<
>
Download

Hausübung
Englisch

Oberstufe rodgau

12 Punkte

Vanessa . ©
2.00

0.18 Mb
sternsternsternstern_0.5stern_0.3
ID# 3092







Catcher in the rye the childhood Holden


Holden is a sixteen-year-old boy, who is torn between childhood and adolescence.

He has a problem of giving up his childhood with all it qualities and the easy way of live, although he says on the first page of the book, that his childhood was lousy. An Explanation of that could be the loss of his little beloved brother Allie, who had died on Leukemia.

Holden always describes him as the best and nicest person he had ever known. They had a real close relationship, maybe the closest Holden ever had. Holden can’t deal with Allie’s death, he thinks it was unfair to take such a good person out of live an betray him of all the things they could have done together.

Leaving childhood would mean leaving Allie and the good times they had. He would feel like a betrayer, because, he could reach a state of live Allie was not able to reach. On the other hand I think he is afraid of becoming an adult because he doesn’t want to take responsibility for his acting.

He hasn’t mentioned that Allie would be in his heart for his whole live even if he enters adulthood. From my point of view he has a great traumata and needs professional help, which he finally gets at the end of the book, when the readers gets to know, that Holden tells the whole story while staying in a psycatric hospital after a breakdown.

He is unable to make friends or long lasting relationships to other people. Maybe we can find the cause in Allies death again. He is afraid of losing again a person he loved.

Being expelled from many schools in former times I another sign of Holden’s revolt against adulthood. As far as I’m concerned I would like to point out, that he perhaps thinks that not getting the grade means not to achieve adulthood.

Holden’s relationship to his “girlfriend” Jane was a very innocent one. They spend lots of time together, playing miniature golf or going to the cinema. They had kissed, but like Holden underlines never on mouth. He describes their time together as happy and afterglow.

Now Jane is dating Stradlater and Holden is afraid, what Stradlater could have done with her. I think Holden is afraid, that Jane has lost a part of her innocence and is now becoming an adult. If Jane would become an adult it would mean for Holden to lose her, because she would become as phony as every other adult around him.

The only person Holden is able to get along with seems to be his little ten year old sister Phoebe. She is innocent and doesn’t behave like a phony. When he watches her on the children roundabout he is happy and tears come to his eyes. That moment seems to be one of the happiest in the whole book.

On his trip he hears a boy singing the song “the catcher in the rye”. Holden likes that song and imagines he is the catcher who saves the children from falling down the cliffs. I think the cliff is an metaphor for adulthood. Holden wants to make the children stay in childhood as long as possible.

On possible reason acting like that is that he wasn’t able to save his little brother Allie. And furthermore because of his brother was unable to become an adult, because he died, Holden doesn’t want to become an adult too.

Holden thoughts are often childlike, for example when he thinks about what happens to the duck on the lake during winter, when the lake is filled with ice. But he often tries to behave like an adult with the result of failing badly. For example, when he meets the prostitute, he doesn’t have sex with her, even if sexuality seems to be often in his mind.

Having sex would mean to make a big step in the direction of an adult. That can be explained by the fact that he thinks having sex is the most important thing in an adult relationship.

All in all I came to the conclusion, that he is not ready to make the final step to adulthood, right now. I think he has to get over the death of his little brother. He has to understand becoming adult is a natural process and trying to stay a child forever doesn’t help him to solve his problems any way.

The sorrow he feels will not get away staying child and his brother won’t come back too. I have got the notion he needs that professional held in that mental institution to go on with his life. The book seems to be a part of his therapy.





| | | | |
Tausche dein Hausarbeiten