Catching High Schoolers by Ashley

Catching High Schoolers by Ashley - February 2015 Scholarship Essay

One book every high schooler should read before they graduate is, Catcher in the Rye, by J. D. Salinger. There are many themes in this book that I feel like a high schooler should pay attention to. The first one is lying and deception. We see in the book that Holden doesn’t like the people who lie to him, but we see him doing the same thing. He doesn’t realize how people are affected by his lies and I think that is important for high schoolers to learn. One lie can ruin a person’s perception of you and you may not be trusted ever again. Holden never seems to learn this lesson through his hypocrisy.

Another theme is the pain of growing up, and this is a great theme to read about in high school. For example in the scene with the Museum of Natural History, Holden doesn’t like change and he doesn’t like that it’s not simple. He would rather stay immature and live life simply. This book isn’t not saying that growing up is bad, but when you’re a teenager you’re stuck between being an adult or child. Holden has these thoughts of staying immature and being a child running through a field of rye, because adulthood will end in death. This theme is perfect for high schoolers because teenagers go through the struggle of acting like a child, and growing up to be an adult. I think this book helps a high schooler to realize that they are not the only one with these thoughts, and being in high school is one of the hardest times of our lives. Holden expresses his fear of death, and everyone has those thoughts. Growing up is hard, and I think that Holden is the embodiment of that.

Adulthood is the last theme of the book, and I believe is perfect for high schoolers to catch on to. In the book, Holden describes adulthood as a bunch of “phoniness.” Holden says that adults are superficial, and hypocrites. He doesn’t realize that he is a hypocrite as well because he falls into the same category of lying to people around him. Catcher in the Rye tells us as high schoolers that there will always be hypocrisy in the world. How we choose to deal with it, is how we can fix it. Holden goes through many situations that put these thoughts in his head, but he wasn’t mentally capable to fix them. This book helps high schoolers to see that there may not be any fix to any problem in life, we just need to realize them, and try our hardest respect everyone around us.