What Are The Differences Between Catcher In The Rye And Huckleberry Finn

“I’d say to him,’Allie, don't let me disappear. Allie, don't let me disappear. Allie, don't let me disappear. Please, Allie.’ And then when I'd reach the other side of the street without disappearing, I'd thank him”. (Salinger 258). In Catcher in the Rye, by J.D Salinger, Holden Caulfield, the main protagonist, experiences many deaths throughout his journey. One of these deaths being Allie Caulfield, Holden’s long lost brother. Allie dies of leukemia in the year of 1946, at the age of eleven. As Holden progresses throughout the book, the reader comes to understand that Allie’s death begins to degrade Holden, to the point where he wants to remain in his childhood years.

Throughout Catcher in the Rye by Salinger, the protagonist, Holden, is greatly influenced by the lost of his brother, Allie, who has a mystic presence throughout the novel. Even without Allie’s presences, he was still able to affect the action as well as the development of Holden’s life. To a greater extent, Allie indirectly affects Holden’s behavior and life for that he is associated with the concept of Holden’s darkness as well as opening up Holden’s perspective to hope and innocence.

In the novel, Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger, Holden, the main character, is in a mental hospital where he is telling the story of how he got there. Holden starts his story around the time where he gets kicked out of his school, Pencey Prep. Holden, who has gotten kicked out of two schools including Pencey has to face his parents who do not know that he got kicked out of Pency yet. Up to now, Holden has had a rough life between his brother Allie dying of cancer and having to go to multiple different schools. On the other hand, Holden cares about very few things.

In the novel, The Catcher in the Rye, the protagonist, Holden Caulfield, is introduced as an extremely perplexed boy. The relationship that he holds with his parents is unstable. At many points in the novel, Holden refers the fact that he has a rocky relationship with his parents. He has been kicked out of many private schools he has attended. In the novel, he attends and lives at a school named Pencey. Holden is kicked out for having failed in some of his classes. His instability begins at this point when the reader learns that he doesn’t want to return home to his parents because he knows the fury that will rage from his parents. He has lived a misguided life by attending private schools. Instead of having parents, he has had professors guide him. Holden’s strange personality helps prove the authors assertion that he is mentally instable. Holden’s narration is very scattered. He sometimes interrupts his own conversations by going off on tangent subjects.

This demonstrates the recklessness of youth theme, as Holden does not think farther ahead into the future, but chooses to live in the present and deal with the consequences of his actions later. In addition, his actions show that Allie’s death had a serious impact on his mental health, as his parents were going to have him psychoanalyzed. Allie’s death was the Cataracts from Heaven archetype, because it destroyed Holden’s Golden Age and changed his world completely. This also leads to many other problems for Holden as he struggles with his mental and emotional problems while navigating his way to adulthood. As the book progresses, so does Holden’s mental issues. He begins to think illogically and imagines terrifying things happening to him. Not only does his actions reflect his issues, but a close look at his thoughts also confirm his growing insanity. When Holden was walking, he notes, “Every time I came to the end of a road I get the feeling that I’d never get to the other side of the street… Then I started doing something else. Every time I’d get to the end of a block I’d make believe I was talking to my brother Allie. I’d say to him, ‘Allie, don’t let me disappear. Allie, don’t let me disappear. Allie,

Holden Caulfield, the main character of J.D. Salinger's "The Catcher in the Rye," undergoes an intense journey marked by encounters with various people and experiences that shape his perspective and ultimately lead to his admittance to a rest home. Among the influences on Holden, the most significant are his family, his struggles with mental health, his interactions with Phoebe, and his disillusionment with societal expectations. Firstly, Holden's family dynamics significantly impact his mental state and decision-making. The loss of his younger brother, Allie, to leukemia deeply affects him, leaving him with feelings of grief and isolation. Holden's relationship with his younger sister, Phoebe, serves as a catalyst for his realization of the

Along with the notion that the death of a loved one can affect a person’s relationship with themselves, is the idea that the death could also affect a person’s relationships with others. Throughout The Catcher in the Rye we can see that Holden is isolated from everyone else in the novel, yet before Allie’s death Holden appears to have had a normal childhood. Holden recalls playing checkers with Jane (Salinger 31) and going golfing (38), but after Allie’s death he seems to begin to pull away from society. Holden was very close to his brother, so it was probably difficult for him to continue with his normal life when nothing was the same anymore, even feeling wrong to continue living and having fun while Allie is gone and unable do these things

Throughout the novel of Catcher in the Rye, Holden Caulfield is on his own psychological journey. This journey tells a lot about who Holden is as a person and the problems he is dealing with. It all starts when Holden has flunked out of Pencey Prep. His psychological struggles are triggered by the traumatic event of his brother, Allie, dying 4 years prior. The death of Allie has affected Holden in all aspects of his life, including friends, school, actions, and thoughts. This causes concern in Holden’s parents. They are concerned with his health and well-being, therefore send Holden to a rehab center. His parents fear that Holden may have Post - Traumatic Stress Disorder, and have him psychoanalyzed. So, Holden struggles with post-traumatic stress disorder because he shows the causes, symptoms, and effects of the chronic disorder.

One of the hardest parts of life is accepting the loss of a well-loved family member or friend. Although death happens in the span of only a few moments, the ghost of the memories linger long after the loss. In The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger, Holden lost his younger brother Allie to leukemia when he was only thirteen. The rest of the novel details Holden’s travels through New York City before checking into a hospital for his mental health. Allie died years prior, but much of Holden's mindset as a sixteen year- old is drawn from his brother's death.

Hope 's, failures, accomplishments, joy, excitement, and sadness are all feelings that Holden experiences through the novel. Feelings aid in the dictation of how we live our lives. The feelings may seem insurmountable at one point in time are actually temporary in the bigger picture. This perspective is something that Holden lacks through the course of the novel. After leaving boarding school Holden feels like his life is over he is unable to see that life could change. After Allie died Holden felt like his life was over without his brother he was lost and alone. After he felt like the people around him gave up, he felt like his life was over he had no support. Again and again, Holden 's feelings kept pointing in a negative direction. This struggle is what ultimately directs Holden 's actions and emotions. Holden is naive to the reality that emotions are like a rollercoaster there are great highs and great lows. However, at the end of the day the rollercoaster ride will finish. The underlying theme is to never give up on any of them through the highs and lows of life. You will always have things that hold you back, but at the end of the day success only comes when you are able to conquer those challenges. Catcher in the Rye is a story about a young boy who is lost in the world and has faced his fair share of challenges in his life. After getting kicked out of a boarding school and pretending to be an adult. He finds himself lost and without hope.

In J.D Salinger’s novel, The Catcher in the Rye and Mark Twain’s Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, it can be inferred that the main characters of Holden Caulfield and Huckleberry Finn are shells of what an adult should be like while preserving their innocence which is a topic both authors struggled with. Twain and Salinger told their novels through a teenage boys which made their books controversial since the author’s were adult talking about adult issues which you wouldn’t expect a teenager to express during the time periods in which they were written in. For example, the theme of depression is displayed in Salinger’s novel which during his time period, was considered an “adult disease” but not only did Salinger write about depression, he wrote

during his quest on the river. In the end, Jim is captured and Huck decides to

The way Allie had died had definitely changed the way Holden looks at life. Allie was just an innocent child who happened to get leukemia. He was such a good kid and was so undeserving of it. So now, Holden has a pessimistic outlook on life. He is very cynical and sees the worst in everything. He hates the world for what happened to Allie. So in turn, this is what gives the story a mood of pessimism. Holden is against growing up and hates the adult world for the lack of childhood innocence. There is a scene where Holden says that he wants to be a catcher in the rye, to save playing kids from falling off the edge of a cliff. What he is really saying, is that he wants to be able to save kids from growing up, from becoming just like every other adult. Allie dying as a child brings out a theme of importance of protecting

Being a teenager is hard. There are even many struggles that a person has to face throughout their adolescent years such as dating, getting good grades, and keeping a good relationship with friends and family. For Holden, the protagonist in The Catcher in the Rye, going through the traditional high school’s struggles wasn’t easy. In addition to all the ‘normal’ challenges that every teenager has, Holden also had depression. Depression cast a dark shadow that followed Holden all throughout the story. Despite all of this, Holden made his life difficult for himself by doing things such as unfairly judging people, telling numerous lies and having a pessimistic attitude. Holden’s life, and the lives of the people around him could have been much simpler if he tried using these traits in a positive way. Instead Holden’s life was unnecessarily complicated, as he forced challenges onto himself from the way he behaved.

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain and The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger are arguably two of the most popular American novels. Both novels have withstood the test of time through their timeless themes and relatable characters. Their protagonists, Huckleberry Finn and Holden Caulfield, are memorable and unique with their own distinctive personality traits. Due to each characters originality, it is interesting to note the similarities and differences between them.