Similarities Between Salinger And Harper Lee 's ' The Rye '

In the book, “The Catcher in the Rye”, Holden Caulfield has many conflicts and life lessons. Throughout the story the author, J.D. Salinger, creates events that make the main character realize that in life people change and grow. The message behind the story is let children grab the “gold ring” and you can’t always be the catcher in the rye. All of the things that make Holden who he is have many resemblances to the life of the author, J.D. Salinger.

"Do not be mislead by what you see around you, or be influenced by what you see. You live a world which is a playground of illusion, full of false paths, false values and false ideals. But you are not part of that world" (Sai Baba). A world of illusion is an alluring, yet perilous place to enter. It can deceive the mind only to cause damage and distress. Holden Caulfield's life has led to. an atrophy through his struggle of conceiving illusions as reality. In J.D. Salinger's novel, "The Catcher in the Rye", Holden Caulfield battles the constant reminder of his brother, Allie's, death while he roams the streets of New York. Preceding his futile adventures, he is expelled from his fourth school, Pencey Prep. During his extent at

The Catcher in the Rye was J.D. Salinger’s first step onto the literary playing field. This commencing status left Salinger, as a serious author, unique as a sort of liberated agent, not confine to one or more schools of critics, resembling many of his contemporaries were.

He was the youngest in his family with his parents having a thriving import business. Despite his apparent intellect Salinger flunked out of school, his parents ent him to Valley Forge Military Academy. After graduating from Valley Forge his father encouraged him to head to Europe to learn another language and learn the art of the import business. Upon returning home Salinger mad another attempt at college at Ursinus College in Pennsylvania and taking night classes at Columbia University. There Salinger met Professor Whit Burnett who also happened to be the editor of Story magazine. Burnett sensed Salinger's talent for writing and pushed him to use his creativity to the very limit. His work was finally gaining attention until WWII following the attack on pearl harbor he was drafted into the military serving from 1942-’44. During his time in the military Salinger continued to write, assembling chapters for his new novel who contained a very complicated teenager afraid to grow up. After the war Salinger was checked into a hospital for trauma and suffering a nervous breakdown. Not many people are sure what happened around that time but soon after he married a woman named Sylvia their time together was short only eight months. He married again in 1995 with Claire Douglas they had two children together, Margaret and

Early in Salinger's life, he faced one the cultural illnesses widespread in the North Eastern states of America.  It was the virulent disease of anti-Semitism.  Salinger lived in New York City, where he was raised as the son of Jewish parents.  The 1920's and 1930's were a time in America when Anti-Semitism was written into the policies of many institutions.  His heritage automatically deprived him from attending the best colleges: Harvard, Yale, and Dartmouth.  He was prevented from belonging to certain social clubs, from certain professions, and from the rank of officer in the U. S. Military.

“Don’t tell people what you are thinking, or you will miss them terribly when you are away” (Salinger 214) says Holden Caulfeild as he warns the world. Salingers novel pinpoints the many fears and phobias of growing up from an immature, pessimistic, “everybody’s a goddam phony” perspective that makes it relate-able to young transitioning teenagers. Salinger's Caulfeild is afraid of growing up and the unknown prospects of entering the adult world after experiencing a life changing event. Holden, clinging to his innocence, most importantly learns how the Phony adult world not only treats people like HC poorly, but it kills them.

One of the greatest American Literature writers, J.D. Salinger, was familiar with a rough childhood by experience. He was able to parallel his experiences to the experiences of Holden Caulfield, the protagonist in The Catcher in Rye. In this novel, Holden experiences conflicts that most youth are not familiar with. The conflicts in Holden Caulfield’s life are caused by various forces and circumstances.

When J.D. Salinger went to war, he not only affected his own life, but also the life of Holden Caulfield. Similarities between Salinger and Caulfield are too numerous to write off as coincidence: both went to and flunked out of prep schools, and both had a penchant for language classes. Salinger’s life greatly impacted the plot and style of his works because Salinger used himself as inspiration for Holden, as demonstrated through “I’m Crazy”, “Slight Rebellion off Madison”, and The Catcher in the Rye.

There is little biographical information on Salinger since he insisted on preserving his life private. Salinger would mislead by giving out false information and complicating the picture, but there is some information that is accepted as true. Salinger attended a public school in Manhattan and was considered an average student. At the age of thirteen, Salinger was enrolled on a prestigious school in Manhattan but was dismissed because of his failing grades. He then was sent to the inspiration for his novel The Catcher in the Rye, Valley Forge Military Academy in Pennsylvania was the model of Pencey Prep. His first stories were published on the school yearbook of this inspirational school. Salinger then wrote a column in Ursinus Weekly at Ursinus College in Pennsylvania, in which he went only for a half semester. He enrolled to short-story classes with Whit Burnett who was the editor of Story magazine. Salinger’s first published story was “The Young Folks”, which appeared on the issue of March/April 1941 of Story. He subsequently wrote and published more stories in Collier’s, Esquire, and Story magazines before leaving to the Army in the year 1942. While on the war he wrote stories which he then published after his comeback. In 1947, Salinger signed a contract with The New Yorker. He then began to have a desire for isolation. He published his only novel by which he is so

Written in 1951, J.D. Salinger’s, The Catcher in the Rye continues to be a popular book amongst Americans. Although The Catcher in the Rye has been banned in many public school settings in the United States it continues to stay atop some of the greatest books of all time lists. Whether people are in their teens or in their fifties they find themselves drawn to Holden Caulfield. At some point in their life they could relate to a sense of alienation, caused by money and wealth. Humans are wired to be jealous and want what others have. Holden Caulfield has the opposite problem, he has money and wealth which he inherited from his hard working parents. However, he himself is not motivated to work hard, graduate prep school and earn his own wealth. Instead he despises hard working students at the many prep schools he drops out of. Holden also has a big number of family complications. An area to explore is how wealth can contribute to feelings of alienation and despair. Holden Caulfield has a complex relationship with money, not wanting to associate from it, but benefiting from it. A further look into the 1950’s may give an insight into the troubled mind of Holden Caulfield.

In the novel Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger, the protagonist Holden Caulifield views the world as an evil corrupt place where there is no peace. Holden has a phony phobia that restricts him from becoming a fully matured adult. In Holden's attempted journey in becoming a fully matured adult, he encounters many scenarios involving friendship, personal opinions, and his love of children. His journey is an unpleasant and difficult one with many lessons learned along the way; including the realization that he is powerless to change the world.

Many authors put their own life as inspiration towards their works and characters. J.D. Salinger’s character development of Holden Caulfield has been affected by Salinger’s complications in his school life, devastating past relationships, and overwhelming traumatic events during his pre-The Catcher in the Rye adulthood.

Salinger was born in New York City an attended public school until he switched to the exclusive McBurney School. In attending this school, Salinger was called an “academically unexceptional student”. After this he was sent to the Valley Forge Military Academy. During his time there he added to the literary magazine and yearbook. After this he went on to NYU for a short amount of time.

Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye has been pronounced a literary classic for its atypical portrayal of adolescence, to effectively convey the protagonist’s alienation and confusion. The introduction of The Catcher in the Rye is underpinned by disorder and confusion through a stream-of-consciousness narration, which digresses from one subject to another. Consequently, Holden’s multitudinous thoughts and feelings appear to lack a cohesive pattern. Additionally, Holden’s prevalent ascription of other students as “phony” (Salinger, p.3) alludes to his alienation and isolation as a form of self-protection; he rejects those he does not understand. Furthermore, the vocabulary encapsulates typical adolescence dialect of the 1940s, and resultantly, alienates contemporary reader. This is typified through Holden’s use of colloquial speech, in particular, his exclamation “that killed me” (Salinger, p.42) to express his amusement. Therefore, the introduction of Holden’s disjointed monologue in The Catcher in the Rye foreshadows Salinger’s unique interpretation of adolescence.

Salinger, J(erome) D(avid) (1919- ), American novelist and short story writer, known for his stories dealing with the intellectual and emotional struggles of adolescents who are alienated from the empty, materialistic world of their parents. Salinger's work is marked by a profound sense of craftsmanship, a keen ear for dialogue, and a deep awareness of the frustrations of life in America after World War II (1939-1945).