Blog Option #1
Daryn
Kagan’s “Your Rattle No One Else Can Hear” Article is about the difficulty
people experience when they feel they’re going to face a problem alone. When no
one besides yourself can understand what specific emotions are flowing through
you at this very and at times you may not even know. She offers the comfort of
having someone else acknowledge our problems and though they may not be there
to solve them, having someone else simply knowing that there’s something wrong
can benefit us in ways that seem foreign until we experience them in the
moment.
Holden,
in Catcher in the Rye, seems to have this exact problem. He has all of these
problems floating around in his head and he has no one to vent about them to.
Thankfully, this composition was there for him in a way. Those feelings found
some sort of outlet. He told us about Allie and then about his mitt. All the
poems and everything. Holden actually opened up for a split second. The mitt
was a way for Holden to acknowledge his own problems and give himself some sort
of comfort. The fact that he opened up a little bit, even if only to himself or
whoever he’s talking to, is enough to give him a little more confidence he
needs.
I find it interesting that you say Holden has these emotions but he has no one to share them with. It seems to me that Holden does not want to feel anything. He says that "the only trouble is, [Phoebe's] a little too affectionate sometimes". This comes right after Holden is describing his younger sister Phoebe in a warm and affectionate manner. My question for you would be do you believe that Holden truly hasn't found someone he can share his feelings with? Or is it because he tries to distance himself from emotion that he is unable to handle a situation that triggers an emotional response?
ReplyDeleteThat's actually a really interesting point. I think Holden may have found someone though. He's telling his story to someone. We know this based on his First Person POV. In the beginning of the book we have, "If you really want to hear about it...and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don't feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth," Here we can tell if he's opening up to somebody. Or maybe I'm mislead?
DeleteI appreciate your blog because it gave me a different perspective on Holden's situation... Just as Daryn Kagan's offered her audience a bit of comfort and sympathy, do you think that Salinger gave that tidbit of information about Holden for us to feel for him?
ReplyDeleteI liked your post because it was very good at connecting the article and the book in how Holden is trying to face all of his problems alone. this reminds me of when he goes to the hotel he is running away to face all of his problems alone. do you think that he does this on purpose and keeps all of his problems to his self, or that he feels that he should not get anyone else involved with his problems. i think that he feels that he needs to deal with his problems on his own and that they are his responsibility and not any ones other than himself.
ReplyDeleteI appreciated your blog post because of your point of view of his emotions. In my opinion because of these problems he creates very irrational decisions and doesn't think straight. At the end of chapter 17, after he goes out with Sally, he said, "The whole thing was sort of funny, in a way, if you thought about it, and all of the sudden I did something I shouldn't have. I laughed." In my opinion I think he did this because sally was causing him more problems, what do you think? Do you think his decisions could be affected by his emotions?
ReplyDeleteI appreciated your post because it gave me a deeper understanding of the article and how it related to Holden and the baseball mitt. It made me consider the time when Holden was talking to the cab driver about the ducks in the pond. It seemed as if Holden was trying to explain his problems to the cab driver like the woman was trying to explain her problem to the guy at the dealership. And the cab driver, like the guy at the dealership, did not know the problem that Holden was trying to explain to him. The cab driver turned around to Holden and had a confused face and said, "What're ya tryna do, bud?" (60). This makes me wonder if Holden had read the article, "Your Rattle No One Else Can Hear?", if he would feel better about his problems, or his rattle?
ReplyDeleteI enjoy your post because it makes me think about the fact that Holden really isnt what he seems to be leading on. The point that you made about how he has all those thoughts and no one to tell them to anymore shows how he did really recover from the death of his Brother. Do you think the issues that he faced in the book would have never happened if he had just talked to someone.
ReplyDelete