The Catcher In The Rye Analysis

Three seconds remain in the tied basketball game. The point guard shoots and scores right before the buzzer sounds off. I bet for a long time, that player worked hard in the gym to practice and perfect his shooting for game time situations like that. It just goes to show that nothing great can ever be achieved without hard work. Holden Caulfield from The Catcher In The Rye, however, does not quite understand this saying. In the story, Holden does not apply himself to his education at Pencey Prep, which results in his expulsion from school. Throughout the story, Holden, as well as a few other characters, represent the terms expressed in Freud’s Theory of Personality known as the id, superego, and ego. According to Freud, the id operates on the pleasure principle and serves as the storage area for our desires. In The Catcher
Holden’s little sister, Phoebe, represents the superego by far. “That’s all I’d do all day. I’d just be the catcher in the rye and all. I know it’s crazy.” (Chapter 22) This line expresses Holden’s superego very well. As Holden walks around town late at night, he decides to sneak into his apartment building to visit Phoebe. After he wakes her up, he tells her about his expulsion from school, at which she becomes angry towards him. Phoebe acts as the Superego here because of how much Holden loves her and always tries to act as the best big brother possible. He considers her the only reason he wants to do better for himself. Mr. Spencer, Holden’s history teacher, acts as the superego as well. For Holden, school served as the only place where he had to actually follow some rules, and Mr. Spencer was one of the people that enforced them. Even after Holden receives expulsion from school, Mr. Spencer still scolds him for his lack of commitment to his schoolwork, but Holden does not stick around to