Is Caulfield messing with us too?
Last week we talked about whether or not we could trust Holden Caulfield as an accurate narrator of the events happening. On one hand, Caulfield is very blunt with his thoughts about people he interacts with and tells us (the reader) what he really thinks of them. However, his actions to that person contrast what his true feelings are towards them. For example, we see this happening with his dorm neighbor, Robert Ackley. Caulfield raves on and on about how annoying and disgusting Ackley is. He dreads every time Ackley comes into his room because he just messes with his things and bothers him. At one point even wishes his roommate, Stradlater, was in the room because Ackley hates Stradlater and never enters the room if he’s in there. After Caulfield makes his dislike very clear towards Ackley, he still invites him to accompany him to the movies while he was bored on a Saturday evening. This gets the reader thinking, is Caulfield masking his true feelings from us like he is with Ackley and almost everyone else he interacts with?
On the other hand, we’re the only constant in Caulfield’s life, so what would be the purpose of also faking his feelings to us? It’s very clear from the start that he doesn’t take school (and life in general) seriously. With his recent visit to Phoebe, she guesses that he got kicked out of school and keeps repeating, “Daddy’ll kill you” (216) throughout their conversation. However, Caulfield almost brushes it off and insists he’ll eventually just get sent to another school. Everyone comes and goes for Caulfield, his classmates, “friends,” and teachers. Even his parents and siblings aren’t around. He’s traveled from one random place to another and his parents are completely unaware. The reader is Caulfield’s only confidant, so it would make sense he wants to be casual and normal with anyone for some consistency and “support.”
Another reason that contributes to this argument of whether or not we can trust Caulfield is his level of self-awareness. He spends a lot of the time talking about other people’s flaws and what he dislikes about each person, but he also talks about his shortcomings. Caulfield doesn’t paint himself as the king of the world, he realizes he isn’t good at a lot of things. For example, he compares himself to his sister, Phoebe, and says he wasn’t as smart as her, he almost adores her for her intelligence. There’s also a side of the self-awareness argument that shows he could be lying to himself. He’s constantly telling us things about himself, but they contradict with how people treat him. For example, he claims his grey hairs make him look older, but most of the bars he goes to don’t buy it and give him a coke to enjoy. Also, when he calls his Princeton friend’s friend, she tells him that he sounds young. She called BS on his age and didn’t even see him. At this point, I don’t know if he’s really dumb and doesn’t understand social cues and get basic communication or if he’s messing with everyone (including us) for entertainment but lowkey has a bigger plan playing out.
What do y’all think, do you trust Holden Caulfield's narration?
Another reason that contributes to this argument of whether or not we can trust Caulfield is his level of self-awareness. He spends a lot of the time talking about other people’s flaws and what he dislikes about each person, but he also talks about his shortcomings. Caulfield doesn’t paint himself as the king of the world, he realizes he isn’t good at a lot of things. For example, he compares himself to his sister, Phoebe, and says he wasn’t as smart as her, he almost adores her for her intelligence. There’s also a side of the self-awareness argument that shows he could be lying to himself. He’s constantly telling us things about himself, but they contradict with how people treat him. For example, he claims his grey hairs make him look older, but most of the bars he goes to don’t buy it and give him a coke to enjoy. Also, when he calls his Princeton friend’s friend, she tells him that he sounds young. She called BS on his age and didn’t even see him. At this point, I don’t know if he’s really dumb and doesn’t understand social cues and get basic communication or if he’s messing with everyone (including us) for entertainment but lowkey has a bigger plan playing out.
What do y’all think, do you trust Holden Caulfield's narration?
I agree that although Holden tends to send a lot of mixed signals, he would have nothing to gain from manipulating the reader. But I suppose you could say that he likewise had nothing to gain from lying to his classmate's mother on the train or internally belittling Spencer, either. Also, I don't think that Holden is very self aware. His hyper-criticism of others comes from his extremely pessimistic worldview, but he still can't seem to pinpoint where in the world he fits in, or how others perceive him. In the end, I think that Holden's narration is reliable from his perspective. He's speaking his truth as he objectively sees it.
ReplyDeleteI think a big part of what makes Holden so unreliable is that he doesn't want to admit or acknowledge a lot of stuff to himself, so therefore he can't show any sign of it to us, the reader, either. For instance, he often doesn't want to recognize that he actually (gasp) LIKES people sometimes (i.e. Ackley), maybe *because* he's so worried about the come-and-go trend, and because if he actually likes someone, he can miss them as well. So especially in regards to his own emotions and opinions of other people, I don't think Holden can really be trusted, unless of course it's about one of the few people he IS willing to admit he likes (like Phoebe).
ReplyDeleteHolden is definitely not self aware. I definitely understand his tendency to mask his true feelings because etiquette was pretty important back then and he does probably know he's doing that. However, his thinking can often be so black and white, he either hates a person or absolutely adores them, I guess the best we can do is try and objectively look at what people do aside from Holden's extreme biases.
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