Before I went to Istanbul I said I was going to start a new series of pieces called ‘Something Different’. It obviously wasn’t the best time to try something new as I got distracted by travels, but I’m going to back into it. After a reflection I’ve decided to change the name as well – and get going with ‘weekend reads’ – something lighter and different for the weekend.
For this Sunday evening, I’m going to get going with a review of J.D. Salinger’s Catcher in the Rye.
I came into Catcher in a Rye with quite a bit of scepticism. My mother-in-law lent me the book, with a warning that it certainly did deserve the label of ‘classic’. She wanted me to see if I agreed. After finishing it however, I have taken a different perspective. Catcher in the Rye is a fascinating study of human behaviour, and one that is certainly worth reading.
For those who don’t know the piece, Catcher in the Rye is told through the lens of Holden Caulfield. Caulfield is in fact not just the main character, but basically the only character. Caulfield tells the story largely as a flashback, only returning to the present every now and then to reflect on what happened. The story covers the three or four days after he has been kicked out of prep school in Pennsylvania. With his parents expecting him home a few days, Caulfield decides he doesn’t want to shock them with his expulsion, so spends his time wandering through New York.
In doing so The Catcher in the Rye is not one of those books with a classic beginning, middle and end structure. In many ways it reminds me of On the Road by Jack Kerouc, an ongoing story where nothing really happens, but a lot happens at the same time (although I think this is much better than One the Road – a book I have never managed to finish). In doing so, Salinger paints a picture of a character going through the depths of alienation, depression, anxiety and helplessness. Caulfield is self-centered and lost, a hopeless character who is still in many ways a child, but is searching for a way to become an adult.
And it is here where I can see the criticisms of the piece. The language in the piece is simple at best, frustrating at worst. And the story has no real moral to it – it is a depressing tale with in many ways no great message to come out of it.
“One of the most widespread criticisms of The Catcher in the Rye deals with the adolescence and repetitive nature of the main character, Holden Caulfield. Anne Goodman commented that in the course of such a lengthy novel, the reader would weary of a character such as Holden. Goodman wrote “Holden was not quite so sensitive and perceptive as he, and his creator, thought he was” (20). She also remarked that Holden was so completely self-centered that any other characters who wandered through the book, with the exception of Holden’s sister, Phoebe, had no authenticity at all.”
James Stern of the New York Times, criticised the language in the book, imitating it to provide a punch to his criticisms (this will give it a sense of what it is like to read the book). He said:
“That’s the way it sounds to me, Hel said (a friend of the author), and away she went with this crazy book, The Catcher in the Rye. What did I tell ya, she said the next day. This Salinger, he’s a short story guy. And he knows how to write about kids. This book, though, it’s too long. Gets kinds of monotonous. And he should have cut out a lot about these jerks and all at that crumby school. They depress me. They really do. Salinger, he’s best with real children. I mean the ones like Phoebe, his kid sister. She’s a personality. Holden and little Phoebe, Hel said, they kill me. This last part about her and this Mr. Antolini, the only guy Holden ever thought he could trust, who ever took any interest in him, and who turned out queer — that’s terrific. I swear it is”
And I can understand these criticisms completely. The language in the book takes a while to get used to, and at face-value Catcher doesn’t really seem to have a purpose, or any positivity to it. It follows Caulfield as he isolates friends, drops out of school, gets caught in a fight when he is over-charged by a sex-worker, and worst of all, ruins himself as he struggles with a complete sense of hopelessness about his life and his relationships. Completely centered on Caulfield (with a strong cameo from his sister Phoebe) the books paints a picture of a generation of youth completely isolated in their lives. The only two characters Caulfield ever really talks about in a positive light (apart from Phoebe), his brother Allie (who is dead) and a love-interest Jane Gallagher never appear in the book – friends and hope that are not achievable. You don’t really come out with a positive picture, nor really any answers to what is happening and why.
But for me, that is what makes Catcher in the Rye such a great piece. And it is understanding Salinger himself where I will build this argument. Salinger was raised in Manhattan, starting his writing career whilst he was in secondary. He published a number of short stories, before serving in World War II from 1940. It was at the end of his service that Salinger started to write Catcher in the Rye, his real breakthrough piece – a novel that catapulted a relatively unknown story-teller into an international limelight.
Salinger describes the book as ‘autobiographical’, telling a reporter decades after it’s publication; “My boyhood was very much the same as that of the boy in the book.” As Gish Jen explains:
He (Salinger) did, though, like Holden, flunk out of prep school, and he was also, like Holden, manager of his high school fencing team, in which capacity he really did, according to his daughter, Margaret, once lose the team gear en route to a meet. (this is a story told by Caulfield in the piece)
More important, Salinger seems to have shared Holden’s disaffection. Numerous youthful acquaintances remember him as sardonic, rant-prone, a loner. Margaret Salinger likewise traces the alienation in the book to him, though it does not reflect for her either her father’s innate temperament or difficult adolescence so much as his experiences of anti-Semitism and, as an adult, war.
Looking at his biography, it is easy to see the sharp connection between Caulfield and Salinger, and more importantly how it comes about. Disaffected by anti-semitism and war, as well as the realities of living in the 40s and 50s, and you can see the real life frustration that is played in the book.
What I’m trying to get here, is that whilst Catcher in the Rye is frustrating and without purpose, it does so in a way that honestly reflects a world that for so many is frustrating and without purpose. Yes, Caulfield is juvenile and self-centered, but that is simply based on a reality of a world where, in Salinger’s world, young people live feeling frustrated and feeling hopeless. And you can see how this disaffection plays out in real life. In one of the best passages of the book, Caulfield explains his desire to be a deaf-mute so he doesn’t have to interact with people:
“I figured that I could get a job at a filling station somewhere, putting gas and oil in people’s cars. I didn’t care what kind of job it was, though. Just so people didn’t know me and I didn’t know anybody. I thought what I’d do was, I’d pretend I was one of those deaf-mutes. That way I wouldn’t have to have any goddam stupid useless conversation with anybody. If anybody wanted to tell me something, they’d have to write it on a piece of paper and shove it over to me. They’d get bored as hell doing that after a while, and then I’d be through with having conversations for the rest of my life. Everybody’d think I was just a poor deaf-mute bastard and they’d leave me alone . . . I’d cook all my own food, and later on, if I wanted to get married or something, I’d meet this beautiful girl that was also a deaf-mute and we’d getmarried. She’d come and live in my cabin with me, and if she wanted to say anything to me, she’d have to write it on a piece of paper, like everybody else”
Whilst never becoming deaf-mute status, you can see Caulfield’s desired life played out in Salinger. After the success of Catcher in Rye Salinger effectively became a recluse. Unable, or unwilling to deal with the exposure and attention, Salinger wrote little after Catcher in the Rye and lived his life trying to avoid attention.
And it is here where you can see the real picture of Caulfield, and Salinger. This is not just a picture of self-centered kid who has flunked out of prep-school, but a picture of a young man who struggles to engage with life. As an autobiography, Salinger doesn’t just paint a picture of himself, he paints a picture of a struggle – one that many of us face. A struggle to interact, a struggle to survive, and a struggle to find purpose. Of course, for Salinger, a famous author, this struggle takes a different sort of turn, but the realities of Caulfield’s life can relate to so many.
Yes, the book doesn’t end anywhere. There is no climax. It is depressing. But in doing so it is far more honest than many other books I read. And that is where its genius lies.