The Catcher in the Rye, J.D. Salinger

So this book is a throw back to a more classical, canonical text compared to the others I've posted on the blog so far. It's hard to find someone who hasn't read The Catcher in the Rye at some point in their academic career or adult life, and even harder to find someone who has never at least heard of it. The name Holden Caulfield seems to ring a bell with anyone.

To be honest, I hadn't read this novel until this year for this project. I read The Perks of Being a Wallflower several times in high school and now recently, and I was always told that “Perks is the new Catcher”, so I figured I better read the Catcher to not only be able to see what everyone was talking about in relation to Perks but also in general. It couldn't be that bad if it had stood the test of time so well, right?

The story chronicles the experience of Holden Caulfield, a seventeen year old who has just been booted out of yet another private school, this time the fictional Pencey Prep. Holden narrates the story for us, discussing his experiences at Pencey and then in New York City where Holden has several less-than-savory encounters and experiences. Holden is driven by his daydreams and his drunkenness, and his ramblings eventually expose to the reader the true experience of their guide in the novel, which, even at the end of the novel, is not completely clear but an explanation can at least be inferred.

Overall I liked the novel. I can definitely see the connections between the classic Catcher and the more modern Perks, in that they both deal with mental illness and are ultimately coming-of-age stories about young males. I wouldn't agree that Perks is the “new” Catcher per se, as I believe that there is a lot of value to be found in the latter that isn't necessary explored in the former, and it isn't fair to figuratively replace a canonical text with one that may be more appealing to our modern students because “similar” is not simply not equivalent to “same”. I think both texts have value, and so both should be read at some point by all adolescents.