The Catcher in the Rye: The Language of a Rebel
‘I am not aiming high
I am only trying to keep myself alive
Just a little longer’
— Charles Bukowski
By virtue of being published in 1951, J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye didn’t fit into any well defined literary canon, it was too early to be part of the Beat generation and too late to be in the highly respected Modernist group. The creation of Holden Caulfield however, is considered to have been a stroke of Salinger’s genius. It was perhaps this lack of any existing pattern that made The Catcher in the Rye a best seller for all time to come. So popular was the novel that Salinger, who shared a desire for anonymity with Holden, had to instruct his publishers not to print his photograph with his biographical note at the end of the book.
The protagonist, Holden Caulfield personified the desires, fears and frustrations of the American youth after the Second World War in the typical teenager vernacular of the 1950s. The conversational style of Holden’s language was unusual, and its apparent lack of pretension or ‘phoniness’ was what attracted thousands to the book. The faulty structure of Holden’s sentences is quite common and typical in vocal expression.[1] It indicates that Salinger wanted the language to represent spoken speech rather than formal written (read recordable) speech. The conscious use of these phrases and a deliberate violation of grammar rules is not only a part of teenage vernacular, but also an act of defiance on Holden’s part and hence Salinger’s.
Holden seems incapable of definite thoughts, as most of his sentences are incomplete and only broadly convey the idea he has in mind. His language is replete with sentences ending ‘…and all’ or ‘something’, especially where these phrases are not required; for instance, “Somebody with sense and all.” or “I should’ve at least made it for cocktails or something.” This recurrence suggests a sense of looseness of expression and of thought which becomes a part of Holden and helps to characterize him.[2] Salinger very consciously draws a distinction between Holden and the precocious Carl Luce. The difference between them becomes clear in their respective usages of language. An extract from their conversation serves as a telling example: Holden says, ‘In her later thirties? Yeah? You like that? You like ’em that old?’ to which Luce replies, ‘I like a mature person, if that’s what you mean. Certainly.’ to which Holden asks again, ‘You do? Why? No kidding, they better for sex and all?’ In this exchange, Luce comes across as controlled and confident, like an adult. The important thing is however, that the sympathy of the reader lies with Holden, because Luce, like Stradlater, appears sophisticated, but is ultimately a ‘phony’, whereas, Holden’s transparency and evident lack of tact suggest a childish innocence.
Holden seems very conscious of his speech and confesses his lack of communication skills which becomes apparent in the number of times he repeats himself. In spite of his disdain for school, he is somewhat embarrassed of his position as an outcast of the education system. In his conversation with members of society, he often adopts characteristics. He pretends to have friends, to be a regular donor to charities, and in general to be older and more mature. This highlights his sense of alienation and his lack of confidence, which also becomes evident in language. He is also extremely aware of the ‘phony’ quality of many words and phrases that he uses, such as, ‘grand’, ‘prince’, ‘traveling incognito’ etc.
One of Holden’s main concerns is the ‘phoniness’ of the world. Almost everything seems fake and ‘phony’ and just ‘kills him’. For instance, ‘“How marvelous to see you!” old Lillian Simmons said. Strictly phony.’ This one word is repeated numerous times in the novel and it captures the American ethos of the 1940s and the 1950s. Interestingly, the other phrase Holden constantly uses, ‘It really was’ or ‘I really did’, works in contradiction to the ‘phony’ world, as he feels compelled to reinforce his sincerity and truthfulness.[3] It was a response to the post Second World War and early Cold War era, where all alliances were political and temporary. This period saw a breakdown of old political, cultural and moral structures. As John Updike explains, America’s artists and intellectuals, like those of the Twenties, felt mostly a sardonic estrangement from a government that extolled business and mediocrity.[4] The public realm seemed ruled by a variety of fantasies, both comic and dreadful[5], and the people felt the need to find an escape route from the overbearing control of the ‘superstate’. This is effectively portrayed when Holden says he would like to be ‘the catcher in the rye’. He says, ‘I keep picturing all these little kids playing some game in this big field of rye and all…and nobody’s around, nobody big…I have to catch everybody if they start to go over the cliff.”
The most important aspect of the language in The Catcher in the Rye is the distance between the writer and the protagonist. As the novel is recounted in first person, this distinction is often blurred. The use of a colloquial, ‘tangy’ idiom was an extremely conscious step on Salinger’s part to create this distance between himself and the teenage Holden. Simeon Potter identifies the use of slang as a means of increasing intimacy, because it allows the speaker to drop into a lower key, to meet his fellow on even terms and to have ‘a word in his ear’.[6] The American reader could identify not only with Holden’s character but also with his language.
The late forties saw new writers making a visible effort to change the style and language of fiction. The Catcher in the Rye borrows aspects of the Modernist movement in art and literature. This becomes evident in a number of ways; firstly, in the opening line of the novel: “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, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don’t feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth.” Salinger rejects the established method of story telling, with a snide remark reserved especially for Dickens — representative of canonical storytellers. Secondly, the novel, like most Modernist works, focuses on the microcosm, the individual – Holden Caulfield. In Holden, Salinger creates a confused character who tells a rather fragmented story. While the direct focus is on the individual, ultimately, it serves as an analysis of society.
In the fiction of the period, the trend was to negate the realist and naturalist style that dominated the literary scene. Salinger, however, borrowed aspects of the naturalist tradition in his portrayal of Holden’s gloomy life full of betrayals and dejections and an unfulfilled desire for love and acceptance. At the same time, Salinger distanced himself from the tradition in his use of an extremely informal language full of slang and swear-words. What really separates Salinger from other naturalist writers is that he doesn’t attempt a disinterested, detached portrayal of Holden. In this novel, like in a lot of American fiction following the Second World War, the controlling image of the hero was that of the rebel-victim. Almost always, he was an outsider, a child, adolescent, criminal, saint, scapegoat or clown compounded in ironic or grotesque measures.[7] Again, the reason America could relate to Holden was that they saw bits of themselves in the character.
It is this sense of the world and its people being fake that gave rise to the Beat generation of which Salinger can be considered a part in spite of the ten odd years that lie between him and the peak of the Beat movement. The Catcher in the Rye is a follow up of a long list of trends and influences from Camus, to The American Dream and predates a long list of symbols of rebellion from Cacth-22 to Elvis Presley. The novel’s experimentation, rebellion and consequent staggering popularity influenced an entire generation of literature to come.
[1] ‘The Language of The Catcher in the Rye’ – David P. Costello. From Salinger – Henry A. Grunwald (ed)
[2] ‘The Language of The Catcher in the Rye’ – David P. Costello. From Salinger – Henry A. Grunwald (ed)
[3] ‘The Language of The Catcher in the Rye’ – David P. Costello. From Salinger – Henry A. Grunwald (ed)
[4] More Matter: Essays and Criticisms – John Updike
[5]‘The New Consciousness’. From Literary History of the United States
[6] ‘Slang and Dialect’. From Our Language - Simeon Potter
[7] ‘Resisting Orthodoxy: Dissent and experiment in fiction’. From Literary History of the United States.
‘I am not aiming high
I am only trying to keep myself alive
Just a little longer’
— Charles Bukowski
By virtue of being published in 1951, J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye didn’t fit into any well defined literary canon, it was too early to be part of the Beat generation and too late to be in the highly respected Modernist group. The creation of Holden Caulfield however, is considered to have been a stroke of Salinger’s genius. It was perhaps this lack of any existing pattern that made The Catcher in the Rye a best seller for all time to come. So popular was the novel that Salinger, who shared a desire for anonymity with Holden, had to instruct his publishers not to print his photograph with his biographical note at the end of the book.
The protagonist, Holden Caulfield personified the desires, fears and frustrations of the American youth after the Second World War in the typical teenager vernacular of the 1950s. The conversational style of Holden’s language was unusual, and its apparent lack of pretension or ‘phoniness’ was what attracted thousands to the book. The faulty structure of Holden’s sentences is quite common and typical in vocal expression.[1] It indicates that Salinger wanted the language to represent spoken speech rather than formal written (read recordable) speech. The conscious use of these phrases and a deliberate violation of grammar rules is not only a part of teenage vernacular, but also an act of defiance on Holden’s part and hence Salinger’s.
Holden seems incapable of definite thoughts, as most of his sentences are incomplete and only broadly convey the idea he has in mind. His language is replete with sentences ending ‘…and all’ or ‘something’, especially where these phrases are not required; for instance, “Somebody with sense and all.” or “I should’ve at least made it for cocktails or something.” This recurrence suggests a sense of looseness of expression and of thought which becomes a part of Holden and helps to characterize him.[2] Salinger very consciously draws a distinction between Holden and the precocious Carl Luce. The difference between them becomes clear in their respective usages of language. An extract from their conversation serves as a telling example: Holden says, ‘In her later thirties? Yeah? You like that? You like ’em that old?’ to which Luce replies, ‘I like a mature person, if that’s what you mean. Certainly.’ to which Holden asks again, ‘You do? Why? No kidding, they better for sex and all?’ In this exchange, Luce comes across as controlled and confident, like an adult. The important thing is however, that the sympathy of the reader lies with Holden, because Luce, like Stradlater, appears sophisticated, but is ultimately a ‘phony’, whereas, Holden’s transparency and evident lack of tact suggest a childish innocence.
Holden seems very conscious of his speech and confesses his lack of communication skills which becomes apparent in the number of times he repeats himself. In spite of his disdain for school, he is somewhat embarrassed of his position as an outcast of the education system. In his conversation with members of society, he often adopts characteristics. He pretends to have friends, to be a regular donor to charities, and in general to be older and more mature. This highlights his sense of alienation and his lack of confidence, which also becomes evident in language. He is also extremely aware of the ‘phony’ quality of many words and phrases that he uses, such as, ‘grand’, ‘prince’, ‘traveling incognito’ etc.
One of Holden’s main concerns is the ‘phoniness’ of the world. Almost everything seems fake and ‘phony’ and just ‘kills him’. For instance, ‘“How marvelous to see you!” old Lillian Simmons said. Strictly phony.’ This one word is repeated numerous times in the novel and it captures the American ethos of the 1940s and the 1950s. Interestingly, the other phrase Holden constantly uses, ‘It really was’ or ‘I really did’, works in contradiction to the ‘phony’ world, as he feels compelled to reinforce his sincerity and truthfulness.[3] It was a response to the post Second World War and early Cold War era, where all alliances were political and temporary. This period saw a breakdown of old political, cultural and moral structures. As John Updike explains, America’s artists and intellectuals, like those of the Twenties, felt mostly a sardonic estrangement from a government that extolled business and mediocrity.[4] The public realm seemed ruled by a variety of fantasies, both comic and dreadful[5], and the people felt the need to find an escape route from the overbearing control of the ‘superstate’. This is effectively portrayed when Holden says he would like to be ‘the catcher in the rye’. He says, ‘I keep picturing all these little kids playing some game in this big field of rye and all…and nobody’s around, nobody big…I have to catch everybody if they start to go over the cliff.”
The most important aspect of the language in The Catcher in the Rye is the distance between the writer and the protagonist. As the novel is recounted in first person, this distinction is often blurred. The use of a colloquial, ‘tangy’ idiom was an extremely conscious step on Salinger’s part to create this distance between himself and the teenage Holden. Simeon Potter identifies the use of slang as a means of increasing intimacy, because it allows the speaker to drop into a lower key, to meet his fellow on even terms and to have ‘a word in his ear’.[6] The American reader could identify not only with Holden’s character but also with his language.
The late forties saw new writers making a visible effort to change the style and language of fiction. The Catcher in the Rye borrows aspects of the Modernist movement in art and literature. This becomes evident in a number of ways; firstly, in the opening line of the novel: “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, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don’t feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth.” Salinger rejects the established method of story telling, with a snide remark reserved especially for Dickens — representative of canonical storytellers. Secondly, the novel, like most Modernist works, focuses on the microcosm, the individual – Holden Caulfield. In Holden, Salinger creates a confused character who tells a rather fragmented story. While the direct focus is on the individual, ultimately, it serves as an analysis of society.
In the fiction of the period, the trend was to negate the realist and naturalist style that dominated the literary scene. Salinger, however, borrowed aspects of the naturalist tradition in his portrayal of Holden’s gloomy life full of betrayals and dejections and an unfulfilled desire for love and acceptance. At the same time, Salinger distanced himself from the tradition in his use of an extremely informal language full of slang and swear-words. What really separates Salinger from other naturalist writers is that he doesn’t attempt a disinterested, detached portrayal of Holden. In this novel, like in a lot of American fiction following the Second World War, the controlling image of the hero was that of the rebel-victim. Almost always, he was an outsider, a child, adolescent, criminal, saint, scapegoat or clown compounded in ironic or grotesque measures.[7] Again, the reason America could relate to Holden was that they saw bits of themselves in the character.
It is this sense of the world and its people being fake that gave rise to the Beat generation of which Salinger can be considered a part in spite of the ten odd years that lie between him and the peak of the Beat movement. The Catcher in the Rye is a follow up of a long list of trends and influences from Camus, to The American Dream and predates a long list of symbols of rebellion from Cacth-22 to Elvis Presley. The novel’s experimentation, rebellion and consequent staggering popularity influenced an entire generation of literature to come.
[1] ‘The Language of The Catcher in the Rye’ – David P. Costello. From Salinger – Henry A. Grunwald (ed)
[2] ‘The Language of The Catcher in the Rye’ – David P. Costello. From Salinger – Henry A. Grunwald (ed)
[3] ‘The Language of The Catcher in the Rye’ – David P. Costello. From Salinger – Henry A. Grunwald (ed)
[4] More Matter: Essays and Criticisms – John Updike
[5]‘The New Consciousness’. From Literary History of the United States
[6] ‘Slang and Dialect’. From Our Language - Simeon Potter
[7] ‘Resisting Orthodoxy: Dissent and experiment in fiction’. From Literary History of the United States.
1 comment:
Excellent piece of research. Just what I needed to complement a project of my own. Thanks a bunch! :)
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