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重点论文网    文科论文    英语论文    赏析《麦田里的守望者》中霍顿形象
创建时间:05-19

赏析《麦田里的守望者》中霍顿形象

 

Analyse Holden in J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye

1 Introduction
1.1 The Introduction of the Author
Jerome David Salinger (1919-2019), a distinguished American novelist and short story writer, is best known for his controversial novel The Catcher in the Rye (1951). Salinger is recognized by many critics and readers as one of the most popular and influential authors of American writers after World War II. His only novel, The Catcher in the Rye has become one of the two “modern classics” in contemporary American literature (the other one is Ralph Ellison’s The Invisible Man that is published in 1952). 
J.D. Salinger was born on January 1, 1919 in New York City. As an undistinguished student, he flanked out of several private preparatory schools before graduating from Valley Forge Military Academy (the model for Catcher’s Pencey Prep) in 1936. Later, he spent short periods at New York University, Ursinus College, and Columbia University. From 1942 through 1946, he served in the 4th Infantry Division of U.S. Army, achieving the rank of staff sergeant.
As a native New Yorker, he understood New York to the core; as a student who flanked out of school several times, he preserved poignant memories of loneliness, alienation, sorrow and desperation as a loser in society. Later, he created literary images of this kind in his works. While at Columbia University, Salinger took a class in short-story writing from Whit Burnett, founding editor of Story magazine. He subsequently sold his early fiction to Story, but then quickly went to the higher-paying fiction magazines like the Saturday Evening Post, Esquire, and The New Yorker. 
Roughly speaking, his writings can be divided into two phases. In the first phase, he published short stories in the above-mentioned magazines, such as A Perfect Day for Banana fish (1948), Uncle Wiggly in Connecticut (1948), Just Before the War with the Eskimos (1948), The Laughing Man (1949) and Down at the Dinghy (1949). These works established his literary fame as a short-story writer. Salinger is really at his best in the description and revelation of psychological sick men like Holden, who fight a doomed war against the phony and suffocated world around them. 
In 1951, Salinger’s most famous work, The Catcher in the Rye, came into the world and became one of the most popular novels of the latter half of the twentieth century. After the publication of The Catcher in the Rye, Salinger went on bringing out several stories about the sense of disillusion, loneliness and despair. Namely, they are De Daumier Smith’s Blue Period (1953); Teddy (1953); Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters (1955); Franny (1955); Seymour An Introduction (1963); Hapworth 16, 1924 (1965). These stories reflect the protagonists’ loneliness, trauma and tribulation in an affluent society in terms of material wealth but in a void society in terms of spirit.
In the 1950s, Salinger was considered the most successful writer of fiction in America. Later on, though his reputation has declined since the mid-sixties, The Catcher in the Rye has continued to be influential and read by people all over the world, especially by college students. 

1.2 The Catcher in the Rye a Story of Escape and Quest
As a modern classic, The Catcher in the Rye tells the story of Holden’s struggle against hopelessness in a hypocritical world. The theme of this book, in its broadest sense, is the difficulty of growing to maturity, the lonely and arduous trek from innocence to experience and from adolescence to adulthood. After thorough reading and profound analysis, it’s easy for us to realize that it reflects not only a naive adolescent’s poignant struggle against the adult world, but also the themes of escape and quest in a phony world. 
As an innate lover of honesty and purity, Holden dissatisfies with the reality, the loss and his depression resulting from the love which he can not obtain in the adult world. He is extremely tired of the hypocrisy and degradation in modern society, thus he can not live in harmony with all the people around him, and he spares no efforts to escape the modern wasteland. He yearns for impartiality and has a strong sense of justice. He expects to live a life to his liking. 
In an affluent society, the need for spiritual life often outweighs material considerations. Holden is unwilling to merge into such a vulgar and sham society. As he makes endeavors to escape from the phony world, he searches for self-identity, purity, innocence and love. What should be noted is that though he eventually reconciles himself to reality through his perpetual love for humans, it’s self-evident that he will not totally melt into the society or become one of the kinds of phony persons he bitterly hates. On the contrary, he will forever cherish innocence and purity.

1.3 Reviews on Escape & Quest in This Novel
As Salinger is a master of contemporary dialect and idiomatic expression, it is no wonder that many critics center on the language in this novel. Many critics also lay their study on Holden’s spiritual crisis and self-redemption. Nevertheless, escape and quest have long been important sectors in Salinger’s studies. In 1958, Frederick L. Gwynn and Joseph L. Blotner co-wrote The Fiction of J.D. Salinger, in which they declare “and it is not inconceivable that some day Holden Caulfield may be as well known as an American boy as Huck Finn.”(Frederick L. Gwynn &Joseph L. Blotner, 1958:29) In 1990, Holden Caulfield edited by Harold Bloom came out. “Holden’s real quest throughout the novel is for a spiritual father (an innocent adult).”(Harold Bloom, 1990:65)
Moreover, various studies on Holden’s escape and quest which are carried out on the ground of close study of the text, studies of psychological analysis and studies of background -- center on the relationship between the writer’s seclusion with Holden’s escape and quest. In J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye (1965) by Charlotte A. Alexander, and New Essays on The Catcher in the Rye (1991) edited by Jack Salzman, we can also pick out reviews about Holden’s escape and quest.
This thesis is centered on the analysis of Holden’s escape and quest from the perspectives of the decline of religion, cultural background and spiritual crisis. Therefore, we may understand Holden’s dilemma the agony of escaping from society and the yearning for rejoining it.
2 Holden Caulfield as an “Escapist”
2.1 Holden Escape from Modern Civilization
Western civilization has undergone great changes since the Renaissance. After that, humans came into an era in which crea

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