Writing Style
The Catcher in the Rye is written in a subjective style from the point of view of its protagonist, Holden Caulfield, following his exact thought processes. There is flow in the seemingly disjointed ideas and episodes; for example, as Holden sits in a chair in his dorm, minor events such as picking up a book or looking at a table, unfold into discussions about experiences.
Critical reviews agree that the novel accurately reflected the teenage colloquial speech of the time. Words and phrases that frequently appear include:
- "Phony": Superficial, hypocritical, and pretentious
- "That killed me": I found that hilarious or astonishing
- "Flit": Homosexual
- "Flitty": Homosexual behavior
- Wuddya: (the ya slang) vernacular rendering, idiomatic
- "Crumby": Inadequate, insufficient, and/or disappointing
Read more about this topic: The Catcher In The Rye
Famous quotes containing the words writing and/or style:
“The naive notion that a mother naturally acquires the complex skills of childrearing simply because she has given birth now seems as absurd to me as enrolling in a nine-month class in composition and imagining that at the end of the course you are now prepared to begin writing War and Peace.”
—Mary Kay Blakely (20th century)
“I am so tired of taking to others
translating my life for the deaf, the blind,
the “I really want to know what your life is like without giving up any of my privileges
to live it” white women
the “I want to live my white life with Third World women’s style and keep my skin
class privileges” dykes”
—Lorraine Bethel, African American lesbian feminist poet. “What Chou Mean We, White Girl?” Lines 49-54 (1979)