Preview

Stradlater Character Analysis

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
781 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Stradlater Character Analysis
(Suspicion) Stradlater came was coming down the corridor and met Holden as he passed through their dorm room door. Holden was hoping that he gave Jane his regards because she was one of his friends growing up. Stradlater wasn’t really in to talking with Holden when Holden kept asking questions about Jane. Finally Holden had suspicion that Jane and Stradlater did a little bit more than just go on a date. Holden was getting worried and was shaky inside. Stradlater was not responding to his question and that’s when Holden know what they really did tonight. (Page 43) (Phoniness) Holden was lugging himself to his seat on the train and shortly after he sat down a lady sat down next to him. Out of all the other empty seats she had to sit …show more content…
Holden was supposed to write about a special room or place but instead he wrote about Allie and his left handed baseball mitt. This brought back some grief. Holden wrote about how Allie had poems written on his baseball mitt, but didn't use Allies name. Holden shared with us how Allie died from Leukemia when Holden and his family were up in maine. After it all happened holden punched all the windows in his garage out and tried breaking the car windows. (38-39) (Hospitality) Holden was at his house with Phoebe in the middle of the night when his parents weren’t home. Holden knew he couldn’t stay at his house because his parents might catch him home. So Holden called up Mr. Antolini to see if he could stay the night at his house. Mr. Antolini was very quick to answer and told Holden that he was more than welcome to stay at their house for the next couple nights. (Low self-esteem) Maurice had just gave Holden the ole’ knuckle sandwich because holden refused to cough up the extra five dollars. After, Holden was thinking about what if he went down to the elevator and started plugging Maurice up. Holden knew he was to weak inside to do it. So Holden took a long bath and once he got out he felt like suicide would be best for him but again he was to weak inside to even try

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Satisfactory Essays

    6. What was the "big mess" Holden got into when he got back to the hotel after being at Ernie's?…

    • 470 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Holden Caulfield, like every teenager, deals with adolescent struggles but few have to deal with the loss of their younger brother. Holden loves his brother and described him as very smart “He was terrifically intelligent” (38). Everything Holden said about Allie was positive “God, he was a nice kid, though” (38). Holden was only thirteen when Allie died and didn’t take it well. Holden says in the novel, “I broke all the windows in the garage. I even tried to break all the windows on the station wagon but my hand was already broken” (39). He says, “My hand still hurts me once in a while, when it rains and all and I can’t make a real fist any more, not a tight one.” (39) I believe the reasoning behind Holden’s actions is regret and guilt. There are parts throughout the novel that show Holden regrets not spending time with his brother, such as the times he didn’t let Allie come with him and his friends to hang out. Throughout the novel, Holden refers to death a lot. "I felt like jumping out the window. I probably would've, too, if I'd been sure somebody'd cover me up as soon as I landed…" (104). I don’t think that Holden would have fixated on death so much if he hadn’t lost his brother. I also believe that if this hadn’t happened Holden wouldn’t feel depressed all the time. “The more I thought about it, the more depressed I got” (195). Everyone gets melancholy once in a while but it seems to be a routine for Holden. Allies death also impacts the way Holden views life. He doesn’t understand why such a young and smart child, like Allie, had to die…

    • 460 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Holden agreed to do the composition for Stradlater about a descriptive thing such as a house. However, since he ‘couldn't think of’ anything Stradlater wanted, Holden chose to write something that was barely related to the topic, a baseball mitt. There is a saying that writing reflects the writer’s personality. Holden’s essay revealed a lot of himself. He didn't care about the topic; instead, he just followed his random thoughts.…

    • 70 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Holden himself is very closed off from everyone and it's just a part of his personality from the very beginning. It isn't till Holden had wrote the composition for Stradlater that we breakthrough this wall and distance that he’s created between not only all the other characters in the book itself but the reader as well. As Holden talks about his brother allie and baseball mitt it's easy to imagine a young boy out in the field enjoying the poetry written on his mitt. “He had poems written all over the fingers and the pocket and everywhere. In green ink. He wrote them on it so that he'd have something to read when he was in the field and nobody was up at bat” (Salinger 77). To hear Holden talk about his brother led him to have a new fond tone that had been far…

    • 984 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Holdens brother had a baseball mit, which was given to Holden after Aliie’s death; one of the only belongings of Allie he has. “The thing that was descriptive about it, though, was that he had poems…

    • 399 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Although Holden calls Sally a phony, he still decides to spend a night with her. In his head, he continues to say how much he hates Sally and how much she annoys him, yet he expresses that he loves her. Holden extends his contradiction by necking with Sally in the back of the cab, and still continues to think about the fact that he hates her. “I told her I loved her and all. It was a lie, of course.”(125) Holden’s actual thoughts about Sally stick out from the other statements through the use of first person point of view. Holden even goes as far as trying to run away with Sally. He expresses a want of running away and living on their own, right after calling her a pain in the ass. “I was getting excited as hell the more I thought about it, and I sort of reached over and took old Sally’s goddam hand. What a goddam fool I was.” (132) This contradiction was shown through the use of first person point of…

    • 747 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    When he is at the carousal with Phoebe, he says, “if they fall off, they fall off, but it’s bad if you say anything to them” (211). What Holden means by this, is that you cannot stop people from growing up. The only way to stop aging and stay a child forever is death. Holden was so caught up with Allie’s death because Allie no longer is growing up, and he does not have to face the hardships of being an adult. Allie does not have to live in a society “surrounded by phonies” (13). Holden finally comes to terms with the fact that he must grow up and move…

    • 694 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Holden is asked by one of his friends if he could write his paper for him since he had a date. Holden accepted this offer and wrote this paper for Stradlater. As Holden was writing this paper he got into talking about…

    • 578 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    While facing the aspect of school, a topic Holden would rather avoid, he was tasked with writing a composition for Stradlater. He relayed the fond memory of his younger brother’s baseball mitt in extreme detail. This began an opening into Holden’s past, beginning with Allie. Allie became an image of innocence to Holden, “But it wasn't just that he was the most…

    • 1227 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    However, Holden does so by not thinking about the situations he puts himself into. At the beginning of Holden’s journey, Holden finds out that a jock named Stradlater had gone on a date with a girl that Holden has a keen interest in, Jane Gallagher. Holden inflicts pain upon himself by trying to fight Stradlater because of Holden’s own jealousy towards Stradlater. Stradlater is obviously stronger than Holden and expresses his reluctance towards hurting Holden as Stradlater says “Holden, God damn it, I’m warning you, now. For the last time. If you don’t keep your yap shut, I’m gonna— ” (50), yet Holden “tried to sock him, with all [his] might ,“ (49) but “only he missed” (49) and ended up getting hurt. Holden should have realized the reality of the fight and kept his feelings inside or avoided violence altogether, but Holden starts a situation that only ends up with him getting hurt. Moving on, Holden puts himself into another situation as soon as Holden leaves the school and enters New York City. At one…

    • 442 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Stradlater “thinks he’s a real hot-shot...[and everyone’s] crazy about [him],” so he is “always asking [Holden] to do him a favor” because he thinks that “[Holden’s] just dying to do [him] a favor” (27-28). Holden “sees through [Stradlater’s facade] quickly...clearly...[and] unforgivingly” (Menand) and is not so easily influenced by others’ opinions of Stradlater as the “handsomest guy in the Western hemisphere” (27). Living in such close proximity to Stradlater, Holden has seen the true Stradlater, the one that is only interested in “very sexy stuff” and “madly in love with himself” (32, 27). Because we see Stradlater through Holden’s eyes, we, in turn, see Stradlater for a womanizing, superficial, conceited, phony. We wholeheartedly believe Holden because for everything he states about Stradlater, he shows it. Holden doesn’t care that Stradlater “[isn’t] too bad,” which is almost a compliment to Holden, because it’s what Stradlater does and thinks that determines Holden’s view about…

    • 834 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Although she declines his offer it shows that Holden still has some growing to do to become an adult. After Holden hangs up on Faith, Holden goes down to Lavender Room in the hotel. He sits at the bar, but the bartender realizes that Holden is a minor and refuses to serve him. Although this seems small it has a greater meaning as the story purpose later on. After the bartender refuses to serve Holden he begins to flirt and dance with three older women. He begins to feel a sense of “Fake Love” with one of the women after he sees how well she dances. After Holden reveals to the women how old he is the three women leave making Holden responsible for the bill. Afterwards, Holden goes out to the lobby, he starts to think about Jane Gallagher and, in a flashback, recounts how he got to know her. This shows how Holden is reflecting upon things that he has done when he was a child. This shows how Holden is starting to understand that he is growing up. He begins to reminisce about his childhood and he begins to remember how he had meet Jane. He remembers how they played golf, checkers, and held hands at the movies. He remembers how one day when they were playing checkers and her father came on the ponch and when he left she began to start crying. Holden had moved to sit beside her and comfort her. This is a great example of how Holden really care about things even though he tries to hide it. He kissed her all over her face but, she wouldn’t let him…

    • 2510 Words
    • 11 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    He reveals his fondness of Allie which suggests there was a strong connection which is something that Holden doesn’t have in his life anymore. . ‘I remember once, the summer I was around twelve, teeing off and all, and having a hunch that if I turned around all of a sudden, I’d see Allie. So I did, and sure enough, he was sitting on his bike outside the fence.’ The irony of his brother’s death is that the only person Holden had a connection with, passed away leaving him alienated. Through Allies death it also becomes evident that Holden can’t deal with change. His stream of consciousness continues to explain how he reacted to Allies death. “I broke all the windows in the garage.” He confirms his emotional dysfunction to such a vast change and reveals how alienation took over his life. Holden speaks using a puzzled sense of emotive language. “He’s dead now. He got leukaemia and died when we were up in Maine, on July 18, 1946. You’d have liked him.” He suggest that the reader would have liked Allie and though the rest of the scene he speaks fondly of him, though to talk of his death in such an emotionless way begins to contradict everything he is saying “He’s dead now.” Later during a conversation with his sister Phoebe he reveals that he is in fact isolated from people and the one true person he was close to has died “Just because somebody’s dead, you don’t just stop…

    • 889 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Catcher in the Rye

    • 708 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Holden meets Maurice who is a pimp. When they meet, Maurice immediately tells Holden he is lonely and needs to have some “fun.” Holden decides to take Maurice up on his offer thinking it will be good practice for him to be with a woman before he gets married. When the prostitute arrives at his room, Holden begins to judge her. He projected some of his feelings on her. He realized he did not want to have relations with her and decides to pay her but not have sex. When she asks for ten dollars, he insists that they agreed upon five dollars. Thinking that he just got out of trouble, Maurice comes in and starts to yell at Holden. While he was yelling, the prostitute takes the money. The reason that this had an effect on Holden’s personality later is he finally learns that bad stuff things sometimes happen and he needs to…

    • 708 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Holden first associates with the concept of being unable to function satisfactorily with peers. Characteristics of this stage include the following stated, “ The influence of the peer group is very strong. Most adolescents conform assiduously, as non-conformists are aggressively sought out for rejection and ridicule by the group....Thus the ability to function adequately and appropriately within it to gain the necessary social rewards is vital”(Judd, 469). He is first seen as an ignorant student before he was expelled from Pencey. He furthermore develops a marginal relationship with the students at Pencey. It’s demonstrated when Holden was chatting with Stradlater, his roommate, in the bathroom about Stradlater’s ex-girlfriend, Fitzgerald. After Stradlater insults her, Holden confronts Stradlater in a rather unusual way. “ That’s a wrestling hold, in case you don’t know, where you get the other guy around the neck and choke him to death, if you feel like it. So I did it. I landed on him like a goddamn panther” (Salinger, 30). Holden attacks Stradlater, portraying his struggle to communicate normally with his…

    • 1031 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays