Symbolic Bull in The Catcher in The Rye

The Symbolic Structure of "The Catcher in the Rye"
Author(s): Clinton W. Trowbridge

Source: The Sewanee Review, Vol. 74, No. 3 (Summer, 1966), pp. 681-693
Published by: The Johns Hopkins University Press
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/27541452
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THE SYMBOLIC STRUCTURE OF

THE
IN THE
CATCHER
RYE
By CLINTON W. TROWBRIDGE
symbolic content of Salinger's work has been hinted
THE
at, wildly
denied.
conscious
and arbitrarily
interpreted,
and even
overlooked,
In view of the fact that Salinger is the most self
the under
surprises
(it always
to learn that The Catcher
took ten years to
in the Rye
graduate
write
as well
as one whose
and was
twice as long),
originally
and deliberate
of artists
interest in symbolism proclaims itself in the very title of his

novel, it seems surprising that Salinger's use of symbolism has
not been
closely
as in poetry,
In fiction,
studied.
a symbol
cannot
be fully understood without discussing it in relation to the entire

work. Yet it is just this that those critics who deal with Salinger's
use of symbolism have failed to do. This lack has tended to
make
their
remarks
either
tantalizing,
absurd,
or
simply
obtuse.
For instance, the great significance that the Central Park ducks
have for Holden Caulfield is hardly more than suggested in the
following passage: "Like the Central Park ducks in winter,
Holden
is essentially
homeless,
frozen
out."1
An
example
of
the absurdities into which the arbitrary symbolmonger can be

led is revealed in the following passage from Leslie Fiedler. Re
ferring to The Catcher in the Ryey he writes: "It is the Orestes
Iphigenia story, we see there, that Salinger all along had been
redeemed
brother
the account of a Fury-haunted
trying to rewrite,
in
sister
that
demotes
his
Salinger
though
by
priestess-sister;
to
the
from
the tone of
thus downgrading
tragic
legend
age,
see what
to
a
failure
Salinger
Only
complete
merely
pathetic."2
Some Crazy
and James F. Miller,
Heizerman
Cliff",
Arthur
Salinger:
Jr., "J. D.
For
and Personal
A Critical
Humanities
Western
1956; in Salinger:
Spring,
Review,
and
New York
A. Grunwald,
1962, p. 214.
Brothers),
(Harper
trait, edited by Henry
in Grun
Partisan
2Leslie Fiedler,
1962;
Review,
Winter,
"Up From Adolescence",
p. 60.
wald,
682
THE
IN THE
CATCHER
RYE
can account
to do in The Catcher
is trying
of
for the obtuseness
this remark
Geismar:
from another
Maxwell
debunker,
Salinger
ac
an episodic
are
"For the later sections of the narrative
simply
count of Holden
which
manages
'lost weekend'
Caulfield's
to
our
sustain
our
deepens
hardly
so far as to praise
goes
critic
another
Finally,
understanding."3
Salinger for not making use of symbolism.

no
showy
or covert
in the direction
gesture
story
of a quest,
"In his work we find

of Symbolism."4
recognized, The Catcher in the Rye
As has been generally

the
in New York City
but
interest
a search
in a world
truth
for
that has
is
been
dominated by falsity, the search for personal integrity by a hero

who
short
falls
constantly
of his
own
in fact, partici
ideal, who,
pates in the very falsity he is trying to escape.

power
of
the novel
stems
from
two
things:
The
dramatic
the hero's
that
con
flict is both internal and external and that it increases in intensity

as his vision
of
overwhelming.
inner
What
the resolution
simply
if we take into account
Thematically
outer
and
of
this
conflict,
Salinger's
Salinger's
speaking,
more
call "the pat Happy
Fiedler
what
becomes
falsity
as
compliments
the
idealist
a recognition
Salinger's
rendering
Ending"5
intent
is to present
is
one
a superbly
appropriate
intention
is.
the plight of the idealist in the modern world.

particularly
graduate's,
shows
for The Catcher
and more
us with
The
under
enthusiasm
undergraduate's,
as well
of this basic purpose
A
of his theme.
college
student writes: "Why do I like The Catcher} Because it puts

forth in a fairly good argument the problems which boys of my
some of us
the inadequacy with which
face, and also perhaps
because
for Caulfield
I have great admiration
them.
cope with
.
.
.
the
likes
He
he didn't
only things really worth
compromise.
that aren't worth
most
of us like all the things
liking, whereas
for less."6
settle
won't
he
sincere
is
he
Because
liking.
age
from
of Fiction",
School
Yorker
and the New
Child
"The Wise
p. 90.
1958; in Grunwald,
(Hill and Wang),
from Radical
Rare
Innocence,
4Ihab Hassan,
Quixotic
Gesture",
Salinger:
J. D.
p. 138.
Press),
University
1961; in Grunwald,
(Princeton
in Grunwald,
p. 60.
5Fiedler;
3Maxwell Geismar,
American
Moderns,
eChristopher
Parker,
"Why
the Hell
Not
Smash All
the Windows?",
Grunwald,
p. 257.
The
idealist,
CLINTON
W.
the person
who
683
TROWBRIDGE
a difference
sees
what
between
is and what ought to be and is bothered by that vision into some

sort of action,
a number
has
of alternatives
If he
him.
facing
is
to remain an idealist, he must either strive to find his ideal world

or attempt
idealism
to reform
social.
He
can,
of attaining
bilities
is into what
what
can be either
his
personal
of course, become
his
end
and,
to be.
escapist
disillusioned
as a result,
That
is,
and
impersonal
about the possi
or
abandon, modify,
ought
and
or
change his ideal.

What
to Holden,
happens
structural
of
pattern
the
therefore,
a
of
frighten
and what
constitutes,
is that, as a result
the novel,
ingly clear vision of the disparity between what is and what ought
to be both in the world and in himself and because of an increasing
of
feeling
to re-form
incapacity
to escape
he attempts
either,
into
a series of ideal worlds, fails, and is finally brought to the realiza

tion of a higher and more impersonal ideal, that man and the
world, in spite of all their imperfections, are to be loved.
The first of the ideal worlds into which Holden tries to escape
is
the
man-about-town's
sophisticated,
New
York
the
City,
symbol to virtually every New England prep school boy of the

glamorous adult life that his school is the monastic and detested
is hardly in the right frame of
antithesis of. Although Holden
mind to enjoy fully the anticipation of the typical prep school
boy's dream?a
seen
has even
long
on
weekend
the
town?and
his parting
this dream,
through
a
do
morons!"7
ya
represent
complete
tight,
that immediately
The
action
adolescent
world.
scene with
successful
is allowed
dent,
rejection
follows
trying to play the part of an adult. His
Holden
the
he
although
words:
"Sleep
one.
Mrs.
He
the
reveals
first encounter,
his most
enough,
is, significantly
on his own terms.
He
delightfully,
evi
it
is
the man-of-the-world,
only,
though
Morrow,
is taken,
to play
he is so clearly
because
of
playing
in the Rye,
The Catcher
7J. D. Salinger,
are to
references
*958> P- Bo. All further
in parentheses.
numbers
it.
New York
this edition
The
rest
of his
experi
Library),
(The New American
and will be indicated
by page
684
THE
as a
enees
man-of-the-world,
are
by Maurice,
stroyed
of sophistication
IN THE
CATCHER
rather
until
RYE
that
is de
image of himself
It is his lack
unsuccessful.
increasingly
than her unwillingness
for the failure of the Faith Cavendish
is the
that
reason
affair, but he is refused
a drink
as well
as taken
and patronized
by the waiter
of by the three "grools"
at by
from Seattle,
screamed
as the younger
the taxi driver,
and treated very much
at Ernie's.
Lillian
Simmons
these scenes we
During
advantage
Horowitz
brother
by
learn more
both about Holden's

real affections (his love for the childish
innocence and simplicity of his sister and Jane Gallagher)
and
the degree of his detestation for the very part he is playing and
the adult world that he believes insists on his playing that part.
comes
Then
the
climactic
scene with
its devastating
and
Sunny
aftermath.
Maurice's question "Innarested in a little tail t'night?" (84)

constitutes a challenge to Holden's
image of himself as the
suave
and
sophisticate
thus must
subsequent failure with

treatment
of him
image of himself.
at this point of
learning
and religious
idealism.
is our
sexual
His
affirmatively.
Sunny and the brutality of Maurice's
are forceful
of-the-world
be answered
of destroying
More
important
ways
the nature
Holden's
to us, however,
of Holden's
and degree
use
cannot
He
man
Like
people.
Christ, he finds pity and compassion to be stronger in him than

self-will; unlike Christ, he is unable to find anything in himself
to the love of God,
approximating
anything
a
force.
And
and
compassion
pity
positive
to
the
of
depressed
contemplating
point
that
can make
so Holden
of this
is merely
we
Already
so important
later in the
of what
is to become
have the suggestion
cannot
to
his
live
Christ
that
since
Holden
up
ideal, he will
novel,
in the Bible
to emulate
he likes,
choose
the only other character
suicide.
the lunatic "that lived in the tombs and kept cutting himself with
is
stones".
It
adolescent
world
Pencey
Prep,
that
just
significant
shout
in his parting
so Sunny
dismisses
his
as Holden
to his
rejected
mates
dormitory
the
of
an
pretensions
being
at
CLINTON
adult with
"So
long,
the wonderfully
685
TROWBRIDGE
casual, and completely devastating,
crumb-bum."
as a man-of-the-world
of himself
vision
His
W.
has not
com
been
to young man-of-the
altered
however,
merely
destroyed
a
that
he has tested before,
pose
that, in fact, he has just
world,
so he calls up Sally
that he cannot emerge
And
learned
from.
pletely
a date with
and makes
Hayes
the double
represents
full of falsity
the
in
dramatizes
but
but
nature
undeniably
she was
ass,
for us the appeal
her
of
to go to a matinee.
the social world
"She
attractive.
very
good-looking."
that social conformity
Sally Hayes
It
it is.
as
me
gave
She
has
is
pain
both
for Holden
and shows us his weakness in failing to escape from it. She fits
in beautifully with his genuine leather bags from Mark Cross,
but we learn in this section of the novel that one of the things
as they are is that ap
things
much
How
than reality.
seem to have more
power
pearances
father
social position
your
your
is, what
you have, what
money
even
what
a
church
what
does for
you look
you belong
to,
living,
are superficialities
that separate us from our
like, all these things
from the life of in
and ultimately
from ourselves,
fellow man,
that most
from
tegrity,
truth.
Hayes's
mother,
thinks that they do.

by
categories,
Even
so pitilessly
charity Holden
Sally
about
Holden
bothers
so much
see
the
nuns,
against
whose
genuine
of
contrasts the false philanthropy

things
To Holden
so that
as Catholics;
at
the adult world

it can
only
be fled
least Holden
is dominated
from.
It
is
to value the child over the adult

this vision that leads Holden
terms of
(the child has not yet learned to experience the world in
categories)
Holden's
of the world
as to seek a personal
escape
he
that
while
is
however,
dilemma,
as well
from society.
sees the phoniness
inwhich he lives, he is bound to that world
through
as through
force of habit and social pres
ties of affection
of the
the "queen
sees Sally Hayes,
sure. Thus when
he finally
I saw
minute
her
the
like
"I
felt
he says,
marrying
phonies",
even like her much,
and yet all of a
I didn't
I'm crazy.
her.
as well
686
THE
IN THE
CATCHER
RYE
sudden I felt like I was in love with her and wanted to marry her.
I
swear
to God
I'm
it."
I admit
crazy.
When
he
proposes
to Sally that they go off to New England together to live a Fare

well to Arms sort of idyllic life, he is desperately trying to escape
the
from
world
adult
ever-encroaching
at
and
same
the
time
carry off that which is attractive to him in it. But this is the sort
of romantic
that even Holden
escape
after
only
though
rejects,
he
has been rejected, and he ends by insulting and abandoning her,

once
defeated
again
in his quest
for an ideal world.
In abandon
ing Sally he has for the second time turned his back on himself as
an adolescent.
seeking
Luce.
he tries
Now
advice
from
his
former
a man,
again to become
at a previous
advisor
In many ways Carl Luce

represents
that Holden
still dimly wants
and has all
years older than Holden
has a Chinese
He
sophisticate.
by
Carl
school,
ideal of the man-about
the
town
time
this
to become.
He
is several
of the suave
the appearances
and seems
to Holden
mistress
to
be coolly in control of his life. Yet his lack of understanding of

Holden's plight and even more his lack of concern for it de
to the point where
presses Holden
and seek comfort
in the company
all
of
he
the
can do
Holden
to discover
needs
the "patterns
home
he
knows
person
only
will not disappoint him, his sister Phoebe.
is sneak
advice, that
Luce's
of his mind",
represents
the idea of adjustment to the world as it is that is the dubious

gift of psychoanalysis, and though only dimly understood as such
it is more
by Holden,
pressing
With
integrity.
a "cure"
for
idealism
than
a way
of
ex
it.
Phoebe, Holden
is at home in a world of innocence and
can trust
He
and
her to take his side, to understand
reacts
in
she
when
it is doubly
depressing
even being
manner.
Without
told, she knows
Thus
sympathize.
just the opposite
that he has been kicked out, and her "Oh, why did you do it?"
him
affects
intends
so
to about
that he
deeply
of his
the extent
confesses
own
nihilistic
far
more
than
world-weariness.
he
W.
CLINTON
687
TROWBRIDGE
Phoebe's penetrating "You don't like anything that's happening"

sort of
some
to make
him
forces
idealism
sort
that would
of
justify
to
affirmation,
so
sad-making
the
explain
of the
picture
world as it is. Neither his affirmation of his love of goodness (his

brother Allie, James Castle) nor what might be called his love of
pure being (just being with his sister) satisfies Phoebe, but Hol
of James Castle,
the only person he has ever
a
to him a way
in which
suggests
principle,
den's memory
who died for
known
can
he
devote his life to the protection of goodness. The significance

of the catcher image lies in three things. First of all, it is a
saviour
and
image,
idealism.
us
shows
of Holden's
religious
concept of good
for us Holden's
it crystallizes
Secondly,
extent
the
and evil; childhood is good, the only pure good, but it is sur
rounded by perils, the cliff of adolescence over which the children
will plunge into the evil of adulthood unless stopped. But finally,
the
is based
image
on a
The
misunderstanding.
Burns
poem
goes
"If a body meet a body" not "if a body catch a body"y and the
fact that Phoebe is aware of this and Holden
is not, plus the
manner
are re
and "meet")
("catch"
at
the
of
the
end
Holden
novel,
by
re-interpreted
center
in a powerful
the
and deeply
of
way
suggestive
in which
examined
us
shows
Holden's
is and
two words
these
and
notion
his
of what
of man's
understanding
the end does Holden

difference
Of
ideal,
between
the
course,
and Holden
all Holden
on a mis
to be are based
ought
in the universe.
In this central
catcher
knows
catching"
is his nihilism.
When he telephones Mr. Antolini

hopes
that his
and
parents
will
on
not until
though
the significance of the
"man meeting".
a workable
image does not represent

Its very
that.
impossibility
to go out West
and work
plans
is to be saved from
his real desire
almost
of the novel,
fully understand
"man
is left with
life
place
the essence
is condensed
metaphor
nihilistic view of life as it
Both Holden's
difficulty.
He
means
tells Phoebe
a ranch,
the emptiness
but
he
that
that he
shows
that
of his negativism
and when he admits that he

catch
him
as he
sneaks
out
of
688
THE
the
The
apartment.
saved.
saviour
Mr.
nearest
that Holden
he
such,
in fact,
catcher,
a former
Antolini,
IN THE
CATCHER
thing
is Holden's
last
RYE
wants
to be
teacher
of Holden's,
is the
English
to the non-phony
knows
adult, and, as
As
the person who
refuge.
protected
a kind of catcher
the body of James Castle, he is also toHolden

an
of his own
image
figure,
concern
for Holden,
ing
advice, Antolini
does,
ideal,
In his understand
therefore.
and
his
through
remarkably
appropriate
in fact, seem to be saving him.
Holden's
as well
as the fact that he seems
to have
relaxation,
physical
the
caught,
abandoned his plan to run off to theWest (he even tells Antolini
that he is planning to call up Jane Gallagher in the morning),
augurs well for his spiritual recovery. What Antolini tells him,
state is a perfectly
in essence,
is that his present depressed
of man
result of an awareness
of evil, the imperfectness
natural
the
and
world, and what he promises him is that if only he will not give
up his quest for truth, he will find a way of incorporating his
about man
idealism
constructive
way
help
him discover
ally
can
and
of life.
contribute
His
so
close
sort of action,
that a formal education
promise
his potentialities?the
ways
the implementation
toward
what he means by discovering

phrase,
into some
the world
to Carl
a wholly
represents
but adjustment
world
the "size
of
[of one's] mind".
maturity
and
a more
practical
then all is ruined by what
The
"the
his quotations from Stekel, he is urging Holden
With
will
he person
the ideal?is
of your mind",
pattern
to the
not
It is
idea.
adjustment
is advocating.
self that Mr. Antolini
Luce's
contrary
to one's
in which
some
and
less
egotistical
is basically Holden's
toward
idealism.
But
intolerance of
him
He
is awakened
patting
by Antolini's
imperfection.
lack
more
is
of
its
because
he rejects what
on the head, and once
of
his
about
Pursued
of perfection.
interpretation
by doubts
as
as
about
well
Antolini's
feelings
guilt
homosexuality
apparent
human
his rejection of Antolini
("even if he was a flit he certainly'd been
in a state
he wanders
very nice to me"),
as figurative
death.
literal as well
toward
of
terrible
depression
The
coalesce as Holden
literal and figurative

into a void
plunging
each
689
TROWBRIDGE
W.
CLINTON
crosses
he
time
the
seems to be
he manages
street;
to get to the other side only by praying to his dead brother Allie
to save him.
So
isHolden's
terrible
so
depression,
his
complete
sense of alienation from the world of the living, that in his dis
turbed imagination only the dead, idealized brother can save him
the nothingness,
on
a Fifth
Avenue
ing
from
bench
of his own
state
the hellish
to a vision
comes
he
Rest
nihilism.
the
of
only
ideal world that now seems left to him. Though he does not
believe in the serious possibility of the deaf-mute image of him
self any more than he did of the catcher figure, it is equally
as a metaphor
significant
of
state
his
of mind.
as
Just
in the
catcher image Holden was showing his devotion to the Christ

ideal, so in the deaf-mute figure Holden is revealing his allegiance
to the only other character he likes in the Bible, the lunatic who
lives in the tombs and cuts himself with stones. They are, of
obverse
course,
of each other:
images
save
or completely
the world
reject it, cherish and protect the good or wall yourself

the evil,
choose
health
for truth
search
apparently
return to her
and
Phoebe
It is as if he were
West.
or the masochistic
and happiness
isolation and self-pity. Holden's

over.
the money
saying
to
only to say good-bye
starts
she lent him before he
has
to life
good-bye
tion that Salinger enforces by having Holden

runs across
itself,
a sugges
almost killed as he
the street.
has given up his idealism, that his decision to go
That Holden
West
of
lunacy
is complete, his
disillusionment
He
in from
an
not
represents
escape
into
an
ideal
as he
world,
had
formerly thought of it as being, but rather a rejection of his quest,

is made
clear
to us
in the next
section
has been
in search
out the novel Holden

an
ideal
accept
that does
not
is the mutability
static images:
in the back
row;
What
change.
of life.
The
Jane Gallagher
children
who,
of
the novel.
of a world,
he has never
images
that
Through
a way of life,
been
he
able
loves
to
are
as the girl who keeps her kings

because
of
their
absorption
in the
690
THE
present
because
and
CATCHER
of
their
IN THE
RYE
seem
innocence,
to be unchanging;
and above all (and increasingly as the novel progresses) the

the martyred James Castle, the idealized,
world of the dead:
the natural
brother Allie,
history museum
younger
Holden's
the smells are the same year after year.
dead
even
where
absorp
tion with the idea of death reaches its culmination, appropriately

of Art. The
enough, in the Egyptian tombs of the Museum
to achieve
was
able
that they were
the Egyptians
as the
as essentially
with
permanence
impermanent
something
over
the kind of conquest
human body.
The mummies
represent
of
marvel
time and mutability that Holden has been in search of all along.
While to the younger boys thatHolden is guiding, the tombs are
they are
spooky places from which they soon flee, to Holden
written
under
one
nence
is a hopeless
that's
find a place
there
because
peaceful,
is
West
embraced,
escape.
trip
a
as
sort
of
Caulfield
negative
enthusiam,
nice
is no
Even
death
out
the usual
is the most
that he so desperately
permanence
in the form of the obscenity
there,
of the glass cases, is that the quest for perma
can't ever
one. "That's
trouble. You
the whole
and
peace
he discovers
the
of
symbolic
wants.
What
and
isn't
The
pathetic,
as well
as the most
fantastic,
image
any."
but with
It
ideal.
of him
self that Holden has yet created; and we see how little he is
must in fact be contempla
really interested in it, how sadly he
ting
scene when
next
it, in the
Phoebe
arrives
and
insists
on going
with him.
The brilliance of the concluding section of the novel lies almost
has already been estab
wholly in its irony. The ironic pattern
one
ideal images of himself is
of Holden's
lished that each time
tested by reality it fails and in so failing shows us the phoniness
of that particular image. But the images of himself that have
been
tested
thus
far have
been
phony
ones
and we
have
been
re
lieved rather than disappointed that he has failed to act in accord

ance with
Here,
for
them.
the first
Consider,
time,
his behavior with Sunny.

for example,
an
image of
genuine
however,
apparently
is being tested: Holden
himself
phony
at least
left,
in the
691
TROWBRIDGE
W.
CLINTON
adult
the non-phony,
is going
world,
the only non

to preserve
his
own integrity by keeping himself unspotted from the world and

an oasis in the desert
for
of phoniness
time provide
are
those who
of salvation,
Phoebe
and his older
worthy
mainly
are remnants
There
of the catcher
in this
brother D. B.
image
the
of himself
but more
is the world-weariness,
picture
significant
same
at the
from all but a chosen few, his apparent
alienation of himself
this
But
himself.
too, when
His
with
anger
tested,
for
turns
out
to allow Phoebe
refusal
her
even
himself,
first place,
wanting
to be a phony
of
image
to accompany him, his
to go, provides
us, and
into his real character.
finally
In the
insight
as alienated
he is by no means
as he or
from his world
We
to
have
theatre
the
of
believed
be the epitome
supposed.
with
we
of the world.
for and hatred
contempt
a climactic
about
yet what most infuriated Holden
phoniness to Holden;
Phoebe's decision to leave with him is that she will not be acting
in her school-play if she does. And consider the ironies involved
in the fact that the part she is to play is that of Benedict Arnold.
He
her
is concerned
over whether
that she has
to go back
or not
to school.
she has had

In fact, we
lunch.
He
see quite
tells
clearly
that she is now behaving like him, has taken on his role. This
as well
as his sudden
of himself,
realization
of the extent
that
the very goodness
and innocence
to which he has endangered
so horrifies
him that he immediately
to protect,
he most wanted
vision
abandons his plan to go West, tells her he is going home instead,

and carefully and touchingly tries to lead her back to normalcy.
been uninfluenced
by the various
apparently
in the course of the novel,
have
tried to help him
people who
of Mr.
and
acts in this scene like a combination
Spencer, Antolini,
who
Holden,
as she had
Phoebe
her
has
even
smacks
at the
Holden
cording
on the previous
night.
headmaster's
statement,
and has
that life's a game
been
of his
time,
to the rules.
What
he
tells
so abhorred
by
ac
to be played
THE
692
RYE
behavior with Phoebe
Secondly, Holden's
genuineness
Phoebe
and
IN THE
CATCHER
of
the
his
desire
When
catcher
image.
to save her
innocence
for
his love
tested,
than
is far greater
to abandon it. His
his hatred for the world and his determination

love
than
is stronger
of good
And
of evil.
his hatred
to us the
proves
so, para
doxically, he is saved through saving; the catcher is caught by the

he most
person
merely
He
saved,
completely
his world-weariness.
He
down.
doesn't
is by no means
course, Holden
state of
from the death-like
reclaimed
to catch.
wants
know
Of
does, after all, suffer

to "apply
if he's going
a nervous
break
himself"
or not.
Though the conclusion of the novel is hardly a "pat Happy End

some glimpse
ing", then, it is affirmative; forHolden has caught
he
of how
and
can
implement
as a result
embraces
that man
the world
and
in action
image of himself
ideal:
a higher
and more
impersonal
im
are to be loved
in spite of their
the
catcher
perfections.
The
experience
occurs while
he
to this final affirmation
that leads Holden
is watching
ride
Phoebe
the
carousel
in the zoo.
All the kids kept trying to grab for the gold ring, and so was
old Phoebe, and I was sort of afraid she'd fall off the god
dam horse, but I didn't say anything or do anything. The
thing with kids is, if they want to grab for the gold ring,
If they
you have to let them do it, and not say anything.
if
it's
bad
but
fall
fall off, they
you say anything to
off,
them.
Understood
in terms
of
its connection
with
the
like
catcher
original
this: innocence
is saying is something
what Holden
metaphor,
of the child,
in the condition
and goodness,
epitomized
must
as
the
child
static conditions;
grow up through
just
are not
adoles
risk
this
push
experience
through
of
the
too
but
the
suggests
promise
gold ring
far,
metaphor
as
as
Some
the
well
the
is
that
end
the beatific
goal.
prize
the
cence
passage
into
adulthood,
so must
innocence
and
evil.
and
One
goodness
cannot
life,
are
CLINTON
defeated
get
ring?fail
to realize
portant
thing
that (to put it back
to attain
is that
in terms
693
TROWBRIDGE
and evil?fall
by experience
the gold
W.
others never
off the horse;
the promise
of life.
The
im
these
are the conditions
of the catcher metaphor),
of life
and
rather
than
attempt the impossible (catch and hold something that by its very
nature
should
cannot
meet
be
man,
and held?childhood,
caught
a
form
of love
relationship
man
innocence),
and understanding
with him, and in so doing help him toward his goal just asHolden
is doing
here with
should not despise
are
Holden
cannot
Man
Phoebe.
it; he may,
immediate.
however,
I was damn near bawling,
love
save
it.
the world;
effects
The
I felt so damn happy,
he
on
if you
want
to know
that she looked
the truth.
I don't
know why.
It was
just
so damn nicey the way she
around
kept going
in her blue
and around,
coat and all.
I wish
you
God,
been there.
could've
This
final
shows
sentence
the
effect
sets
the
on Holden
tone
for
of
his
the concluding
altered
catcher
chapter
ideal.
and
He
even Maurice.
concern
to communicate,
The
everybody,
to establish
a
with
to
has
led
the
love of man.
man,
relationship
whose
actions and ideas had been prompted
Holden,
largely
by
so sensitive
his supersensitivity
to evil,
is now
to good
that he
misses
can even
love Maurice.

Symbolic Bull in The Catcher in The Rye

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Symbolic Bull in The Catcher in The Rye

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The Symbolic Structure of "The Catcher in the Rye"

Author(s): Clinton W. Trowbridge

THE SYMBOLIC STRUCTURE OF

In view of the fact that Salinger is the most self

interest in symbolism proclaims itself in the very title of his

be fully understood without discussing it in relation to the entire

the absurdities into which the arbitrary symbolmonger can be

Salinger for not making use of symbolism.

"In his work we find

recognized, The Catcher in the Rye

As has been generally

in New York City

dominated by falsity, the search for personal integrity by a hero

pates in the very falsity he is trying to escape.

flict is both internal and external and that it increases in intensity

call "the pat Happy

the plight of the idealist in the modern world.

student writes: "Why do I like The Catcher} Because it puts

is and what ought to be and is bothered by that vision into some

to remain an idealist, he must either strive to find his ideal world

change his ideal.

a series of ideal worlds, fails, and is finally brought to the realiza

symbol to virtually every New England prep school boy of the

trying to play the part of an adult. His

for the failure of the Faith Cavendish

affair, but he is refused

both about Holden's

Maurice's question "Innarested in a little tail t'night?" (84)

subsequent failure with

Sunny and the brutality of Maurice's

Christ, he finds pity and compassion to be stronger in him than

casual, and completely devastating,

thinks that they do.

contrasts the false philanthropy

the adult world

to value the child over the adult

inwhich he lives, he is bound to that world

to Sally that they go off to New England together to live a Fare

that even Holden

has been rejected, and he ends by insulting and abandoning her,

for an ideal world.

In many ways Carl Luce

ideal of the man-about

be coolly in control of his life. Yet his lack of understanding of

will not disappoint him, his sister Phoebe.

the idea of adjustment to the world as it is that is the dubious

is at home in a world of innocence and

Phoebe's penetrating "You don't like anything that's happening"

world as it is. Neither his affirmation of his love of goodness (his

devote his life to the protection of goodness. The significance

the end does Holden

When he telephones Mr. Antolini

the significance of the

image does not represent

nihilistic view of life as it

and when he admits that he

the body of James Castle, he is also toHolden

what he means by discovering

[of one's] mind".

then all is ruined by what

his quotations from Stekel, he is urging Holden

his rejection of Antolini

("even if he was a flit he certainly'd been