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In The Catcher in the Rye, are there are a lot of details without unifying and general ideas? Does this weaken the novel? Does it seem to teach a...

The Catcher in the Rye seems — and is — episodic. Author J.D. Salinger seems to have been worried about that himself. The Catcher in the Rye does not seem to have a lot of unconnected or meaningless details, though. What holds the novel together is that Holden, the protagonist, is searching for something. He keeps going from place to place in Manhattan looking for whatever it is he is searching for. He appears to be very lonely, and he must be searching for something like companionship, friendship, love, or some other kind of relief from his loneliness. Countless young people love this novel because they feel the same way. For many, that feeling of existential angst is like a prelude to adulthood with marriage and family.


A novel is a work of art. A work of art does not have to teach a lesson. It is intended to communicate a feeling, or feelings. The Catcher in the Rye does not seem to teach a lesson. I believe it is a mistake to look for "lessons" in short stories and novels. The writer is typically trying to relieve himself of feelings by communicating them to others.


Although The Catcher in the Rye is episodic, it is like a big impressionistic mural of Manhattan. The pictures are all held together by the fact that they are all in the mind of a single individual, Holden Caulfield. I do not believe there are a lot of details without unifying and general ideas. Therefore, I do not feel the novel is weakened. In almost every episode, Holden is looking for human contact. He is usually disappointed. When Holden is in contact with Sunny and Maurice, he is extremely disappointed, but that episode seems illustrative of most of the others in the book. There used to be a saying among New Yorkers which went something like this:



"You want friendship? Buy a dog!"



It is ironic that Holden is staying in Manhattan, the largest city in America and one of the largest in the world, but can't find human companionship. There is an old Latin saying that describes this phenomenon:



Magna civitas, magna solitudo.



This has been translated in various ways. One is: A great city is a great desert. Another is: The bigger the city, the greater the loneliness. Salinger's technique is a way of trying to capture a whole dizzying, dazzling city in one mural or montage. There are few novels that present so many characters so incisively. The novel was first published in 1951. If it were "weak" or only "entertainment," it could not have lasted so long or have meant so much to so many people.

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