Catcher in the Rye: History, Responsibilities between Groups, and Influences

           While being a fictional story, Catcher in the Rye does a decent job of reflecting teenage behaviors throughout history.  Many kids around the country and even the world can feel conflicted during their teenage years.  They are forced to face the harsh realities of growing up with little support.  Part of them may want to become an adult but another side of them wants to crawl back into their safety zone of happy memories and not grow up.  The teenage years can be very difficult for some people and Salinger did a great job depicting this into Holden. 

            J. D. Salinger probably believed that when teenagers are going through this difficult time of their life, they need people to support them such as friends and especially parents.  Holden, unfortunately, did not have many people to turn to for guidance.  From the story it does not sound as if he had much contact with his parents.  He describes them as “touchy as hell” (Salinger 1), which by this description they probably would not have much patience or understanding for Holden if he would try to talk to them about how he is feeling.   Holden did not have any real friends to turn to either.  He was left to deal with all of the conflicting emotions by himself.

            It is likely that Salinger received influence for this story from some of his own personal life experiences.  Since so many teenagers go through feelings similar to what Holden went through, maybe Salinger underwent some of the same feelings that he depicted in Holden.  This book would have been a way for him to express all of the emotions that he went through, just with different characters, setting and story.  Something else that was likely to have influenced Salinger was the school that he went to.  From the ages of fifteen to seventeen, Salinger attended Valley Forge Military Academy and referred to it as being superficial.  This reminds me of how Holden criticized Percey Prep. of being “phony” (The Catcher in the Rye). 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Catcher_in_the_Rye

Salinger, J. D. The Catcher in the Rye. Boston: Little, Brown, 1951. Print.