The Destruction Of Holden Caulfield's Family

Life would be a lot more “normal” for Holden if his brother had not died. He still may have his little quirks here and there, but he would not be struggling as much. Allie was one of the few things in Holden’s life that could make him happy. Holden’s admiration of Allie may not have been as strong as it was in the book if

Holden has shown many signs of having post traumatic stress. Some of the signs Holden had was as stated “triggers that can bring back memories of the trauma accompanied by intense emotional and physical reactions.” Holden always bring up Allie his brother, even when he wrote compositions for Stradlater, “So what I did, I wrote about my brother Allie’s baseball mitt,”(Salinger,38) Holden always tends to bring up the past. This is one of the many signs that Holden shows as the book progress. In the text, “All of a sudden, on my way out to the lobby, I got old Jane Gallagher on the brain again,” (Salinger, 76). Holden continuously brings up many people that has made him feel this way about people. Holden also demonstrates a lack of control when it comes to talking to people. When Holden brother Allie died when Holden was just 13, he punched out all the windows out of the garage saying, “It was just for the hell of it,” (Salinger, 39). This indicates that Holden is not a healthy psychologically adolescent, as he can’t articulate the thoughts of his actions. Holden’s lack of control and ability not to let go of the past shows how Holden is not mentally

Another major factor behind Holden’s perplex personality is his depression. Holden’s makes his depression clear when he states, “New York 's terrible when somebody laughs on the street very late at night. You can hear it for miles. It makes you feel so lonesome and depressed. I kept wishing I could go home and shoot the bull for a while with old Phoebe” (Salinger 81) The joy of other brings misery to himself. However Holden wasn’t always depressed, much like any human being there were moments in his life where he experienced happiness. This is demonstrated when he talks about his younger brother as he states, “You 'd have liked him. He was two years younger than I was, but he was about fifty times as intelligent. He was terrifically intelligent. His teachers were always writing letters to my mother, telling her what a pleasure it was having a boy like Allie in their class. And they weren 't just shooting the crap. They really meant it.” (Salinger 38) Holden’s tone in his descriptions establish how much he idolized his brother. One can only

Holden's past has caused him to be dealing with a lot on his plate. He shows very vibrant signs of having PTSD following the death of his dearly loved brother Allie. When Allie passed away, Holden never got closure, which deeply impacted him. The night of Allie's death, Holden begins to show signs of distress and takes it out in a violent way. “I slept in the garage the night he died, and I broke all the goddam windows with my fist, just for the hell of it.

The comfort that Holden feels from talking to Allie likely makes it harder to grieve his death because it makes him realize how much he misses Allie. Holden’s conflict of grieving stops him from seeing life from a positive perspective and it eventually leads him into severe depression. While Holden is at the bar, he observes all of the cheerful people around him, then describes his hatred for them as “If you sat around there long enough and heard all the phonies applauding and all, you got to hate everybody in the world, I swear you did” (142). Holden manages to find the downside of the situation. In a place full of bright people, he always sees the darkness and cannot even visualize the light.

Holden never made peace with the death of Allie, instead of talking about it openly he thinks he can just forget the death. Instead however he etched Allies death in his head by in a way making him his spiritual guardian because he believes that no one's going to protect him the way the catcher in the rye would protect kids falling of the cliff. Holden pushes away people because they don’t provide things that can help them. Holden throughout the book more specifically after the death on Allie he hasn’t been the same he’s been constantly flunking out of school.

Holden Caulfield encounters himself facing issues of acceptance of death, growing up, and parental neglecting that prevents him from completely understanding why it is that he is severely depressed. One of the hardships Holden must cope with is his inability to come to terms with death, of his younger brother, Allie. We often discover

Holden never going to Allie’s funeral gives us insight into why Holden is still holding onto Allie. After Allie’s death, Holden still went through experiences that caused his BPD, neglect and separation. During the time following Allie’s death, Holden’s family was in great grieving, making Holden feel isolated and not getting the attention he needed to fully grow mentally as a child (“National Allegiance on Mental Health”). Holden also expresses twice, that his mother is still grieving over Allie’s death by stating his mother, “still isn’t over my brother Allie yet” (Salinger 155). Holden is also never close to anyone. He meets with his family a limited amount of time throughout the year, and is kicked out of schools, giving him no permanent guidance in his life. Holden constantly describes his expulsion as, getting “the ax” (107). He shows a continuous changing in guardians, because of his attachment to both Mr. Spencer and Mr. Antolini, both old school teachers from schools he flunked out of. He also dealt with the separation from D.B. his other brother, who moved to Hollywood, Holden seems to be very inspired by him throughout the novel, but is mad that he left (1).

J. D. Salinger, in his novel, “Catcher in the Rye,” reveals how Holden’s life and relationships are affected by the death of his brother. Holden’s brother, Allie, died on July 18, 1946 from leukemia. Before Allie died, the relationship between two were inseparable. Being the younger brother, Allie wanted to be like Holden. Holden often reminiscences times when Allie wanted to spend time with him. “I remember once, the summer I was around twelve, teeing off and all, and having a hunch that if I turned around all of a sudden, I’d see Allie. So I did, and sure enough, he was sitting on his bike outside the fence.” (explain).

Holden has three siblings a little sister Phoebe and two older brothers D.B. and Allie but his brother Allie past away. Holden didn’t take his death well and punched out all the windows in the garage now people think he is crazy. Holden is leaving his school and going to New York City before returning home. In New York he goes through some crazy things and learns a lot. Holden can not be trusted as we see he is an unreliable narrator, openly admits to being a liar, and is always fabricating stories.

Those situations can be either self-inflicted or not. Either way, it is not their fault for their emotions and reactions to those circumstances. Emotions are uncontrollable, therefore becoming depressed or developing anxiety in reaction to a certain condition would not make it their fault. In the book, the death of Holden’s brother, Allie, really changed him. “I slept in the garage the night he died, and I broke all the goddam windows with my fist, just for the hell of it” (39). Allie’s death was an uncontrollable event, in which Holden had a very natural reaction to by punching the windows in anger. We can see that he has become very depressed and negative, and has lost the ability to form connections. This kind of behavior, from our perspective, needs some serious attention. For moments throughout the book, it almost appeared that he was considering taking his own life due to the severe depression he was experiencing. “What I really felt like, though, was committing suicide. I felt like jumping out the window” (104). Holden is saying that since he is so depressed and alone that he honestly feels like committing suicide. His parents had pushed him away in order to deal with their grief, so Holden was utterly alone. He needed someone to talk to and to guide him through that difficult time in his life, which is where a therapist or a respected mentor could have played a vital role in coping and accepting the loss of his loved

Holden experiences extreme difficulty accepting his current realities and one of the main factors causing this is the lasting negative impact his brother Allies death had on his life. Firstly, when Holden decides to leave his school, he tells readers , “I don’t care if it’s a sad goodbye or a bad goodbye, but when I leave a place, I like to know I’m leaving it. If you don’t, you feel even worse” (Salinger, 4). Holden’s need for closure is evident in this quote. When Allie died, it was very unexpected and he was not prepared to let him go, resulting in his denial that his brother is actually

One of the hardships Holden must cope with is his inability to come to terms with death, in particular that of his younger brother, Allie. Holden seems to have experienced a

Holden’s little brother, Allie, had died and Holden is still not over his death. “I get very depressed, I keep saying to him, Holden says, “Okay. Go home and get your bike and meet me in front of Bobby’s house. Hurry up.” (Salinger, 99). There is many moments where Holden thinks of Allie, and even talks to him. Whenever Holden thinks about Allie he gets very upset and doesn’t want to do anything.

The death of Holden’s brother Allie at a young age adds to Holden’s negativity as well as stopping Holden from accepting inevitable change. Allie dies immaturely of leukemia. “I slept in the garage the night he died, and I broke all the goddam windows with my fist, just for the hell of it” (p. 39). Holden is in the hospital because he broke his fist, and he was unable to attend Allie’s funeral. Holden has trouble accepting Allie’s death because he never said goodbye to Allie. His relationship with Allie is similar to his maturity. Just as Holden is unable to accept his brother’s death, Holden is not able to accept that