The Catcher in The Rye: generosity and recklessness

          The Catcher in The Rye by J.D. Salinger takes place around the 1950s and is narrated by a sixteen year old named Holden Caulfield. Holden is unclear about where he is while telling the story but he makes it clear that he is in some sort of a mental institution. In his story, Holden has just gotten kicked out of his fourth school, Pencey Prep for failing most of his classes. His parents don't know yet, so he decides to run away to New York, his home for three days and explore before going home to face his parents. throughout the book, the reader notices many unusual combinations of qualities that belong to Holden. One of them is the fact that he is reckless but is also extremely generous. However an important philosophical question that came up was: does the good in a person overrule the bad?

         In the beginning of the book, Holden visits his elderly history teacher, Spencer, to say goodbye before leaving Pencey. Little did he know that all Spencer wanted was to admonish Holden for his lack of interest in the work given at Pencey. Because of his annoyance at everyone, Holden decides to leave school recklessly with out telling anyone. Holden then catches a train to New York and because his family is quite wealthy, he checks himself into the Edmont Hotel. Holden goes to his room, smokes a couple cigarettes, then goes to a bar and orders himself his favorite drink which is a scotch and a coke. all of these things that Holden does show his recklessness towards everything and as the book progresses he also shows his lack of ethical judgment by ordering a prostitute and not paying the supposedly correct price.

        However, even though Holden obviously has a reckless side to him, he can also show immense generosity. Holden first starts to show his generous side in the middle of the book when he is walking in the park looking for his sister Phoebe who may or may not be in school. He sees a little kid that might know her and asks. The girl doesn't know where she is but Holden offers to tie her ice skate and buys her food. Holden also shows his generosity but striking up a conversation with two nuns. He is very easy to talk to and at the end of their conversation he gives them 10 dollars which was worth a lot more in the 50s.

        Does the good in Holden overrule the bad? its not really a matter of if they overrule because every person has their flaws. I think that even though he's rude, a liar and reckless, Holden's heart is always in the right place and he always thinks of other people. So no, the good in him doesn't overrule the bad, but it doesn't matter because the good in him helps other people and the bad only destroys himself.