Comparing Holden with his Author

After reading Salinger’s book and researching his life I have discovered that there are a number of similarities between the author’s personal life and his character, Holden.   I think it is clear that the Catcher in the Rye is autobiographical.  Salinger was a reclusive person and I believe he found the writing of this novel to be an important vehicle to express his feelings and views.  Salinger gave an interview to a school magazine in 1953 and admitted that the book was “sort of” autobiographical, explaining that the adventure of the young boy was similar to his own childhood and he went on to say that it was relief telling people about it.  Following from the success of the book there has been a continued interest in bringing the novel to the screen.  It is written that Salinger was, early in his career, keen to see his work adapted for the screen.  However, an early adaption of another of his works was critically panned and this is acknowledged as the reason he changed his position to not endorse any proposal, having received numerous offers to adapt the story for the cinema and refusing them all.  In 1999 Joyce Maynard, an American author who is also known because of her relationship with Salinger, definitively concluded: "The only person who might ever have played Holden Caulfield would have been J. D. Salinger."

The Similarities between Salinger and Holden. Both were born and raised in Manhattan, New York and they both attended preparatory, all-boys schools in Pennsylvania.

Similarly, they struggled with poor grades and were expelled from numerous colleges.  Despite Salinger’s failure with his grades, he showed competence in English writing and drama. At one school he was editor of the school newspaper. In the Catcher in the Rye, Holden shows intelligence and yet continually fails his classes.

I think physically they were similar.  Although I haven’t found anything descriptively about J D Salinger’s physical appearance, the few documented photos available online suggest that he was like Holden, who is described as six feet; two-and-a-half inches tall, is gangly, and has black hair with some gray showing.  Both Salinger and Holden had one sister, although Holden’s was a younger sibling and Salinger’s sister, Doris, was his elder.

The two of them had to struggle to come to terms with their religious faith.  Having been brought up in the Jewish faith, Salinger was disappointed that his mother had hidden that she was a catholic, a fact that he only discovered after his Bar Mitzvah. In the early at years at public school he changed his Jewish birth name of David to Jerry because it sounded less Jewish.

In the book, Holden displays his mixed feelings towards Catholics.  His meeting with two catholic nuns presents a dilemma to Holden.  He genuinely wants to donate money to them which I think symbolizes the point that he has a sincere affection towards them, perhaps a nod to his mother, yet at the end of the encounter when he offers the donation, he accidently blows cigarette smoke in the nuns faces, suggesting that, although he likes them as individuals, he is letting them know that he is still uncomfortable about Catholics.

There is another autobiographical experience that  J.D. Salinger has paralleled in his novel and that is the love for a woman who has turned him down for the affections of an older man.  In my opinion, this is perhaps the main reason that the book was written to allow his hurt and emotion to be channeled through the written word.  As I understand it, Salinger became romantically involved with Oona O'Neill, the daughter of Eugene O'Neill, the famous playwright. After a year J. D. Salinger was called up to fight in the second world war. Whilst Salinger was away fighting in the war, and despite writing to Oona daily,  Oona met the actor Charlie Chaplin whilst she was being encouraged to act in one of his films.  The two fell in love and married in 1943 despite Oona's father disapproved of his young daughter, she was only eighteen years old at the time, marrying fifty-four Mr. Chaplin.  Salinger was deeply hurt by Oona, and, apart from reacting angrily with a letter to her, I think it is clear that he has echoed his rejection through his writing.

We can see this in "The Catcher in the Rye". Holden's roommate, Stradlater, goes out on a date with Holden's childhood girlfriend, Jane Gallagher. It appears that one of Holden's anxieties about their date is that Stradlater is too old and sexually experienced for Jane. Holden is also extremely worried and nervous that  Stradlater will make sexual advances towards Jane.

Salinger has created Stradlater is the Charlie Chaplin figure, and Jane as Oona. In both situations, Salinger and Holden feel their relationship with the "Jane" in their lives is being taken away by the "Stradlater" figure.

Both Stradlater and Chaplin are older, well known, and popular. And finally, both Holden and Salinger still have strong feelings of affection for their first loves, and are jealous to hear they are dating someone else. 

There is an argument that the main reason why Salinger shaped Holden to have a hatred for Hollywood is the fact that Oona left Salinger for someone working in the entertainment industry. In the book, Holden expresses that his older brother was corrupted by writing scripts for films instead of chasing a serious livelihood writing literature. He also believes that actors and actresses in movies and plays seem too insincere, or, as Holden would describe “phony”. When  Holden meets worthy actors, he then reasons that they are too good at what they do and seem too confident as can be quoted from page 152:

"In the first place, I hate actors. They never act like people. They just think they do. Some of the good ones do, in a very slight way, but not in a way that's fun to watch. And if any actor's good, you can always tell he knows he's good, and that spoils it."

I believe Salinger was still upset from this experience with Oona and he used his intellect to attack the ‘industry’ that took away his first love.