The more i read The Catcher In The Rye, the more i am finding Holden a very troubled individual. I have two parts that i found very weird in the first reading.
"...I tried to sock him, with all my might, right smack in the toothbrush, so it would split his goddam throat open."
"That's a wrestling hold, in case you don't know, where you get the other guy around the neck and choke him to death, if you feel like it."
I chose both of these scenes because they both are about killing another person and in Holden's case, Stradlater. I also chose these because i think that this might be a sign of foreshadowing to what might happen later in the book.
My question after reading this book is, Why does Holden think so violently with other people?
I would love to have some responses to my question.
Personally I think that Holden’s anger is one of the stereotypes about teens that the author decided to use to help make Holden more believable. Parents often complain that teenagers are often angry and many teens fight with their friends and parents quite a lot. I don’t think that it is such a quantum leap from screaming and thinking mean things to actually taking a swing at someone to try and accomplish it. Most people don’t put their violent thoughts into action. However, being impulsive seems to be one of Holden’s other “quirks” so to speak so I don’t think it is ridiculous that common teen angst combined with that impulsiveness would lead to violence.
ReplyDeleteWhen people get angry, I think most have violent thoughts like that. But, Holden went one step farther and tried to do it. :\ Kinda creepy, and it's probably foreshadowing like you said. I've been waiting for the past hundred-something pages for Holden to snap and actually DO something horrible. Ugh.
ReplyDeleteIt also might have something to do about Allie. Holden doesn't seem very stable most of the time, so his little brother's death may have shook him up and left him with loads of negativity.