“The Catcher in the Rye” by J.D. Salinger should be taught in High school because this work includes the psychological moments appropriate to the age of high school.
J.D. Salinger is one of the most famous representatives of the New York literary school of 1940 – 60-ies of the XX-th century. His works which are a little bit nervous and emotional surrender the reader in to the limits of the world he does not want to leave. Every character is lonely among the people; he is lonely in his unique nature and unusual understanding of the world.
Literature is very individual thing and everybody understands it in different ways. That is why the age for learning the literary texts is different. But think that it is very important to define the appropriate age. Every teacher should take into account this moment. In addition the social position of every pupil should also be taken into consideration in order to find the best way of explanation of the events that take part in the work.
“The Catcher in the Rye” is the American bestseller of the post-war period, but this novel is of current issue even today. The main character of the novel Holden Caulfield goes against social values of that time and tries to save the human individuality and personal features. In order to embody this idea the author of the novel uses the special lexicon, which is highly emotional – the dialect of teen-agers (slang), rich of special words and curses: “Even the couple of nice teachers on the faculty, they were phonies, too. There was this one old guy, Mr. Spencer. His wife was always giving you hot chocolate and all that stuff, and they were really pretty nice.” So, it is very interesting for teen-agers to read something that is very close to their life, and especially when it is possible to speak about this with their teacher at the lesson.
The second moment that is going to prove the statement is that there are many interesting situations in the book that are close to the life of teen-agers. For example many of them want to leave their house because of some problems with their parents and the book shows all the results of this.
The main character is ‘ill with maximalism’ and it is really so and many young people of such age suffer the same. In that age every person wants to treat society of many diseases and as a result it appears that it is impossible. That is the main disappointment of life.
The book shows the family relationship and the problem of trust and understanding: “I said I’m not going back to school. You can do what you want to do, but I’m not going back to school,’ she said. “so, shut up” It was the first time she ever told me to shut up. It sounded terrible. God, it sounded terrible. It sounded worse than swearing. She still would not look at me either, and every time I sort of put my hand on her shoulder or something, she would not let me”. These are the words from the talk of brother and sister and it is possible to say that they afraid to lose each other because they appreciate family relationship and love.
I think that this book would bring everything the young people need though he language they understand best of all and that is why this book should be taught in high school.