Cather in the Rye

NO QUIET PLACE

SALINGER AND POST TRAUMATIC STRESS SYNDROME

By Stephen Wilson

         

'That's the whole trouble. You can't even find a place that's peaceful, because

there is not any.' laments Salinger's central hapless character, Holden Caulfield,

from the classic novel 'Catcher in the Rye.' A young 14 year schoolboy from

Abhazi certainly knows how Holden felt. He decided to visit the countryside

to seek out a peaceful place where he could read his favorite novel - 'Catcher

in the Rye ' and failed to find a place. Instead, he was detained by the Russian

border police for illegally entering Russia. When questioned by the police on

how he had stumbled into Russia, the teenager told the bemused police ;

"I was looking for a quiet spot to read my favorite novel 'Catcher in the Rye".

Well accidents do happen. So the police accepted his explanation and let him

go. The boy was obviously gripped by Salinger's novel and he is hardly alone.

Many Russians I have spoken to tell me how Salinger's novel left an indelible

impression. For instance, fans of Robert Burns are flattered to learn the title of

the novel was inspired by an old song of Robert Burns, school students who

feel alienated, misunderstood and expelled from school can easily identify with

the hero and people who who are brave enough to ask deep questions are

all enchanted by the novel. American school teachers were fired from schools

for teaching this book in the 1970's. Love or loathe it, there is something about

the novel which evokes the most powerful emotions in our souls. Of course, not

everyone adores the novel. A 17 year old Russian school student told me "I

don't like this novel as it is too negative and pessimistic. " Yet the mother of the

school student informed me : "I like Holden. He is not a negative character. He

does not harm anyone and is very kind to the nuns. He wants to help people."

Svetlana Wilson told me "When I first read this novel it made a tremendous

impression on me. I could immediately grasp the deep pain which the character

was experiencing".

It is interesting to note that there exists a myriad of reactions to interpreting the

novel. While some Conservative Christians are scandalized by Holden's negative

views, others might see Holden as positively moving towards Christianity because

of his pleasant encounter with some Nuns who he donates money to. "Holden is

one of us. His kingdom is not of this world. " they might reason. Yet an anarchist

or Marxist might view his novel as a frank critique of the capitalist system. Feeling

confused, some journalists decided to ask the reclusive author himself for an

interpretation. Being exasperated by unwanted attention, the author told journalists

who managed to give him an interview { which represented in itself a great feat},

"just read the novel ".

The novel tells of the adventures of a student who has just been expelled from

a  boarding school for a fourth time for failing exams, how he attempts to cope

with his expulsion and whether he should make a complete break with his friends,

parents and surroundings, or meet them half way. The main character Holden is

unsure what to do with his life and who he can turn to for help.He represents the

completely disorientated outsider adrift and at odds with society.

But one interpretation which is currently in vogue, is that Holden, like the author

of Catcher in the Rye, is suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome. This

interpretation is based on the biography of Salinger, who was a post war veteran

who saw action at D-Day and during the Battle of the Bulge. The argument goes

that Salinger never recovered from the war and became a reclusive who shunned

company. He was not really an eccentric but still suffering from the deep scars of

the war. In 1945, Salinger was hospitalized for 'Battle fatigue'. He told his daughter

"You never really get the smell of burning flesh out of your nose entirely, no matter

how long you live". The idea is that the character,   experiences a traumatic

encounter where one of his fellow students, who borrowed his sweater, is bullied, forced to flee and leap to his death from a window. Holden feels 'survivor guilt' for not saving him. And this is why he wants to become a kind of catcher who waits for confused children to fall off a cliff so he can save them from death.

There may well be some substance to this argument but I think it is overstated.

The character of Holden can 't be reduced to the experience of Salinger but was

creatively invented by the vivid imagination of Salinger himself. There is a good

Russian proverb which goes : 'A tale is an invention, a truth and the song'.

In recent years , the mental health problems of school students have either

increased or at least been acknowledged more openly than in the past. Some

of the more extreme cases are being diagnosed as falling under Post Traumatic

Stress Syndrome'. However, many war veterans would claim that their own

experiences are way to traumatic to be compared to the experiences of school

children. They may well feel insulted by such comparisons.

We should at least try to define this syndrome. In succinct terms, the syndrome

arises from deeply traumatic events in wartime which lead to mental scars where

the victim can't let go of painfully crippling memories, has recurring nightmares

where old events of the war are relived and is afflicted by very negative feelings

of alienation, guilt at what he did and how he survived. The war has left him with

an almost unbridgeable gap with a society which can't or won't understand his

pain. Of course, many school students feel traumatized by bullying, fighting ,being

misunderstood and low self esteem. But there is not the same sense of , say a

veteran who goes into a forest for a picnic but ends up planning how to dig in

for a military defense lest he come under attack.{in  Erich Remarque's novel,

The Road back, a war veteran can't go for a quiet walk in the woods without

being disturbed by war memories and in Robert Mason's Chickenhawk , Back

in the World After Vietnam, he states : 'I wasn't thinking about Vietnam, but it was

there. Awake, in quiet moments, I felt a familiar dread in the pit of my stomach,

even as I angrily informed myself that I was home. Asleep , my dreams were

infected by what I had seen.The explosive jump ups I'd been having since the

last month were getting more frequent'.

Perhaps one thing a troubled teenager and war veteran both lament is 'Nobody

understands me' as well as the trauma of having to adapt to a society based on

trivial and phony values. It might be more accurate to state that Salinger's wartime

experience helped him to better understand the trauma of youth who felt

completely lost or disorientated in society. English teachers should at least creatively

use the novel to raise deep questions on what is Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome,

in what way does it assume different forms and intensity and how it might be

better understood. That is teachers should try and go beyond the academic. This

is because school students  may well encounter war veterans in the future .

I myself have encountered war veterans in Moscow. For example, when Jim Vail

and I were working with the homeless in Moscow , near Kazansky rail station we

noticed a strange man approaching us. He looked dazed, disorientated and utterly

lost. We wondered if he was about to attack us. But  instead he just asked for

directions and informed us he had just returned from Afghanistan.  A war veteran

i met who had returned from the war in UKraine could not seem to settle down

or hold a job for long . He took to heavy drinking and then returned again to the

front. A young Russian student based in Moscow, informed me that a war veteran

who was American , was teaching English to children . He told her this work with

children helped him forget the trauma of the war he experienced in Afghanistan.

He declined to be interviewed. I can never forget encountering a shattered Irish

man who was mentally trembling, traumatized whom I thought was about to

assault me. It was clear that he had undergone some form of torture under

British detention in Northern Ireland. You notice that many traumatized victims

of rape or assault can overreact and wonder if they will be safe when either

going up on a life full of men or seeing a male guest visit their friend's apartment.

The fear and distrust is so deep they can't always discriminate between real

and imagined threats.

I found that there was no hospital which specifically catered for war veterans

in Moscow. Most of the care for war veterans is sporadic, spontaneous and

not coherently organised. Many war veterans thought it was a waste of time

speaking to psychologists or doctors because they could never understand

what they experienced. What makes recovery of Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome

highly problematic is a culture which largely frowns upon any admission of

weakness or not being 'a real man'. War veterans are not supposed to tell

people about their pain but 'put up with it'. They are expected to suffer in

silence. So it comes as no surprise to find veterans can't find anyone to turn

to or take to heavy drinking,drugs or commit suicide. However, it is not all

bad news. There are some people in Russia who understand the problems

of war veterans and seek to aid them. For example, I spoke to a psychologist

who told me how she felt happy about seeing a war veteran emerge from

her session with a beaming radiant face. It was as if she had helped left

some burden from this soldier tortured by war guilt and plagued by recurring

nightmares of meeting old soldiers he had killed. The organisation 'The Union

of Volunteers of Donbass ' sends 20-30 people to psychologists to be treated

for Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome a month. However, as Maria Koleda,

a representative of this group states, veterans also need aid with obtaining

residential rights, citizenship and work.

It is possible that certain people with a high level of empathy can comprehend

the experience of war veterans even if they have not experienced war. For instance,

when veterans heard the songs and poems penned by famous singer Vladimir

Vysotsky, they thought that he himself was such a war veteran. The poet wrote

the lyrics of songs which tell about  'Survivor guilt ' such as 'The Man who did

not return' and 'The One who refused to shoot'. Both characters in the songs

feel survivor guilt because they felt unworthy to live compared to their comrades

who sacrificed their lives for them.Yet this poet had never been to the front. So

somebody out there can understand Holden as well as war veterans. We only

need a quiet spot to lend an ear to  those that are  misunderstood.