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Catcher In The Rye Settings

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The Catcher in the Rye features many different settings all playing an important role in some form to the plot. Scenes and settings surround characters, and can define, shape, or communicate what is happening at that current time. What is included in those settings can add very meaningful, influential aspects to a novel. J.D. Salinger expresses thoughts, emotions, and maturity through the settings he uses in The Catcher in the Rye. Each setting Holden finds himself in excerpts their own attributes that reflect what Holden may be thinking or feeling. Each scene communicates a psychological point of view that is not always expressed directly by a character. Focus will be put on Pencey Prep./Ossenburger Memorial Wing, the Wicker Bar, and …show more content…

The Wicker Bar is where Holden seeks help from an old friend Luce after becoming more and more depressed. Before arriving at the scene Holden says “I used to go there quite a lot, but I don’t anymore, I gradually cut it out.”(141) If Holden stopped coming to this bar we can infer that there is a good reason and that the bar may not be the best place to be. This signals that for Holden to go there, he can’t be doing well emotionally or mentally. While up at the bar waiting for Luce Holden points out “If you sat around there long enough and heard all the phonies applauding and all, you got to hate everybody in the world.”(142) From this statement we know that Holden still has a depressed, immature attitude on life as well as people in it. Also if Holden deliberately is in a place he does like full of people he does like, he must be quite desperate. This fact is reinforced when he says “It was a terrible place, I’m not kidding.”(142) Holden’s maturity is even pointed out by Luce when he remarks “Naturally. Your mind is immature.”(147) This is also quite noticeable because of the setting Holden is in (a bar at the age of fifteen). After Luce denies Holden any help Holden describes the setting around him. Holden says “I was the only one at the bar with a bullet in their guts.”(150) A bar can be seen as a place troubled people go to ignore or push away any emotional problems with the help of alcohol. Now even when surrounded by these people, Holden still feels like he has a bullet in his guts. Holden obviously is in an extremely poor emotional and mental state if he is the worst off even considering what is around him. At the Wicker Bar the surroundings indicate that Holden is desperate, immature, depressed, and in need of some serious

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