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The Catcher in the Rye

by J. D. Salinger

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Holden's Relationship with Stradlater in The Catcher in the Rye

Summary:

In The Catcher in the Rye, the fight between Holden Caulfield and Stradlater arises from Holden's jealousy and protectiveness over Jane Gallagher, a girl he cares about. Stradlater, described as handsome and entitled, goes on a date with Jane, prompting Holden to imagine the worst and become enraged. Holden's feelings of inadequacy and disdain for Stradlater's superficial charm exacerbate the situation. This conflict reveals Holden's impulsive, jealous, and alienated nature, highlighting his struggle with adolescence and societal norms.

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In The Catcher in the Rye, what causes the fight between Holden and Stradlater?

Holden has issues with sex and manhood, and both are issues when he learns that Stradlater and Jane are going on a date.  Since he can't communicate his disapproval of the match to them or himself, he lashes out in childish behavior, knowing full well that he will be punished the bully Stradlater.

First, Holden does not want the adult world to encroach on his childhood innocence.  He's in a state of maturation denial.  And he doesn't want others to reach adulthood either, especially a childhood girlfriend like Jane.  Stradlater clearly believes the opposite: he uses sex as a means to experience the adult world sooner than he should.  So, when Holden learns that Jane is about to cross the threshold from childhood to adulthood by losing her virginity to Stradlater, he expresses hostility.

Holden also is a masochist.  He likes to see himself be victimized by other males in...

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an effort to protect children and girls.  He's playing the role ofJames Castle here: a chilvarous defender of innocence.  Later, Holden will get beat up by Maurice because he refused to pay Sunny.  In both cases, Holden likes to see himself bloody: it's a overture to suicide.  He's a character in his own sadistic gangster film in which the bullies of adulthood beat up the innocent victims.  Again, all of this is repressive behavior in an effort to remain in childhood.

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In The Catcher in the Rye, Holden starts a fight with Stradlater after Stradlater returns from a date with Jane.  Holden really likes Jane, and he becomes enraged when Stradlater starts bad-mouthing her.  This is the outward reason for the fight between the two of them; however, it is likely that Holden has some deep-seated rage regarding Stradlater.  First, Holden knows--even though he does not admit--that Stradlater is much more attractive than he is, so he feels a bit jealous that Stradlater is able to use his good looks to attract girls.  Holden does not feel like he is a match for Stradlater, so he never even attempts to ask Jane out on a date.  Next, Holden has much respect for girls, but Stradlater does not, so Holden is angry that girls still choose to go out with Stradlater even though he carries a low regard for them.  So, Holden is generally angered by the fact that people are able to get by quite well on their appearance rather than on the merit of their character.

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In Chapter 4, Stradlater asks Holden to write a composition for him because he hasn't done the reading required to write the paper. Then he discusses his upcoming with Jane, an old friend of Holden's. Holden begins giving information about what Jane was interested in: ballet, checkers, golf, etc. Holden is convinced that Stradlater is not interested in any of this. "Only the sexy stuff interested him." Holden becomes concerned that Stradlater is only going out with Jane to take advantage of her. Holden is being thoughtful but he's also being judgmental, thinking that Jane can't take care of herself. 

Stradlater returns and reads the composition Holden has written for him. Stradlater criticizes it and Holden tears it up. Since Stradlater left for his date with Jane, Holden had been building up his anxiety and distrust toward Stradlater. The fact that Stradlater was less than appreciative of Holden's work made Holden even more angry. Stradlater playfully punches Holden in the shoulder. Holden continues to press him about what happened on the date. Holden asks Stradlater if he "gave her the time" and Stradlater replies that this is a "professional secret." By this time, Holden, feeling like Jane's protector, generally unhappy with Stradlater's attitude, and frustrated in general at being kicked out of school, finally snaps: 

This next part I don't remember so hot. All I know is I got up from the bed, like I was going down to the can or something, and then I tried to sock him, with all my might, right smack in the toothbrush, so it would split his goddam throat open. Only, I missed. I didn't connect. All I did was sort of get him on the side of the head or something. 

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What does Holden's fight with Stradlater in The Catcher in the Rye reveal about his character?

In chapter six, Stradlater takes Jane, for whom Holden has a soft spot, out on a date. The whole time they are out, Holden gets himself more and more worked up, thinking that Stradlater would take advantage of Jane. To add insult to injury, when Stradlater gets back, he tells Holden that he didn't like the essay which Holden had written for him.

To make matters worse, Stradlater gets evasive when Holden tries to ask him how the evening went, adding to Holden's impression that something untoward had happened between Stradlater and Jane. At this point, all hell breaks loose in Holden's mind, and he hits Stradlater.

If I had to pick two words from this scene to describe Holden's character, they would be impulsive and jealous. The fact that Stradlater and Jane are out having a good time has clearly gotten under Holden's skin, and the fact that he had a history with Jane doubtless played a part in this. However, he had no right to allow his jealousy to cloud his responses to Stradlater.

Holden shows off his impulsiveness in a negative way when he starts a fight with Stradlater, simultaneously taking a swing at him and verbally assaulting him. This was a complete overreaction to assumptions that he was making about Jane and Stradlater's date.

As the old saying goes, jealously makes you nasty, and it is apparent that Holden did not approve of Jane—for whom he clearly has some residual feelings—spending time with Stradlater.

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The episode illustrates just how alienated Holden is from society. Stradlater's "crime" in Holden's eyes is being a fully paid-up member of that society, with all the "phoniness" that entails. There's a twinge of jealousy here, expressive of a general immaturity on Holden's part. Stradlater's insinuations over what he got up to with Jane Gallagher make Holden feel kind of left out. Holden's reaction is way over the top; his repeatedly calling Stradlater a moron tells us more about Holden than it does about his sworn enemy.

Holden knows full well how different he is from everyone else, how distant and apart he is from a society he neither cares for nor understands. But he doesn't like to be reminded of that fact—to have someone rub it in, as it were—especially not by a grade-A phony like Stradlater.

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In the novel "Catcher In The Rye" by J D Salinger, the author shows the intense dislike that Holden Caulfield shows towards fellow school mate Stradlater. Holden seems to be of the opinion that Stradlater is a "phony" - now he thinks he is a "moron" as well.

Caulfield seems to think that Stradlater (and all the other rich boys except himself) are part of a fake establishment structure which he wants no part of. He thinks that in reality Stradlater is a "secret slob." He feels superior. He has the typical adolescent difficulty in expressing himself,only worse. S when he finds out about Stradlater's episode with "his" girl, he cannot get his feelings out quick enough which results in a fight. He has to resort to repetition, calling Stradlater the same name repeatedly. This demonstrates Holden's arrogance/insecurity.

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This fight happens in Chapter 6.  It is caused by the fact that Stradlater is implying that he had sex with Jane Gallagher, or at least went and made out with her in the coach's car.  The fight tells us a couple of things, in my opinion.

First, it tells us that Holden has this old fashioned view of women.  He thinks that it is his place to try to fight someone who has been making out with a girl he likes.  He is either being chivalrous (nice interpretation) or very possessive -- implying she belongs to him.

Second, it tells us that Holden is really immature.  He keeps calling Stradlater a moron.  He says Stradlater is a moron because he doesn't want to discuss things.  But it's not clear why Stradlater should talk about what exactly he did in the car with Jane.  At any rate, Holden just keeps calling him a moron over and over, which seems pretty immature to me.

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Holden has the idea that he is cowardly, but when he starts a fight with Stradlater he shows the reader, if not himself, that he can be courageous under the right circumstances. Stradlater is not only bigger and stronger than Holden but one of the school's superior athletes.

Ed Banky was the basketball coach at Pencey. Old Stradlater was one of his pets, because he was the center on the team, and Ed Banky always let him borrow his car when he wanted it.

This is not the only time Holden shows courage. He stands up to the bellhop on principle, refusing to pay him an extra five dollars extortion money, although Maurice is an older man, obviously much stronger and tougher, and Holden is alone in a strange hotel.

In both cases Holden has altercations with men who are bigger, stronger, and tougher than he is, because he is acting emotionally and on impulse.

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Why did Holden write Stradlater's composition in The Catcher in the Rye?

When Holden's roommate Stradlater asks him to ghost-write a descriptive composition for him, Holden's answer shows a lot about his character as well as why he is flunking out.

"If I get the time, I will. If I don't I won't," I said.

Holden has to be in the mood to do anything. Then if he does it, he does it his way. He is a nonconformist. When he finally gets around to writing Stradlater's composition, he only does it because he is thinking about his dead brother and sees how he could write that "descriptive composition" about Allie.

Anyway, that's what I wrote Stradlater's composition about. Old Allie's baseball mitt. I happened to have it with me, in my suitcase, so I got it out and copied down the poems that were written on it. . . I wasn't too crazy about doing it, but I couldn't think of anything else descriptive. Besides, I sort of liked writing about it.

One of Holden's problems is that he lacks self-discipline. He attends classes when he feels like it and plays hookie when he doesn't. He reads the assigned books if they interest him; otherwise, he ignores them. This pretty much explains why he has flunked out of three prestigious prep schools. Holden always does well in his English classes because he has a natural talent for writing. J. D. Salinger needed to emphasize that Holden is a good writer, as well as a habitual reader of the books that appeal to him, in order to make it plausible that this sixteen-year-old boy could have been the putative author of The Catcher in the Rye. This rambling, episodic, irreverent, and enormously popular novel sounds like the work of a talented adolescent nonconformist. 

When Stradlater returns from his date and reads the composition he was hoping to turn in as his own work, he explodes.

"You always do everything backasswards." He looked at me. "No wonder you're flunking the hell out of here," he said. "You don't do one damn thing the way you're supposed to. I mean it. Not one damn thing."

Holden must realize that Stradlater is telling him the plain truth. Otherwise, he would not be quoting him when he comes to write The Catcher in the Rye.

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In The Catcher in the Rye, what happened to the composition Holden wrote for Stradlater?

It is ironic that Holden Caulfield is flunking out of Pencey Prep and yet that he is writing a composition for his roommate Stradlater, who is a star athlete and is regarded as a good student. Holden must have written his composition about the baseball glove in longhand, because we learn later that another boy has borrowed Holden's typewriter and buys it from him just before Holden leaves for New York.

Stradlater is irate when he reads the composition and finally understands that it is about a baseball glove.

"All of a sudden, he said, "For Chrissake, Holden. This is about a goddamn baseball glove."

Stradlater is afraid that if Holden writes a composition for him it might look "too good." This composition about a baseball glove with quotations written all over it might seem to fall into that category. 

"So what?" I said. Cold as hell.

"Wuddaya mean so what?" I told you it had to be about a goddam room or a house or something."

We can see what sort of a composition Stradlater would turn out if he had to write it himself.

The argument escalates until Holden says:

"All right, give it back to me, then." I went over and pulled it right out of his goddam hand. Then I tore it up....I just threw the pieces in the wastebasket.

As Stradlater says, Holden can't even seem to conform when he is ghostwriting a composition for another student to submit as his own work. The quarrel, which turns into a real physical fight, shows that Holden is a nonconformist who is his own worst enemy. It also shows that Holden is such a good writer that he is capable of writing a whole novel like The Catcher in the Rye. Holden is sensitive about the composition he wrote for Stradlater for nothing because it is about his younger brother Allie who died of leukemia. Stradlater did not realize what a gift Holden was giving him.

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What did Holden write in Stradlater's composition in The Catcher in the Rye?

"The Catcher in the Rye" is supposedly being written in the first person by a sixteen-year-old boy. J. D. Salinger needed to persuade the reader that Holden was capable of writing an entire "autobiographical" book, even though he was a poor student and was actually getting kicked out of school because of his bad grades. The incident involving the composition about Allie's baseball glove and the fight with Stradlater is intended to establish that Holden has a talent for writing--but only when he feels like writing and only when he can choose the topic. The reader is intrigued by the dramatic aspect of the quarrel with Stradlater and hardly realizes that he is being cunningly conditioned to believe that Holden is capable of writing "The Catcher in the Rye," a book full of subtle observations about people and about life in general.

Holden's decision to write about a baseball glove, a subject Stradlater considers unacceptable, leads to their fight, which is one of the factors leading to all the subsequent events in the novel:

"All of a sudden, I decided what I'd really do, I'd get the hell out of Pencey--right that same night and all. I mean not wait till Wednesday or anything.

It is probably significant that Holden sells his typewriter to Frederick Woodruff before leaving Pencey. This may be intended to explain why he doesn't write about his adventures and misadventures in New York until some time after these events have occurred. Salinger probably wanted to establish a temporal perspective and not risk having the reader assume that Holden was writing something like a diary or journal. The reader wants to know not only what happened but how it all ended and what it all meant. Selling the typewriter also allows Holden to establish that he is "loaded" with money because of his grandmother's generosity and can afford to spend several days and nights in Manhattan.

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When Holden's roommate, Ward Stradlater, requested him to write his English composition for him, he didn't specify a subject.

"Anything. Anything descriptive. A room. Or a house... Just make it descriptive as hell."

What Stradlater did not expect was that Holden would write about his late brother's baseball glove. Holden's younger brother, Allie, had died of leukemia several years before, and Allie was one of the few people about whom Holden has nothing bad to say. He worshipped the memory of Allie, and he kept Allie's left-handed mitt in his suitcase. The glove was covered with poems which Allie had written on it so he could read them when he became bored in the outfield. When Stradlater complained about the subject matter--"a goddam baseball glove"--Holden took it from him, tore it up and threw it in the trash. 

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What is Stradlater's criticism of Holden in The Catcher in the Rye?

Before Stadlater goes on his date with Jane Gallagher, he asks Holden if he can write his English composition for him. Holden agrees to write the composition and Stradlater tells him that it needs to be descriptive about something like a room or house. Instead of writing about a specific room or building, Holden writes about his deceased brother Allie's baseball glove. Allie's glove has various poems written all over it and is something Holden deeply cherishes. Despite Stradlater's directions, Holden proceeds to write the composition describing his brother's unique glove. When Stradlater returns from his date, he takes a look at Holden's composition and says, "For Chrissake, Holden. This is about a goddam baseball glove" (Salinger, 22). Stradlater proceeds to criticize Holden's ability to listen and follow directions. Stradlater also tells Holden,

"You always do everything backasswards...No wonder you're flunking the hell out of here...You don't do one damn thing the way you're supposed to. I mean it. Not one damn thing" (Stradlater, 22).

Holden responds by ripping up his composition and throwing it in the garbage. A few moments later, Holden begins to ask Stradlater about his date with Jane Gallagher and the two boys end up getting into a brief physical altercation.

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Why does Holden fight with Stradlater in The Catcher in the Rye?

The main reason Holden gets into a fight with Stradlater is that he is in love with Jane Gallagher and consequently jealous of Stradlater. Holden understands and appreciates Jane, as shown by the fact that he writes about her many times throughout his book. He knows that Stradlater is too much of an egotist, too much of a sexual predator, to appreciate a nice, sensitive, vulnerable girl like Jane. Holden feels protective and somewhat possessive of her. He knows exactly how Stradlater is going to behave with her when he gets he in the car, and he doesn’t know whether Jane can cope with such an aggressive and experienced young man. Holden’s strong feelings about Jane are revealed by the way he starts a fight with an opponent he can’t possibly beat. Stradlater is rather stupid. He can’t even understand why Holden should be angry at him. He thinks Holden must be a little bit crazy. Nobody can really understand Holden very well, with the possible exceptions of Jane Gallagher and his little sister Phoebe.

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The first thing that upsets Holden before the fight is Stradlater's reaction to the essay about Allie's baseball glove which Holden keeps with him. The glove is covered with Allie's poems and is probably the best keepsake That Holden has of his brother.

The other thing that is bothering Holden is the thought of Stradlater being alone with Jane Gallagher. Holden was obviously very fond of Jane and shows some irritation when Stradlater refers to her as "Jean". Holden asks Stradlater "What'd you do?" "Give her the time in Ed Banky's goddam car?"  Holden says his voice was "shaking something awful". Holden is starting to unravel because of the rejection of his very personal essay and the thought of Jane Gallagher being treated badly by Stradlater so he tries to punch Stradlater which begins the fight.

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