English, Analytical Essay, Catcher in the Rye and Huckleberry Finn
Huckleberry Finn and The Catcher in the Rye essay
The novels ‘The Adventure of Huckleberry Finn’ and ‘The Catcher in the Rye’ are both set in times where the expectations of society differed from the ones of today. Huckleberry Finn is set in the late 1800s, pre USA civil war and in a time where slavery was an accepted occurrence and the escape of a slave was seen as legally and morally wrong. This was also a time in which church attendance and education were seen as tokens of respectability. A young boy, the eponymous character, Huck, seeks to reject all that he regards as oppressive and cruel in order to establish an alternative life as a wanderer, far from adult control. ‘The Catcher in the Rye’, on the other hand, was set in the late 1940s, a time when teenagers were just beginning to gain their own lives and being allowed more freedom than ever before. The picaresque novel gives the reader an insight into middleclass life in New York in the 50s and how one boy felt trapped by the expectations of his parents and school. His period of comparative freedom leads to unexpected consequences as he falls victim to depression and eventual supervision in an institution, putting paid forever to his dreams of freedom. Both novels present the themes of freedom and escape and the selected extracts portray incidents in the characters’ lives which focus on this theme.
In both of the extracts, the characters are pretending to be someone else, Huckleberry Finn a young girl and Holden Caulfield taking a false identity. The reader may infer from this that by assuming a different and fake identity, the two boys can escape from their own lives; ones that are full of problems and worries. Escaping their lives allows them both to live a little more freely, even if just for a little while. However, Huckleberry Finn and Holden take on their new identities for different reasons. For instance, Huckleberry Finn assumes the alternative identity in order to travel across town without
The novels ‘The Adventure of Huckleberry Finn’ and ‘The Catcher in the Rye’ are both set in times where the expectations of society differed from the ones of today. Huckleberry Finn is set in the late 1800s, pre USA civil war and in a time where slavery was an accepted occurrence and the escape of a slave was seen as legally and morally wrong. This was also a time in which church attendance and education were seen as tokens of respectability. A young boy, the eponymous character, Huck, seeks to reject all that he regards as oppressive and cruel in order to establish an alternative life as a wanderer, far from adult control. ‘The Catcher in the Rye’, on the other hand, was set in the late 1940s, a time when teenagers were just beginning to gain their own lives and being allowed more freedom than ever before. The picaresque novel gives the reader an insight into middleclass life in New York in the 50s and how one boy felt trapped by the expectations of his parents and school. His period of comparative freedom leads to unexpected consequences as he falls victim to depression and eventual supervision in an institution, putting paid forever to his dreams of freedom. Both novels present the themes of freedom and escape and the selected extracts portray incidents in the characters’ lives which focus on this theme.
In both of the extracts, the characters are pretending to be someone else, Huckleberry Finn a young girl and Holden Caulfield taking a false identity. The reader may infer from this that by assuming a different and fake identity, the two boys can escape from their own lives; ones that are full of problems and worries. Escaping their lives allows them both to live a little more freely, even if just for a little while. However, Huckleberry Finn and Holden take on their new identities for different reasons. For instance, Huckleberry Finn assumes the alternative identity in order to travel across town without