The Catcher in the Rye

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The Catcher in the Rye
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Background 1950s
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1950s Slang

• Back Seat Bingo
• Bad News
• Big Daddy
• Cranked
• Cruisin for a Bruisin
• Fake Out
• Get With It
• Pooper
• Razz My Berries

• Making out in a car
• Depressing person
• Older person
• Excited
• Looking for trouble
• Bad date
• Understand
• No fun at all
• Excite or impress me

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Background 1950s

• Homogenous Society
• Nuclear family
• Father as dominant role
• Mother as subservient
• Conforming to what is socially acceptable
• Unrealistic perception

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Background 1950s

• Post WWII America
• Economy in upswing after WWII
• Start of Hollywood prominence
• Full length films, news clips
• Films were escape from reality

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Background 1950s Television

• I Love Lucy
• Happy Days
• Westerns
• Leave it to Beaver
• Encouraged father as head of household,
  breadwinner
• Presents life free from problems

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Background 1950sFashion

• Women
• Poodle skirts
• Saddle shoes
• Pedal pushers
• Cashmere sweaters
• Men
• Black leather jacket
• Sweater vests
• Rolled white t- shirts
• Peg legs

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1950s ClothingWomen
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1950s Clothing Men
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1950s The Cost of Living 1958

• House
• Income
• Gas
• Stamp
• New Ford car

30,000
4,650
.24
.04
1967-3629
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1950s Music

• Elvis
• Buddy Holly
• Perry Como
• Frank Sinatra

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1950s Culture

• 1950s Home Economic Book
• Have dinner ready. Plan ahead, even the night
  before, to have a delicious meal on time. This
  is a way of letting him know that you have been
  thinking of him and are concerned about his
  needs.
• Prepare yourself. Take fifteen minutes to rest
  so that you will be refreshed when he arrives.
  Touch up your makeup, put a ribbon in your hair
  and be fresh looking. He has just been with a
  lot of work weary people. Be a little gay and a
  little more interesting. His boring day might
  need a lift.

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1950s Culture

• Some Donts Dont greet him with problems or
  complaints. Dont complain if he is late for
  dinner. Count this as minor compared to what he
  might have gone through that day. Make him
  comfortable. Have him lean back in a comfortable
  chair or suggest that he lie down in the bedroom.
  Have a cool drink ready for him. Arrange his
  pillow and offer to take off his shoes. Speak in
  a low, soft soothing pleasant voice. Allow him
  to relax and unwind.
• Make the evening his Never complain if he does
  not take you out to dinner or to other pleasant
  entertainment. Instead try to understand his
  world of strain and pressure, his need to unwind
  and relax.

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J.D. Salinger

• 1919- 2010
• Dropped out of college
• Dad sent him to Austria to learn sausage making
• Left only 1 month before Hitler took over
• Jewish
• Served in the military- WWII
• D-Day, concentration camps
• 3 brief marriages- 1 daughter and 1 son

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J.D. Salinger

• Little known about him
• Practiced Zen Buddhism other obscure branches
  of Hinduism
• Unwanted information published about him
• Said to have suffered from post traumatic stress
  syndrome from the war
• Lives as a recluse

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J.D. Salinger

• Published short story in the New Yorker
• Slight Rebellion of Madison
• Short story spawned Holden Caulfield and The
  Catcher in the Rye
• Refusal to sign rights for film adaptation
• Nine Stories 1953

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J.D. Salinger

• Published 1951
• Immediately successful- 30 weeks best seller
  list
• Somewhat autobiographical
• Most frequently banned book from 1966-75
• language and content
• parents and religious groups
• Said to corrupt youth
• 237 "goddamn," 58 "bastards, 31 "Chrissakes,"
  and 6 "fuck.
• 1970s teacher fired for teaching it

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The Catcher in the Rye

• Bildungsroman
• Novel of education moral, psychological or
  social development and growth of the main
  character, usually from childhood to maturity
• Huckleberry Finn, To Kill a Mockingbird, A Tree
  Grows in Brooklyn

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The Catcher in the Rye

• Praised for capturing the voice of an adolescent
  prep school boy
• Voice of depressed and isolated teen
• Holden idealist, moralist, romantic

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Background

• 48 hours in life of Holden
• Fails out of Pency Prep -
• leaves for NY city
• His disgust with the social norms of society
• How easily man accepts vulgar environment
• 1948-1949