IF YOU REALLY WANT TO KNOW THE TRUTH
or
THE SOLUTION OF THE "QUIZ"
WRONG |
RIGHT | |
1. |
Having been expelled from Fencey Prep | actually, from Pencey Prep - the first clue that there is something wrong with this summary (but maybe this guy was just in a hurry...) |
2. |
Spencer tries to sell Holden an old Navajo blanket | Rubbish! At the beginning of chapter 2 Holden remembers an incident in which Spencer showed them a beat-up Navajo blanket which the teacher liked a lot |
3. |
Ossenburger, an "old fart" | well, he was, in a sense, but actually it is an allusion to this funny incident described at the beginning of chapter 3 in which old Marsalla "damn near blew the roof off"... |
4. |
Ackley, a sensitive boy whom Holden admires. | on the contrary |
5. |
An argument flares up between the two boys about Jane Gallagher, Mr Ossenburger's stepdaughter | Argument? Yes, but there is absolutely no connexion between Ossenburger and Jane |
6. |
On the train to New York he has a conversation with a woman who turns out to be Mrs Yester... | Her name is actually Mrs Morrow (To)Morrow - Yester(day) (Boy, that was a tricky one...) |
7. |
... Mrs Yester, the mother of one of the few classmates he likes | On the contrary: Holden describes him in a very negative way. The best
characterization is the following simile which I always chuckle at:
"Sensitive. That killed me. That guy Morrow was about as sensitive as a goddam toilet seat." |
8. |
he dances with three girls from Seattle and has a heated discussion with one of them about the Statue of Liberty | The discussion bit is nonsense, but at the same time it is a nice allusion to yet another one of Holden's beautiful similes: he thinks one of them is a bad dancer and says she was like "dragging the Statue of Liberty around the floor" (chapter 10) |
9. |
eventually Jane annoyed him by constantly putting all his kings in the back row. | actually, Jane is famous for her habit of not taking her kings out of the back row... |
10. |
Later he has an argument with a prostitute and her pimp about the impending dollar crisis. | Maurice and Sunny claim Holden owes them five bucks |
11. |
he meets two nuns. After an enchanting conversation he inexplicably tries to steal their straw baskets. | total nonsense (the nuns do have a straw basket, though) |
12. |
Then he has a date with Sally Hayes, a rather plump girl ... | Sally is definitely not plump ... |
13. |
... who considers herself an ice-skating champion. | ... and she doesn't exactly consider herself an ice-skating champion either (see chapter 17) |
14. |
Holden tries to persuade her to drive with him to Vermont in the near future and live in a cabin camp in the woods; reluctantly she agrees. | He does try to persuade her at first, but she thinks the idea is totally absurd |
15. |
Holden eventually admits that he liked playing baseball with his brother Allie in a rye field near a duck pond in the vicinity of Central Park South. | Holden would like to be the catcher in the rye in Robert Burns' poem (chapter 22) |
16. |
Holden then visits a former teacher of his, Mr Antolini. However, he has to leave rather suddenly because the spaghetti served by Mrs Antolini have a devastating effect on his stomach. | forget the spaghetti: Holden does visit Antolini, but he leaves because Antolini pats him on the head while he is sleeping on the couch |
17. |
In the morning, suffering from diarrhea and vainly attempting to get a lift from the Holland Tunnel to the West | he does have diarrhoea, but he only thinks of going down to the Holland Tunnel to hitchhike to the West |
18. |
Unfortunately, the principal catches him writing obscene words on the school walls and threatens to call the police. | Could anyone possibly have read the novel and not realize this is
ridiculous? Holden tries to rub off some "Fuck you"s |
19. |
After a while he finally does meet Phoebe; she drags a big suitcase with her, intending to go West with him. When, however, she inadvertently opens it, thus spilling all her belongings on the ground, they decide to go to the carrousel in Central Park instead. | The suitcase bit is okay, but she does not open it, and Holden checks it in the checkroom of the museum |
20. |
Phoebe goes for a ride on it, although she claims she is too small. | she claims she is too big |
21. |
Holden just watches her falling off now and then ... | Actually, he is AFRAID that she might fall off |
22. |
... until the smoke from his cigarette gets in his eyes ... | Rubbish! The song they play on the carrousel is "Smoke Gets in Your Eyes" |
23. |
... and he decides to take a Greyhound bus to California in order to visit his brother D.B. in Hollywood ... | he has to go to the California resthome |
24. |
... and possibly collaborate with him on writing movie scripts. | That's about the last thing Holden would want to do - he hates the movies |
*
Back to
the summary
(CATCHER:
internal aspects)
Praise for
the "Summary"
or:
"...there is inconsistency"
(Now that's an
understatement if ever I saw one)
Below you'll find some
comments people
wrote to me who realized there was something decidedly odd about my
summary. (I have left out their names, of
course.) |
|
* |
© 1999-2004 by Bernd Wahlbrinck, Home of the
Wadel, Germany. |