In a novel with first person narration, it is very important to remember that one cannot trust the speakers words to be one hundred percent true in terms of what actions really went on in a given situation. This is especially true considering the fact that our narrator is Holden Caulfield, who is clearly mentally unstable and is recapping his story to a psychiatrist of the events leading up to his big nervous breakdown. In the very early pages of the book, Holden even tells us that we cannot trust him. Im the most terrific liar you ever saw in your life. Its awful. If Im on my way to the store to buy a magazine, even, and somebody asks me where Im going, Im liable to say Im going to the opera. Its terrible. (pg.16) And on page 37, he states, he wouldnt believe me. People never believe you. (pg.37). Critic Jonathan Baumbach says of Holden that he functions by dint of his pure sight, his innocence and sensibility, as initiate in and conscience of the world of the novel. While I agree that this is true, Holden is not by any means sensible.
Holden proves further that he is untrustworthy and a liar through events in the novel. On the train for example, Holden meets the mother of a boy from his school. Of the boy, Holden notes to his listeners that Her son was doubtless the biggest bastard that ever went to Pencey, in the whole crumby history of the school. He was always going down the corridor, after hed had a shower, snapping his soggy old wet towel at peoples asses. Thats exactly the kind of a guy he was. (pg. 54). But as Holden relates of mothers, You take somebodys mother, all they want to hear about is what a hot-shot their son is. (56). And with that, Holden starts shooting it and distorts reality while fabricating tremendous lies to Ernies mother.
Keeping what an untrustworthy narrator we have in mind, one must pay close attention to the events in each situation that is recapped in order to notice discrepancies or biased judgments the narrator makes. Through a close reading, I noticed that not only was the narration somewhat biased or judgmental, but Holdens whole perception of the world was skewed through his disillusionment and mental processing of events.
Considering this disillusioned world Salinger has created for Holden, upon close reading it is quite apparent that Holdens narration of the story is not only distorted sometimes, but even blatantly untrue. Sometimes Holden tells us that he is lying and other times we must decide for ourselves. Again, the key to understanding the novel and to understanding Holden is to sift through the events and listen to the hints we are given, while noting Holdens biases and discrepancies.
One of the first places in the novel where I noticed Holdens bias and distortion of events is in the beginning of the novel when he is speaking to his teacher, Mr. Spencer about getting kicked out of Pencey prep school. Holden had been to another school, Elkton Hills, from which he left and transferred to Pencey. Spencer questions him as to why he left that school, and in response Holden does not answer Spencer but says to his listeners, I didnt feel like going into the whole thing with him. He wouldnt have understood it anyway. It wasnt up his alley at all. One of the biggest reasons I left Elkton Hills was because I was surrounded by phonies. Thats all. They were coming in the goddam window. For instance, they had this headmaster, Mr. Haas, that was the phoniest bastard I ever met in my life. Ten times worse than old Thurmer. On Sundays, for instance, old Haas went around shaking hands with everybodys parents when they drove up to school. Hed be charming as hell and all. Except if some boy had little old funny-looking parents. You shouldve seen the way he did with my roommates parents. I mean, if a boys mother was sort of fat or corny-looking or something, and if somebodys father was one of those guys that wear those suits with very big shoulders and corny black-and-white shoes, then old Haas would just shake hands with them and give them a phony smile and then hed go talk, for maybe a half an hour, with somebody elses parents. I cant stand that stuff. It drives me crazy. It makes me so depressed I go crazy. I hated that goddam Elkton Hills. (pg 14)
- Now my point about this quote has to do with Holdens perception of Mr. Haas. The reader has no real grounds on which to trust Holden that Mr. Haas is a phony except for Holdens words. This is the only glimpse of Haas we are given in the whole novel, so there is not much evidence to go by on to make a clear decision as to whether Holden is telling the truth or not, but I would have to argue that Holden has completely misconstrued the whole situation involving the headmaster. If we look at the way Holden describes the people Haas does not spend extra time with, we see that they are the people who wear ridiculous clothes or, in Holdens own words, are funny-looking. Now, Sean, if you were seated in between a boy with a long black trench coat and combat shoes on and a boy with a sweatshirt and jeans on, who are you more likely to strike up a conversation with? -Exactly. A natural human emotion or need is to associate with those who are in some way similar to us. Most of us would not, however, be rude to those who do not appear like us. So Id have to argue with Holdens judgment here. Instead of being a phony, I think Mr. Haas is being as real as a human can be. It is his job to greet the parents, which he does to all. But in his tendency to talk more with what we are supposed to judge as the normal parents, he is not being phony, but is being real in the human tendency to associate with those who are similar to us. But with just Holdens perception of Mr. Haas and without close reading, we would never have stopped to consider the other side to things. Holden has effectively distorted the image in my mind to see what he wanted to see, lies and phoniness in the adult world. Now, before I go on I want to pose that question to the class: Do you think Mr. Haas was being phony in that scenario, or real?
There are many other instances where we can deduce that Holdens side of the story is a distorted perception of reality. It seems to be a constant pattern throughout the book, in fact, which is not a surprise given the fragile nature of his psyche. A little later in the book, Holden is in a bar underage. He speaks of the bartender, The bartender was a louse too. He was a big snob. He didnt talk to you at all hardly unless you were a big shot or a celebrity or something... It was a terrible place, Im not kidding. I cut out going there entirely, gradually. (pg. 142). Holden insinuates that the bartender does not talk to him because he is a big snob and only talks to the big shots. In this scenario, again we are only given a short description of the bartender who Holden criticizes, and only a few sentences on which to make a judgment. Presumably according to Holden, the bartender ignores him for superficial reasons because Holden is not a big shot. I would argue that Holdens perception of the bartender may yet again be a distortion of reality. Now, throughout the novel, we see Holden in at least three different scenarios in which he attempts to get alcoholic drinks and is turned down for being a minor since he is only sixteen and to many, clearly appears underage. Instead of ignoring Holden because he is not a big shot, I think the bartender really may be ignoring him simply because of his age. Holden is not legally allowed to consume alcohol, so as the bartender, it is not in the best taste that he associate with Holden for that fact. Also, several times in the novel Holden is in a bar atmosphere and attempts to make company with adults who are way older than he is by asking waiters to send messages to Ernie, the piano star of a busy nightclub, and also to Valencia, the babe that sings at the bar he was at. Holden gets upset at the waiters both times and states People never give your message to anybody. (pg149). Holden is forgetting that he is only sixteen and instead chooses to criticize the waiters and staff for not giving his messages to these people, as if they have a personal prejudice against him. In reality, Holden is just a boy and the waiters realize that.
Through these examples and throughout the book, its easy to notice that there is a common thread in each situation that Holden criticizes people or calls them phonies. He is constantly criticizing the adult world and those with experience. All of his teachers and headmasters are phonies as well as those his own age who try to act older than they are. Sally Hayes, the girl he takes out on a date is a phony because she enjoys shows and hanging around that type of atmosphere where according to Holden, You never saw so many phonies in all your life, everybody smoking their ears off and talking about the play so that everybody could hear and know how sharp they were. (pg. 126). He criticizes and condemns Stradlater, his roommate for being sexy and having experience with girls. Throughout the book if one takes a close look, nearly everyone Holden talks badly of is an older person or crossing into the adult world. So we can say that Holden criticizes those with experience in the world, and since they have experience, they are either corrupt or a phony.
Following this type of thinking, upon taking a closer look at the experienced individuals he condemns more vehemently, one notices that they are all successful people who are making money, or capitalizing on their performance. In this section of the presentation, I would like to incorporate a Marxist perspective as I see a common thread of anti-capitalist sentiment expressed by Holden directed at these successful individuals. And later, I will show how this anti-capitalist behavior relates back to the psychoanalytical look I have taken on Holdens personality.
The very first place we see anti-capitalist remarks by Holden are on the first page of the novel. Here and throughout the story, Holden is constantly remarking about his disdain for the movies as he views them as exploitative. In the opening paragraph of the book he speaks of his brother, D.B. He just got a jaguar. One of those little English jobs that can do around two hundred miles an hour. It cost him damn near four thousand bucks. Hes got a lot of dough now. He didnt use to. He used to be just a regular writer, when he was home. He wrote this terrific book of short stories, The Secret Goldfish, in case you ever heard of him. The best one in it was The Secret Goldfish. It was about this little kid that wouldnt let anybody look at his goldfish because hed bought it with his own money. It killed me. Now hes out in Hollywood, D.B., being a prostitute. If theres one thing I hate, its the movies. Dont even mention them to me. (2).
-Holden begins by describing what a great writer his brother is and how enjoyable his stories are. In the blink of an eye, however, Holden shifts gears to criticize his brother. It seems that when D.B. was writing for the sake of writing and other peoples enjoyment that was fine to Holden. But when D.B. starts capitalizing off of his writings and becoming successful, he is a prostitute. Here we have Holden basically stating that anyone who chooses to profit off of his work instead of doing the work for the sake of enjoyment is exploiting himself and engaging in a form of prostitution. This is clearly an anti-capitalist sentiment.
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