Q.#10 The OBVIOUS BIG QUESTION

[christa]

Nov 18, 2008 0:22:21 GMT -5 @paige14 said:

i think it's talking about how he wants to save kids just like him before they fall. Because he is doing so terriblly in this world and he doesn't want them to be like him. he also cares for the childern, he helps them at the museum and the little girl with her skates. I think these kids could have the same fall, Mr Antolini describes Holden having. And by him staying he can help the most important child, his little sister Phoebe

Why is he worried about Phoebe in that way he always talks about how perfect she is?

[heather]

i think Holden wants to be some one who can help out other people from falling out off life and save them

[heather]

I think Holden wants some one to be his catcher in the rye, and save him from falling from the face of the earth. like if he were a child in the rye

[kennyferr]

In holden literal words he is saying that he wants to save children from falling out of the Rye, but to me symbolically what Salinger was trying to get across was that Holden wants to save kids that are following in the same path he went down. He doesn't want them to make the same mistakes he did. So in a sense holden was a child in the rye and no one was there for him when he "fell". so in a way both Salinger and Caulifield have got to this point of a "savior" Holden showing how not to make the same mistakes he did, and Salinger showing the ways of his book

[ochosiete]

The book title suggests holden wants to be a person who helps people in a very simple way. i think holden is a child in the Rye because he's headed for a fall says mr antonelli but there is no catcher to save him. i think the book is the catcher because its holdens story he's telling to therapist and irts helping him realize how to catch himself

[reyes92]

i just thought of something while reading eveyone else's post including my own. Does anyone else find it odd that Holden, the person in our story who has no idea what to do and alsways seems lost wants to the person that people can come to for advice and help? Don't you think he should figure out HIS life before he tries to help others with theirs?

[ochosiete]

good inference dante and ken. I believe that he has no one to catch him when he falls. The book is a catcher in the way that he is telling it to a therapist. This is the savior in his life. just talking about it makes him sad so he has overcome it.

[heather]

reyes, i think hes so use to his parents picking his dicission he doesnt no how to make his own and is scared to make a wrong turn or somthing

[bigkitty7]

the catcher in the rye means alot, catcher means that person helps keep everyone out of drinking and smoking, in the rye means that he goes out into the world and finds these people.

[lagrimas]

hey gabby!
um i think he secretly has his life worked out. It's just the lack of friends and achievement that he already has that's holding him back. The idea of him wanting people to come to him is just the idea that he wants to be needed or wanted. He wants to be seen. . . idk. that's just how i took it.

[jamesc]

it means that he wants to save children or catch children from falling off a rye. he wants to protect the children

[kennyferr]

OK James but what does the "rye" symbolize to you?

[miles]

Holden wants to save children from falling like he has. I think he has found his purpose in this. I think for someone to write such a detailed book as this the author must've gone through some of this. And i think if Salinger is Holden and is the Catcher I think they've fulfilled their dream. By writing this book he must've saved someone from falling. So I believe this book is the "Catcher in the Rye".

[miles]

I agree with bigkitty7

[jamesc]

i agree with miles.