Catcher In The Rye
The Catcher In The Rye
Preface -
This book has been steeped in controversy since it was banned in
America after it's first publication. John Lennon's assassin, Mark Chapman,
asked the former beatle to sign a copy of the book earlier in the morning
of the day that he murdered Lennon. Police found the book in his possession
upon apprehending the psychologically disturbed Chapman. However, the book
itself contains nothing that could be attributed with leading Chapman to
act as he did - it could have been any book that he was reading the day he
decided to kill John Lennon - and as a result of the fact that it was 'The
Catcher In The Rye', a book describing nervous breakdown, media speculated
widely about the possible connection. This gave the book even more
notoriety. So what is 'The Catcher In The Rye' actually about ?
Superficially the story of a young man's expulsion from yet another school,
'The Catcher In The Rye' is in fact a perceptive study of one individual's
understanding of his human condition. Holden Caulfield, a teenager growing
up in 1950s New York, has been expelled school for poor achievement once
again. In an attempt to deal with this he leaves school a few days prior to
the end of term, and goes to New York to 'take a vacation' before returning
to his parents' inevitable wrath.
Told as a monologue, the book describes Holden's thoughts and
activities over these few days, during which he describes a developing
nervous breakdown, symptomised by his bouts of unexplained depression,
impulsive spending and generally odd,...
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