I have just scanned the "Early Life" section of J.D. Salinger's Wikipedia page. If you did the same, some phrases would jump out at you. He "managed the fencing team," and "Salinger's Valley Forge 201 file reveals that he was a 'mediocre' student." Familiar, no? Others would jump out for the opposite reason. "In youth, Salinger attended public schools on the West Side of Manhattan." Perhaps Holden's dissatisfaction with the elite schooling system is a reflection of the fact that, unlike Holden himself, the author was not born into this society?
All of this is to illustrate a rather obvious point: a fictitious coming-of-age story is going to inevitably be a reflection of the author's own real-life coming-of-age story. We have read one and started another and thus far (my esteemed peers' opinions of Mr. Caulfield notwithstanding) I would much rather be friends with Salinger than Joyce. (Not that J.D. would necessarily want to be friends with me. A few paragraphs later on his Wikipedia page you'd learn he became something of a recluse later in life).
I came into the possession of this conviction while reflecting on the similarities between Stephen and Holden. I remembered feeling a distinct deja vu for The Catcher in the Rye in the first few chapters of Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. Now that we've finished Portrait, though, that feeling is gone. Admittedly, I still see both protagonists as textbook iterations of the self-important, intellectual, cynical teenage boy trope, but to very different effect. Stephen, as a reflection of Joyce, pulls himself away from the world in order to create beautiful, objective art about it. He's indifferent to his family and friends, and is only interested in the objective artistic concept of women, not their living, breathing, thinking reality.
Holden is the exact opposite of this. Although not as explicitly stated in the title this time, here we are also seeing the creation of a writer (English is the only class he didn't fail!). Salinger seems to believe, as reflected in Holden, that to create art about your experiences you have to be absolutely enthralled with them. Holden is hyper-aware of the people in his life. He fixates on the most minute details of their habits. He is affectionate (in different ways, of course) of everyone, even as he's calling them phonies, and over the goddamn moon for his kid sister Phoebe, Allie and Jane. I guarantee he knows how many kids his mom has. I'm not saying he's a saint or anything, but the kid has profound empathy.
Maybe Joyce is the truer artist, but Salinger is the guy I'd want to go bowling or something with for sure.
You did a really good job comparing and contrasting Stephen and Holden, and by extension Joyce and Salinger. I didn't like Stephen at all, and while Holden isn't my favorite either, I find him a lot easier to deal with for a lot of the reasons you articulated.
ReplyDeleteEven though I hold some distaste for Holden, I agree that he seems a much better friend to have than Stephen. Although Holden struggles with admitting he is someone's friend, his interactions with others are a lot more relaxed and friendly than Stephen's, who can only talk about his own intellect or the work of others' before him.
ReplyDeleteI think you did a very good job comparing the two. I personally read Stephen as unintentionally detached from his peers, and Holden more willingly detached (as is seems he would like us to believe he is detached) because of his experiences and the disillusionment that has come with them.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Matt that Holden's detachment, in being more purposeful, makes him slightly more controversial in people deciding whether or not they'd like to be friends with him. The more Caufield admonishes his peers internally the more I wonder whether or not he'd appreciate me or much of anyone else as a friend. However, as a one-time interaction, I think I'd find some enjoyment listening to his spiel.
ReplyDeleteI think the major difference between Stephen and Holden is that Stephen consciously rejects his privilege as he feels it is a necessary step to becoming an artist. However, Holden doesn't even seem to notice his privilege most of the time. He also seems have no thought of what he will do in the future. For these reasons, I respect Stephen more than Holden.
ReplyDeleteThis whole discussion calls to mind Holden's comments about authors he likes, and the special ones he'd like to "call on the phone" sometime. For many readers, Salinger very much fell into the latter category. We'll discuss this further once we get deeper into the novel, but indeed he did find himself overwhelmed by the mass of young fans and would-be pals who hounded him once he became a cult figure, and he responded by withdrawing entirely from public life (something Holden will fantasize about doing near the end of the novel, actually).
ReplyDeleteBut there's something about Holden that makes the author sound like someone we'd love to talk to on the phone. Even if, in fact, he would rather NOT talk to us. So we're stuck with his very chatty and personable narrative voice instead.