for a while, and to give his parents the chance to process the bad news. “I decided I'd take a room in a hotel in New York – some very inexpensive hotel and all – and just take it easy until Wednesday. Then, on Wednesday, I'd go home all rested up and feeling swell. I figured my parents probably wouldn't get old Thurmer’s letter saying I’d been given the ax till maybe Tuesday or Wednesday. I didn’t want to go home or anything till they got it and thoroughly digested it and all” (Salinger 51). Holden is not ready to face the pressure his parents will put on him after finding out he dropped out of school, he knows they will be disappointed and fed up with his behavior for it is not the first time he has done this. Holden respects his …show more content…
They are unable to be mature, stay away from unwanted pressure, and have small understanding of what the adult world really is. The transition into adulthood is rough, harder for some more than others, and is the biggest leap that you must take in life. Both Holden Caulfield and Peter Pan proved to be unready for the tasks in front of them, they are unprepared to take on responsibilities and become grown up
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
When we grow up we’re raised to do our best and to be mature. People know their right from wrongs. Throughout the novel The Catcher in the Rye by, J.D. Salinger the main character goes through a difficult life and time growing up. Growing up too fast is not the answer for everything. The main character Holden Caulfield is a misfit because he is very dramatic, he avoids facing things, and he shows reckless behavior.
J. D. Salinger’s Catcher in the Rye features a complex narrative surrounding a troubled young student, Holden Caulfield. Difficulties he faces throughout the story force Holden to confront his fears of adulthood and maturation and the responsibilities therein through the difficulties he faces throughout the story. Academic controversy surrounds whether Holden learns from these confrontations and adjust accordingly, maturing throughout the story. While initially this seems rather subjective, a thorough analysis of Holden’s actions throughout the story as well as of the symbolism injected by Salinger makes it quite clear that Holden does undergo a significant maturity arc as the story progresses. Holden’s social development and maturation
It is a natural tendency for all men and women to dream but sometimes these dreams may be unattainable. In J.D Salinger’s Catcher in the Rye, Holden Caulfield has a desire to preserve the innocence of children and save them from adulthood. He is a victim of the “Peter Pan Syndrome,” a condition that aspires to remain young. The experiences that Holden has had leads him to believe that the adult world is dangerous, full of phonies and perverts.
JD. Salinger’s 1951 book, The Catcher in the Rye, shows us how society treated their confused and changing teenagers during their transition into adulthood. The book’s main character Holden Caulfield is being pressured into growing up even though he doesn’t feel ready, to lead an adult life. He is still struggling socially and mourning for his deceased brother whose death turned Holden upside down and into a negative, hopeless person from a young age, which causes him to be distracted, indifferent and to flunk every school he goes to.
In J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher In The Rye, Holden Caulfield, a seventeen-year-old boy, transitions from childhood to adulthood. The death of Holden’s little brother signifies the beginning his loss of innocence and growth of maturity. As he enters adulthood, Holden views society differently from his peers by characterizing most of his peers and adults he meets as “phonies.” Thus, Holden takes the impossible challenge of preserving the innocence in children because he wants to prevent children from experiencing the corruption in society. The Catcher In The Rye embodies Holden’s struggle to preserve the innocence of children and reveals the inevitability of and the necessity of encountering the harsh realities of life.
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 is also described as a ‘young rebel’, who refuses to accept not only what his parents believe but also what they provide to him. He is the ugly duckling of the family, incapable and unwilling to take advantage of the opportunities his parents have bestowed upon him. He fails to meet their expectations and is shunted off to be cared for by others. His parents continue to live their New York socialite life, while Holden is enrolled, and expelled from one expensive private boarding school after another. The theme of parental neglect and insensitivity to the true needs of their children is prominent throughout Salinger’s novel and stems greatly from an increased focus in America upon material consumerism. The years following WWII were ones
In The Catcher in the Rye, by J.D. Salinger, readers are introduced to a highly annoying, highly depressed and troublesome soul by the name of Holden Caulfield. Holden is narrating his expulsion from the high-class boarding school, Pencey Prep School for Boys and the events that follow soon after, also the small memories he holds inside of him that mold him into the person he is at the end of the novel. When Holden leaves Pencey Prep. behind and goes off to New York, he takes on the challenge of sex, depression, loneliness and his own impulsiveness. Holden’s past trauma and the tragic incidents around him, are affecting his romantic relationships and are pushing people away from him and leaving him more depressed. Whether it be his relationship
The resistance of maturity and adulthood is greatly expressed throughout the novel The Catcher in the Rye. J.D. Salinger describes the events of an adolescent and his inability to escape the difficulties of his past causing a delay in maturity. Both fear and trauma created during past events caused a delay or rejection in maturity. Holden is unable to move on from his past and is constantly trying to live in a memory. This causes him to want to stay with his childhood and resist transitioning into adulthood. Holden’s fear of adulthood causes him isolate himself from society in order to preserve and protect his childhood innocence. Lastly, Holden’s inability step out of his immaturity
Lies, failure, depression, and loneliness are only some of the aspects that Holden Caulfield goes through in the novel The Catcher in the Rye written by J.D. Salinger. Salinger reflects Holden’s character through his own childhood experiences. Salinger admitted in a 1953 interview that "My boyhood was very much the same as that of the boy in the book.… [I]t was a great relief telling people about it” (Wikipedia). Thus, the book is somewhat the life story of J.D. Salinger as a reckless seventeen-year-old who lives in New York City and goes through awful hardships after his expulsion and departure from an elite prep school. Holden, the protagonist in this novel, is created as a depressed, cynical, and isolated character and he
Holden Caulfield, the main protagonist in J.D. Salinger 's The Catcher in the Rye, illustrates the endless struggle of becoming an adult, without actually growing up. Psychoanalytical theory provides a closer lense into the character development of sixteen year Holden Caulfield, a six foot two grey haired child who’s afraid to grow up and face the problems of an inevitable reality. There’s many factors that contribute to Holden’s perplex personality including the absence of his parents, the death of his younger brother and the fact that he has to cope all this while simultaneously migrating from school to school . The ramifications of living under such
Holden Caulfield is a very, very troubled young boy in a grown up filled world. In J.D. Salinger’s novel, The Catcher In The Rye, 16 year old Holden Caulfield is stuck in a rut. He has been expelled from numerous schools, including his current one, Pencey Prep. Holden has been a troubled kid since the death of his older brother, Allie. Allie has played a big role in Holden’s life, and was completely traumatized by his death. Along with those family struggles relating to Allie’s death, Holden has a hard time accepting his adulthood. He wrestles with mental illness and growing up with all of those “phonies”. Even more so, he struggles with the idea of the person he is going to grow into. The environment of The
J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye presents a look into the mind of Holden Caulfield, a popular literary icon numerous teenagers have rightfully found themselves relating to at some point. While the familiar emotions of Holden were welcoming for me, his anecdotes and witty remarks proved entertaining as well. The story chronicles Holden’s exploration through New York post-expulsion, with his point of view influenced by his growing alienation with the world. He represents that growing sense of unease at growing up and facing a reality that is not always pretty, and, in his case, a need to save children from having to face that reality. I personally admired the fact that he was not just an angry teenager in the world as stereotypes suggest.
In J.D. Salinger's Catcher in the Rye, a young man named Holden Caulfield is on the edge of adulthood. He is a bright kid but struggles with many mental diseases mainly because of the passing of his brother Allie. This has caused him to not focus on school and has got him kicked out of many schools. He did not have many friends and he did not like many people. He thought of everyone as phony. Holden does not want to confront adulthood in fear of losing his childhood because of the fear of change, conformity to the phony world and the passing of his younger brother Allie.