"The Catcher in the Rye" Question 1

The writing in this little novella can reveal quite a bit about the authors values and attitudes.  There is predominantly one character:  Holden Caulfield.  He is the first person narrator of this little tale.  "Anyway, it was the Saturday of the football game. […] I remember around three o'clock that afternoon I was standing way the hell up on top of Thomsen Hill. […] You could see the whole field from there, and you could see the two teams bashing each other all over the place. […] You could hear them all yelling."  I think this quote that we see right off the bat tells us a lot about our narrator.  He's at this fancy prep school with all the possibility in the world to make friends and enjoy life and he's choosing to sit up on a hill all by his lonesome.  Granite he hasn't described any of them as people I would want to be friends with I have a feeling he's exaggerating.  Okay, so not only is he up on this hill but he is simply sitting up here bashing on everyone down there.  This is very Holden-esque.  I think the narrator and writing-style of this novel reveals that the author, J.D. Salinger, maybe had a warm heart for kids in that situation.  Maybe he, himself, was in that situation as a child.  The situation being getting "the axe" or in simpler terms, kicked out.  The narrator is also very apposed to material objects. Well, frankly, he's apposed to everything except his little brother, who died three years earlier, his little sister Phoebe, and Jane Gallagher.  Oh, and alcohol and women.  You can basically count everything off as a 'hate' in his metaphorical book of pro's and con's to the world besides those things.  This, to me, show that the author is pretty picky about the world.  It seems as if he can't stand much of the things in the world, yet indulges himself in them at the same time.  The narrator calls everyone phonies consistently throughout the novel, but how real is he himself?  I think this shows the author maybe as a teenager was a little confused himself on whether to go with the crowd or to go it alone.  


Salinger, J. D. The Catcher in the Rye. Boston: Little, Brown and, 1991. Print.

Salinger, J. D. "Chapter 2." The Catcher in the Rye. Boston: Little, Brown and, 1991. 2. Print.