Friday, May 15, 2009

"The Catcher in the Rye"- Almost a review

I just finished reading “The Catcher in the Rye” by J.D.Salinger. It was a parting gift from my juniors when I passed out from college. And now, for the review, or rather, my response to the novel:

If you think reading ahead would spoil the book for you, don’t worry. There’s nothing to be spoilt! It’s as bad a novel as can be. It was the first novel I’ve finished in over a year. I thought my lack of reading was responsible for the searing headaches I used to get after reading a few pages of this novel at night. But now I’m sure the culprit was just the novel, and not lack of novel-reading. As I lumbered my way to the final few pages and the long-anticipated climax- and I was a fool to believe that there was a climax, the 'carousel incident' being a strict non-event- my mind drifted to another death-inducing bore (Inducing sleep is a noble thing to do- ask my mum! Saas-bahu serials have gone a step further by inducing thoughtlessness- that dream of nirvana-seekers; but some books unleash a boredom so ghastly that they might induce death). I’m referring to “The Namesake”. Just as Jhumpa Lahiri had done in her literary sleeping pill, J.D.Salinger suffocated me with the insignificant travels and travails of his protagonist.

Holden, the protagonist, is an aimless teenager who gets kicked out of every good school his parents get him into. Fed up with the phonies in his school, the teachers included, he roams around in his hometown New York on his own to keep his parents from finding out that he was thrown out. Our anti-hero utters the word ‘goddam’ with an irritatingly high frequency- I couldn’t find a goddam sentence where he didn’t swear. He calls nearly everyone a phony, notwithstanding the fact that he’s the biggest phony of all- a shameless liar who's pretentious and manipulative. Narcissistic, directionless and a major drunkard, Holden’s almost a juvenile Devdas, or is at least on his way to becoming one. Reading those pages was very painful- especially considering that the book I read before this one was Rushdie’s “Midnight’s Children” and the one I’m reading now is Orhan Pamuk’s “My name is Red”.

They say that “The Catcher in the Rye” is a book about adolescent angst. That, the phony that Holden really is weary about, is ‘adulthood’. Bollocks I say. Good ideas and noble intentions cannot make up for bad writing and the utter insignificance of what’s being described- I would have thrashed this book even if I had read it as an adolescent. Here’s someone who shares my views about this nightmare novel.

But yes, nothing ever goes in vain- this bad little book got me blogging again- reading sure helps me shrug of my laziness to write.

22 comments:

Abhinav Maurya said...

Though I started with the book about a month back, I did not get past a few pages having switched to another book I considered a better waste of my time. ;-)

And hey, you're back and blogging again! Capital!

Joey said...

I cannot believe you hated the book.I know it's strange, but it's one of the coolest books I've read.It's practically a poem about having no focus and not really fitting in.
Holden is acutely aware of the fact that he's a phony, which probably makes him madder at the world.
Read it again,you might just see that.
Now I'm going to stop because I'm attacking you on your blog and my comment is getting longer than the post!

Amogh said...

I'm aware that Holden knows, but that doesn't help endear him to me as a character. I would have still been ok if I hated Holden or any of the other characters, but all I had for them all was indifference. And yes, I agree- there was no need for a 200-page novel- a short poem on the subject would have sufficed :D

ovrwkdundrpd said...

Hey..just wondering..is this Amogh..Kulkarni perhaps? from VJTI?..If it is..then this is really weird and arbit..but in a nice way:)

Abhinav Maurya said...

BTW, The Namesake was a wonderful read, at least for me. I think we should not read without patience the fruits of great labour.

goyalakshay said...

Hi Amogh,
I beg to differ with ur views on this buk. Maybe u dint like it coz u cudnt corelate with it. Maybe u dint like it bcoz there is no climax or any interesting twist towards the end. Just try readin it once again, do not keep expectations from it like a thriller movie which keeps u glued to the seat. Do not expect any message from it. Jus consider it as a portrayal of adolescent life....u may like it then !!!

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