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Dean Moran

Dean Moran is probably the ultimate role model for how to deal with bullies. Throughout the chapter “Maggot,” Jason gets several choices for dealing with it from people around him, ranging from his teacher’s somewhat cryptic advice to his bus driver’s idea to “slice his tendons.” I think the most important advice he receives is from Holly Deblin and Dean Moran. While his teacher’s note is nice, it’s somewhat vague and it doesn’t stick as well as “Don’t let dickheads define who you are.” Norman Bates’ idea is even worse, as it would’ve landed Jason in jail. Holly’s advice provides a neat summary of what Dean exemplifies: not caring what “they” think. Dean doesn’t try to fit in with them, and he hardly reacts to whatever they do. At the beginning of the chapter, Jason does the opposite, and shows that he cares what they think about him. However, we can see at the end of “Maggot” when Jason is attacked and later in “Goose Fair” when he’s approached that Jason follows Dean’s example. H...
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Sylvie is better than Martha Stewart

Sylvie is not knowledgeable about houses. Her inexperience is understandable, as she lives a transient lifestyle, never staying in one place for too long. As a newcomer to domestic life, she experiences a steep learning curve for housekeeping. She often goes through the motions of homemaking without understanding why or how to do it well.             The best analogy I can imagine for Sylvie’s housekeeping is the music of a band called The Shaggs; Sylvie is to housekeeping what The Shaggs are to music. Sylvie is a transient, forced into domestic life by circumstance, and The Shaggs were three sisters forced into music by their father. Sylvie has a surface understanding of the things people do to maintain their houses, does not understand what purposes they serve. As a result, she attempts to keep the house, but often does things that seem bizarre. For example, she understands that houses are supposed to be swept, but not where o...
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Esther and Holden: Best Buds Maybe

Holden and Esther would probably get along well if they met. First, they both constantly need to criticize and point out everything wrong with the world. Holden could easily follow Esther’s criticisms of Buddy as a “hypocrite,” as it so similar to Holden’s signature insult, “phony.” Esther and Holden also might make each other feel less “crazy” by validating one another’s perspectives. For example, they both feel that there is something wrong with the way 1950s society treats women, even if they do not exactly have the vocabulary to describe it. Such views can be seen in Holden’s conversation about Jane Gallagher, and much more strongly throughout the entirety of The Bell Jar. They might disagree about other matters, however. Holden tends to be dismissive of any kind of formalized event: he lays into everything from the football game to the Christmas performance. While Esther often skips these events, it is not necessarily because she dislikes them, finds them “phony” or thinks th...
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Catcher in The Rye

Catcher in the Rye has been an uncomfortably relatable read for me. At the beginning of the book, I felt refreshed by Holden’s perspective and his readiness to call people out for being “phony.” But of course, every angsty teen relates to this aspect of Holden. As the book progressed, however, I began to see myself in Holden in a way that I didn’t like. First, there was Holden’s outward façade of “not caring,” covering up that he cares deeply. For example, Holden pretends not to care about who Stradlater was going on a date with and jokes with him, but he can no longer hide it when he finds out it is Jane Gallagher. If he really didn’t care, would he have “nearly dropped dead” or gotten in a fistfight with Stradlater? Second, there’s his fear of growing up. He expresses his fear through his self-sabotaging behavior and lack of any ideas or plans for the future. While my behavior isn’t nearly as extreme as his, the underlying feelings behind it were too familiar.
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Big Boy Stevie

A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man follows a pattern of ending each chapter with a climactic ending which shows Stephen's development in a serious fashion. Chapter one ends with “the fellows” cheering for Stephen’s accomplishment and lifting him onto their shoulders. The next chapter ends with his “romantic encounter” with a prostitute, the third with his confession and spiritual reawakening, and the fourth with his epiphany on the beach. The climax tends to resolve the conflict Stephen has faced in the chapter. In the first chapter, for example, Stephen struggles to be accepted by the other children at his school. His frustration reaches fever pitch when he father Dolan unfairly punishes him in front of his class. He bravely faces his fears and confronts his teacher. When he tells his classmates what he did, they cheer loudly and lift him up. Portrait also follows a pattern of undermining each climactic moment at the beginning of the next chapter, seemingly as a remind...
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What is "Coming of Age"

On the first day of discussion in the “Coming of Age Novel” course, we talked about what it means to come of age. The meaning of the phrase should be useful, after all, since we plan to talk about various examples of it for an entire semester. We hardly reached a clear consensus, however. Some people held the idea that a coming of age is a clear-cut event or ordeal after which you are an adult. This idea is upheld by many cultural traditions. My grandpa was a Boy Scout back in the 1950s. To join the Order of the Arrow, a national honor society for scouts, he had to complete an “ordeal,” which involved staying in the woods overnight, building his own shelter, and preparing his own food with few supplies. Though the ordeal wasn’t explicitly a coming of age ceremony, it’s a good example of a specific event which is supposed to change someone profoundly. However, most people seemed to agree that coming of age is more of a process. Even a major experience can shape a person throughout...
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