L'Aliénation (document en anglais)

Alienation

One of the main theme of the Catcher in the Rye is the alienation of Holden Caufield. It is from one side self inflicted and from the other also forced by society. He is a very confused character and that reflects on his isolation. He needs the distance, he pretends that he does not stand to stay a longer period with the same person and also escape from the crowd at the football game in the beginning. On the other side, he needs contact to other persons, during the hole story he is trying to get in touch with strangers or call up old friends, and when he finally manages to, then I does not mange to stay with them for a long time because they are morons and their is no sensible conversation possible with them. A good example for this is Carl Lewis with whom he had a fight after only a couple hours talking to him. Another point that shows the internal problems that he has are is the movies, he pretend that he hates them, there are so far away from reality and the visitors of cinemas are simply morons, but he also goes sometimes watching them and he pretends being in some of them. The fact that he still does not now where to place himself makes the alienation even stronger, because he is not completely ot of childhood and is for sure not an adult yet. He wants to try out everything though, he is drinking an smoking and is attracted by the idea of sex but he loves the presence of children and does not like change but growing up is changing, that fact makes everything more difficult. At the end of the story, he is so annoyed from society that he wants to escape it by going out west and live in a cabin where he wants to pretend being death so that he does not have to talk to anybody.

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