What's so great about The Catcher In The Rye?

[Craigboy2]

I just finished reading that book (out of free will) and it didn't seem that great. I mean I think the only part that was atleast somewhat good was Mr. Antolini's speech. But the story seems to have holes in it. It seems like a diary and it seemed like the author didn't feel like clearing up a lot of the story. And at first I thought I had found some metaphors but then it turns out it was really nothing. What do you think?

[Pop]

Well, it's going to be a GnR song on their new album. So it has to be good, right?

 

Right?

[Laozi]

So you're asking us why you didn't like it?

Edited January 7, 2007 by Laozi

[Pidesco]

What's most interesting to me about Catcher In The Rye, is that the narrator is so damn unreliable and as such you never really know whether he's actually telling the truth both about himself and about the people around him. Mostly because he seems to not have a clue about anything while at the same feeling absolutely sure about everything.

 

In case you haven't gotten it yet, the book is all about Holden being a teenager.

[Sand]

Its a good book. Not the best mind you. I enjoyed Kafka's Metamorphosis more.

[Tale]

I enjoyed Achebe's Things Fall Apart.

 

The thing about Catcher in the Rye is that there's a giant government conspiracy behind it. troof

[Dark Moth]

Meh, haven't read it. I'd be willing to bet it's a lot better than The Left Hand of Darkness, though.

[Sand]

Haven't read that one.

[Hurlshort]

The unreliable narrator is a difficult literary technique, and "The Catcher in the Rye" is bar none the most famous example of its use. In my opinion, the book captures the delicate mental state of a teenage boy quite well and has resonated with enough people to sell about 300,000 copies a year. That's an incredible feat that is only bested by the Bible.

 

The ending really sums it up for me, but not everyone sees it the same way.

He ends up in a mental institution. During that time in history, it was common enough for wealthy families to pack any disturbing member off to the loony bin. It's a tragic end for a character that is simply misunderstood.

 

[blue]

It's great because it moves me. Uniquely. It's as simple as that.

 

The narrative is unreliable, and that's all very interesting, but for me the technique is scaffolding to a story about love and loss. The style works because it helps depict the complex ways in which one kid deals with his confusion and grief.

 

I'm not talking about figurative loss. There's that too--that clumsy "loss of innocence" stuff teachers love to preach about. I mean death. It poses the central question in all of Salinger's novels: how do we deal with it? How do we mourn -- especially the loss of a family member? How do we make sense of senseless suicides or (in this case) the death of a child?

 

For me, the story of Holden trying to cope with the death of his brother ranks as one of the most honest pieces of fiction I've read. Holden's reverence for Allie is intimate and profound.

 

How can you not be moved by this?

 

I'm not too crazy about describing rooms and houses anyway. So what I did, I wrote about my brother Allie's baseball mitt. It was a very descriptive subject. It really was. My brother Allie had this left-handed fielder's mitt. He was left-handed. The thing that was descriptive about it, though, was that he had poems written all over the fingers and the pocket and everywhere. In green ink. He wrote them on it so that he'd have something to read when he was in the field and nobody was up at bat. He's dead now. He got leukemia and died when we were up in Maine, on July 18, 1946. You'd have liked him. He was two years younger than I was, but he was about fifty times as intelligent. He was terrifically intelligent. His teachers were always writing letters to my mother, telling her what a pleasure it was having a boy like Allie in their class. And they weren't just shooting the crap. They really meant it. But it wasn't just that he was the most intelligent member in the family. He was also the nicest, in lots of ways. He never got mad at anybody. People with red hair are supposed to get mad very easily, but Allie never did, and he had very red hair. I'll tell you what kind of red hair he had. I started playing golf when I was only ten years old. I remember once, the summer I was around twelve, teeing off and all, and having a hunch that if I turned around all of a sudden, I'd see Allie. So I did, and sure enough, he was sitting on his bike outside the fence--there was this fence that went all around the course--and he was sitting there, about a hundred and fifty yards behind me, watching me tee off. That's the kind of red hair he had. God, he was a nice kid, though. He used to laugh so hard at something he thought of at the dinner table that he just about fell off his chair. I was only thirteen, and they were going to have me psychoanalyzed and all, because I broke all the windows in the garage. I don't blame them. I really don't. I slept in the garage the night he died, and I broke all the goddam windows with my fist, just for the hell of it. I even tried to break all the windows on the station wagon we had that summer, but my hand was already broken and everything by that time, and I couldn't do it. It was a very stupid thing to do, I'll admit, but I hardly didn't even know I was doing it, and you didn't know Allie. My hand still hurts me once in a while when it rains and all, and I can't make a real fist any more--not a tight one, I mean--but outside of that I don't care much. I mean I'm not going to be a goddam surgeon or a violinist or anything anyway.

 

 

When the weather's nice, my parents go out quite frequently and stick a bunch of flowers on old Allie's grave. I went with them a couple of times, but I cut it out. In the first place, I certainly don't enjoy seeing him in that crazy cemetery. Surrounded by dead guys and tombstones and all. It wasn't too bad when the sun was out, but twice--twice--we were there when it started to rain. It was awful. It rained on his lousy tombstone, and it rained on the grass on his stomach. It rained all over the place. All the visitors that were visiting the cemetery started running like hell over to their cars. That's what nearly drove me crazy. All the visitors could get in their cars and turn on their radios and all and then go someplace nice for dinner--everybody except Allie. I couldn't stand it. I know it's only his body and all that's in the cemetery, and his soul's in Heaven and all that crap, but I couldn't stand it anyway. I just wish he wasn't there. You didn't know him. If you'd known him, you'd know what I mean. It's not too bad when the sun's out, but the sun only comes out when it feels like coming out.

[Hurlshort]

Excellent passages, I think I'll go find my copy when I get home from work.

[thepixiesrock]

Mel Gibson had to buy the book everytime he saw a book store in that one movie. You know, Conspiracy Theory.

[Laozi]

That's because the guy who shot John Lennon supposively read it over and over I guess

[Hurlshort]

And the guy who shot Reagan had it as well.

[DeathScepter]

OMG IT IS AN CONPICASY THEORY

 

 

 

 

That is creepy

[kirottu]

OMG IT IS AN CONPICASY THEORY

 

 

 

 

That is creepy

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Constipation theory?

[OLD SKOOL WHEELMAN]

OMG IT IS AN CONPICASY THEORY

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

That you're mentally retarded?

[Musopticon?]

It's a prime example of white angst.

[Pop]

What's Black angst? NWA?

[Baley]

Tupac.

[Dark_Raven]

The book is evil. It killed John Lennon.

[metadigital]

Yep, reading is evil.

[kumquatq3]

Yep, reading is evil.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Well, if you used this forum as part of the argument a case could be made...

[Volourn]

Oh SNAPIO!

[metadigital]

Yep, reading is evil.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Well, if you used this forum as part of the argument a case could be made...

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Well, writing is okay: few people here actually read other people's writing, so it should be acceptable. "