J.D. Salinger, in his novel The Catcher in the Rye, uses a variety of word and expressions to show the tone. The Tone in the novel is demonstrated as bitter and very cynical. First, the reader is introduced to holden. They see his actions and get a peek into his thinking. His character is quite harsh, he trust no one and he believes everyone but himself is a phony. He points out the bad attributes in everyone and everything. In chapter one of the novel when talking about himself he says "If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you'll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me... my parents...They're nice and all--I'm not saying that--but …show more content…
Though there is some verbal irony and situational irony present as well, the dramatic irony overshadows them. Dramatic irony is used in almost every chapter of the novel. In several moments in the book, Holden claims that everyone is a phony, whereas the readers can easily tell that Holden is the real phony. The audience can mostly tell that by seeing Holden is hypocritical of almost everything. Holden states that he is the “The most terrific liar you ever saw in your life. It's awful. If I'm on my way to the store to buy a magazine, even, and somebody asks me where I'm going, I'm liable to say I'm going to the opera” (Salinger 16). This shows how fake and similar he is to, if not more fake than those he often criticizes. Revealing that Holden Caulfield as a hypocrite though he is repulsed by such fakeness, but in reality is no better than those he ridicules for being someone other than who he assumes them to be. Likewise, Holden cannot stand how unreal and artificial movies are, and as a result loathes them, however, he ends up attending them anyway. An example of verbal irony in the book can be seen when holden says “I'm the one that's flunking out of the goddam place, and you're asking me to write you a goddam composition”(Salinger 28) This is verbal irony because what holden is trying to say is he is the one failing for not being smart enough yet Stradlater is asking him to write a composition. He is basically …show more content…
The novel is written in past tense. Holden is recounting what led up to a certain moment. The entire book is presented by holden caulfield, the protagonist, and every detail is told from his perspective. How he view things and people. The reader sees his outlook on life and his innate anger towards almost everyone and everything. Holden's view of the world around him is subjective and his whole narration can be seen as him warping reality because he can't get past his anger and complex. The purpose of the first person point of view is to get the audience to relate to the book. Salinger wants the audience to know how Holden is feeling in each situation, how he views his life and most important how he views those around him and why. The world as perceived through his experiences is what readers, especially young readers, identify with. The audience are able to identify with holden and his struggles. They understand the struggles of school and failing and just not ever being good enough. Holden goes through all the issues that most teenagers go through but in the end he is able to show that there is hope. For example toward the end of the book he says " I got pretty soaking wet, especially my neck and my pants….I didn't care though, I felt so damn happy all of a sudden" (Salinger 213). This is one of the most important lines in the book because from here the audience sees a little change in holden's
By portraying phoniness through Holden’s character, Salinger shows that Holden’s expectations for who is phony and who is not are not reasonable because Holden fails to meet the expectations
J.D. Salinger uses varying diction and syntax in “The Catcher in the Rye” to create mood and tone throughout the novel. The specific choice of words (diction) that the author uses contributes to the characterization of Holden Caulfield. The use of profane and jargon-like word choice encapsulates the voice of the teenage narrator Holden. Holden’s informal diction emphasizes his immaturity and allows the reader to learn more about Holden’s character. Holden often uses the word “and” in a repetitive manner which gives the reader a child-like impression of Holden.
Throughout the novel, J.D. Salinger uses slang as a method of style to not only show the time period when this book was written, but also the intelligence of Holden and his accompanying characters. In chapter two, Holden’s slang is especially evident when describing Mr. Spencer and the way he lives his everyday life. This chapter also depicts Holden’s feelings about Mr. Spencer and shows that Mr. Spencer is the only known father figure around Holden at this time and Holden just continues to disappoint and push Mr. Spencer further away. The author uses this passage and passages like it to further develop the characterization of Holden and show how he views the world and its inhabitants. This style is evident in the paragraph “They each had
The Catcher in the Rye Salinger gave the tone of the book humorous so that the book can be more relatable to teenagers in society. He talks about how Holden is lonely and he’s lost like every other teenager but he more like he doesn’t see from the real world. He is judgmental, he judges everything he sees and knows. Salinger writes this book to let us know what some teenagers go through and how people stay strong no matter what. He’s wanting us to know how teenagers are all different and they go through different things and they act a certain way because of what they’re going through.
Salinger vs. Caulfield: An Analysis When I was a freshman in highschool, I decided to read The Catcher in the Rye for an outside reading assignment for my english class. Initially, I picked the book because I read that the main character had a little sister named Phoebe. I ordered a copy online and I fell in love with the revolutionary coming-of-age novel. I've done an assignment over the book at least once every year throughout my high school career.
I know it.” and “I said” to all dialogue. This shows us that the character Holden wrote his story about himself, giving us his personal reflection of a certain period in time. The running commentary of his every spoken word and rhetorical thoughts are voiced throughout the novel. Effectively J.D. Salinger has created him as an extremely poor narrator because his train of thought is always erratic, and he is always repeating himself.
As the story goes on Holden meets new people and he gets a taste of what the real world is. Holden is a struggling boy that has many problems, but he likes to run away from them instead of facing them. His home life wasn't really there, because he got cast out of three schools prior to his expulsion from Pency. The main idea of the book is growing up, but it's ironic that Holden did not grow up at all. Holden would run and hide from all of his problems.
Holden’s Struggle To Find Himself: Throughout the novel, The Catcher In The Rye, by J.D. Salinger, Holden struggles to find himself and who he truly is in order to be happy. His struggles relate to many things that he does or say in particular. Holden lacks with a social status with women and his family, whether it’s a relationship or being antisocial. Throughout The Catcher in the Rye, Holden Caulfield experiences the complexities and struggles involved with both physical and emotional relationships.
Introduction Catcher in the Rye by J.D Salinger published in 1951 is a fictional story of a boy named Holden Caulfield who is suspended from his high school for bad grades. Written in the first person narrative through the voice of Caulfield, the narration brilliantly brings out the isolation and alienation that many teenagers feel. The novel has had a huge influence on modern society and on popular culture. It has been associated with many shootings such as that of John Lennon and the attempted assassination of former U.S. president Ronald Reagan.
In the novel, Catcher in the Rye, the protagonist Holden is forced to face with the reality of growing up though he is trying to hold on to his innocence of childhood. Salinger uses many rhetorical strategies to reveal how Holden deals with being faced with the adult word. Whenever Holden is verbally confronted with not facing his adult problems he always denies it, he gets very defensive in his words. “ Yes I do.
He thinks of it as a very phony and painful world. Salinger sends the message that growing up is very painful and phony and that the young should be saved from this complex aspect of life. Growing up is a very complex idea. Not everyone wants to go through it’s process, especially Holden. He resists the process of maturity and fears change.
Holden 's life issue is his need to be, “The Catcher in the Rye”, his life lesson is how he overcomes it. At the end of the novel Holden comes to the understanding that everyone grows up. At the end of the book Holden accepts that he doesn 't need to be little kids protectors and that Phoebe wants to grow up and be an adult. Even though he didn 't grow to his full potential at the end of the novel his progression is made apparent by the quote “Don’t tell anybody anything. If you do, you start missing everybody” (Salinger 214).
As the book starts Holden describes his childhood and how he has been kicked out of several school and once more again from his currently school, giving a sense of irresponsibility and no care in the world. Holden later on mentioned slowly the loss of his brother due to leukemia and how he reacted outrageously by breaking the windows of his garage home. As a reader one would view that behavior as abnormal, but Peter Shaw descried it as a normal behavior for a fictional character in the 1950s and by mentioning that Holden, “is presenting in a somewhat different manner than are the sentimentalized young people in other novels if his period” (par. 3), admitting that Holden was somewhat of an outcast of a character even for its time he is still considered normal. Shaw also challenged the reader’s view of Holden by emphasizing that Holden is not a real person, but a fiction character developed in the 1950s and in fact a mad psychological character is normal and made the reading rather more interesting and acceptable during that time. As readers someone may come across as understanding Holden’s behavior due to a loss and everyone mourns differently and as Shaw said, “ the one period of life in which abnormal behavior is common rather than exceptional” (par.
The Catcher in the Rye In the novel The Catcher in the Rye J.D Salinger writes about a teenager struggling to find his place within the existence of the reality of others. Salinger creates shocking events that lay out the foundation of the the main character Holden Caulfield’s life in the novel. Salinger uses Holden’s characteristics throughout the novel such as Holden’s stubbornness to establish a much bigger theme in the book along with many other symbols.
Jennifer Schuessler writes it as the character of Holden is supposed to be relatable, but “we don’t really speak this way or talk about these things,” (Schuessler, 6). Schuessler is right in this, since teens really are no longer going to bars, and I know that 66 years is a huge time gap. But the topics that Salinger hit are hard to convey into modern day society without getting a book that seems over dramatic and is seen as a stereotypical teen romance novel. If you look over the decades old phrases, you are able to get to the deeper meaning of coming of age in a society that leaves you feeling lonely and wants you to conform to a certain