Consistently Holden

You can call Holden Caulfield a lot of things, but above all I must say that he's amusing. You would think that 277 pages of the same narrator with an awfully repetitive schpiel would be a bother to read and overall annoying. Rather, Holden is captivating. It's his strange quirks that keep readers (or maybe just me) amused. I think so far, the scene where I've been most fascinated by Holden was in last week's reading at the Lavender Room at the hotel. Holden goes to this hotel bar/ club and immediately describes his distaste for it. While Holden's disapproval is nothing out of the ordinary it's so typical Holden that he would find a way to resolve his loneliness and then just complain the entire time about how crumby or phony or brassy (the bad kind, apparently) the place is.

Holden proceeds to try to get a few rum and cokes but is continually shot down by the waiter. The average underage drinker would give up but Holden refuses to back down. After claiming he left his ID at home he expects the server to believe him. He then requests that the server just sneak some rum in his drink. That's pretty ballsy. He shmoozes with three women (apparently only one of which he likes) and tries to impress them with his dance moves, bar tab, or conversational skills. While I have no doubt that these women weren't fine examples of true ladies I think in some part Holden refuses to accept that they see through him. They know he's a kid playing in the big leagues. The scene ends with Holden paying the $13 bar tab which he would have done, obviously, but the women should have offered.

I've found that throughout Salinger's book Holden tries so hard to pretend to be older and mature but truly battles letting go of his childhood. It's as if while Holden pretends to act like he expects everyone to treat him as a young adult , it might mean letting go of Allie or letting go of the sacred Central Park Ducks or playing checkers or a red security-blanket style hunting cap.