Was Holden Caulfield Gay?

This may strike you as an off-topic subject, the contemplation of whether JD Salinger’s most famous and talked-about character is gay. What has this got to do with Buddhism, you may ask? Frankly at first, I wasn’t sure myself. Ever since I first read “Catcher in the Rye,” I have always wondered if Holden Caulfield was gay. With Salinger’s recent death, I began to ponder this possibility anew. With these thoughts resurfacing, a moment of clarity came to me, and that was how “Catcher in the Rye” was a portrayal of the deluded mind from a very Buddhist perspective.

First I want to thank Scott over at the buddha is my dj for his post about Salinger’s death. His musings about Salinger’s work confirmed what I had sensed about the author from my own reading of “Franny and Zooey,” and that it was filled with a very Zen perspective; not like how John Updike speaks of Salinger’s prose as being open-ended and Zen-like. No, there was something else going on for me. And the same New York Time’s obituary that mention’s Updike’s comment also enlightened me to the fact Salinger practiced Zen (although one must take Salinger’s daughter’s description of her father’s practice with some skepticism).

So when I began to contemplate once again Holden’s sexuality, the additional input from the Times article and Scott’s blog post provided the prompt necessary for me to realize that Holden Caulfield is an allegory for the mind.

When many of us read “Catcher in the Rye” for the first time, we instantly identified with Holden and his railing against all the phoniness in the world. We saw the same thing, but perhaps we couldn’t quite finger it: Holden gave voice to what we were already sensing. The trouble is, Holden is a phony too. He also senses this, but is either unable to or unwilling to investigate his own phoniness, so he projects it onto everyone else. That’s not to say that Holden was wrong to say people are phony; it’s just that he wasn’t seeing the same phoniness in himself. He wanted to, he wanted closer relationships with others, he wanted intimacy, but the prospect confused him and frightened him. And like so many of us did, he distanced himself from others, labeling them as phony, as his defense against his own mind.

And that brings up the prospect of Holden being gay. My own adolescence was during the 1970s when sexual liberation was at its zenith. And yet, during that time, my confusion over my own sexuality led me to develop all kinds of irrational defenses against the very idea that I wanted to sleep with other boys. Now take that back to the time period of Holden’s, the late 1940s and early 1950s (the book was published in 1951). That context is important when considering Holden’s sexuality and how he dealt with it.

The fact that Holden is very conflicted is immediately revealed in the early chapters, particularly with his visit to the history teacher that failed him, Mr. Spencer. Holden harshly describes the teacher as mean and vindictive, and yet he feels compassion for the very sick man.

Holden’s interaction with his good-looking roomie Stradlater is interesting as well. Holden chats with Stradlater in the bathroom while the latter shaves. During the conversation, Holden nervously turns on and off a faucet; the sexual tension is palpable. And when Stradlater identifies that he’s got a date with Jane Gallagher, a girl he knows, he’s upset that Stradlater will likely have sex with Jane, a girl Stradlater hardly knows anything about – he can’t even get her name correct! Holden knows Jane well, revealing this with some insight into how the girl plays checkers.

Whether Holden is angry and jealous about the likely sexual encounter because Stradlater will get Jane and Holden won’t, or that Holden is envious that he is not sleeping with Stradlater remains ambivalent to me. It’s just not that clear because Holden remains ambivalent as well. What does become increasingly clear is how lonely Holden is as he attempts to fabricate liaisons with girls and women, which clumsily fail. His recollection of an intimate moment with Jane is more reflective of his present need for someone to show him that same level of intimate support and understanding rather than an example of any sexual desire he may have for Jane. And his fascination with the transvestite and the couple spitting on each other that he sees from his hotel room only reveal his confused and shallow understanding of sex. His later blowup with Sally may be fueled by a deluded desire to convince himself that he is in love with her, but this desperate thought mixed with all his confused emotions leads to an outburst and Sally abandoning him. His ambivalence with homosexuality is revealed with his encounter with a former schoolmate Carl Luce, as well as a later encounter with a teacher, Mr. Antolini. It is clear Holden cannot deal with the world as it is. It’s worth noting too that Mr. Antolini was, in Holden’s memory, the only person who showed any courage or kindness when a boy at school had jumped out a window after being harassed by other boys (for being perceived as gay?).

Whether Mr. Antolini was in fact making a sexual advance on Holden is irrelevant. The more important item is Holden’s homophobic reaction, which he later comes to regret.

All of these vignettes describe a deluded mind unable to see things as they really are. And isn’t that how our minds function? And isn’t it the point of the Buddha’s teaching to cut through this delusion to see truth? As a confused adolescent, I attempted sex with girls, but never carried out these situations with any success, as I was always afraid of the encounter and managed to concoct a reason to avoid it. Just as Holden loathed the idea of casual sex, believing that it ought to be with someone you truly cared for, I also wanted to seek someone I truly cared for. But I was paralyzed by a deluded mind that couldn’t shake the notion that my true desire was an abomination. Instead, I became bitter and cynical, highly critical of others, and filled with anger and resentment. Poisoned with these feelings and fabrications, I hurt people that I cared about. And, of course, this only added to my feelings of despair.

The fact that Holden’s little sister points out his misstatement of the line in the song “Coming Thro’ the Rye” as being “if a body catch a body coming through the rye,” rather than the real line, “if a body meet a body,” reveals the pivotal fear at the heart of Holden’s delusion, and that is his fear of sex. He is so completely screwed up emotionally that his deceits are so masterful that he has completely blinded himself to his own fear of intimacy on any level. His reaction is to runaway, but again, his little sister saves him. Or does she?

The novel’s ambiguous ending is to me a warning of how difficult it is to overcome our delusions once they have become part of us. Of the three taints the Buddha warns us about – greed, hatred and delusion – it is delusion that the Buddha marks as the most difficult to overcome. After all, how does a deluded mind recognize its own delusion?

Seeking the sound of silence

Probably the most common hindrance to my meditation is my mind’s latching on to some damn song, endlessly looping just a snippet of the song through my head. I’ve tried many strategies to get beyond whatever song is playing in my head and sometimes it’s not such a struggle. But just about every time I go to sit, there’s some song in my head.

This morning it was “Jet,” from the McCartney album “Band on the Run.”

My mind is a manic menace. There are times when I easily let go of the bothersome tune that is trying to monopolize my meditation, but I’m never really aware of how that occurs. There are several strategies I employ, all of which can work from time to time, but none of which are universally successful. One, I focus stridently on my breath, really forcing my mind to let go of the tune and pay attention to my breathing. Another is silently chanting Buddho as I breathe, and when that becomes so monotonous that I sense I am drifting into sleep, I will count my breaths going from 1 to 5, then back down to 1, etc.

The counting tends to work the best, but there are other times when I will direct my mind to take a close look at the song in my head, asking it the question, “Where is this coming from?” This is occasionally successful because the mind usually responds with, “I have no idea,” and the song disappears.

Nonetheless, just about every time I sit for meditation, I have to initially struggle with some freaking song. Music playing in my head is so common that when I first wake in the morning, a song immediately starts playing. It’s the first thought of my mind each day!

Granted, I listen to a lot of music. I have a blog as well about Frank Zappa’s catalogue. I have probably more than 1,000 CDs. The thought that a solution to my problem is to turn off all the external music around me is so repugnant that I won’t even consider it. But there are times when I intentionally engage in activities to separate myself from music and the rest of the world, like when I go for a hike.

Any of you have similar recurring distractions to your meditation? How do you deal with them?

Is there meat in that bowl?

One of the first questions I am frequently asked when I identify myself as Buddhist is, “You’re a vegetarian then too, right?” And I reply, “No, I’m not.” This sometimes elicits the question, “But aren’t Buddhists supposed to be vegetarian?” And I reply, “No, we’re not. Many are, but it’s not a requirement of the faith.”

Whoop! Whoop! Danger! Danger! Someone has breached the code! Lockdown sequence has been activated!

Yes, I am sure that is how some of my Buddhist compatriots would respond to such heresy, as many Buddhists cannot differentiate between Dhamma and being a vegetarian. For some Buddhists, one must be vegetarian or one cannot be a Buddhist. I find such categorical statements preposterous. To really determine whether Buddhists ought to be vegetarians as well, one has to be sure to be asking the right question. Because the Buddha taught that if you ask an unskillful question, then you will get an unskillful answer, and unskillful answers do not help you along the path.

Unsurprisingly, there’s a wide variety of opinion on the topic. Take a look at this post at Sweep the Dust, Push the Dirt, where blogger John asked people to share their perspective on the First Precept and whether it demands a Buddhist to be vegetarian. The responses there run the gamut, most leaning toward vegetarianism as either an outright requirement or as an ideal to strive for.

But when it comes to the attraction of Buddhism, I don’t want potential new followers to get hung up on the vegetarian thing. I don’t want someone to decide to not explore the Buddha’s teachings because they like their hamburgers rare and they may even – Oh My Freaking God! – like veal (probably the most cruelly produced meat product out there).

Before I go on, I provide this disclaimer: I eat meat. This morning for breakfast I had bacon and organic free-range eggs fried in bacon grease, plopped on pancakes smothered with real butter. I eat meat almost daily, mostly pork and chicken, sometimes fish, and occasionally beef. I like my beef thick, juicy and rare (I prefer my men more like chicken).

The issue of vegetarianism is mostly concerned with what the First Precept means, which directs practitioners to avoid the deliberate killing of living creatures. This obviously means, some say, that we should not eat meat or other animal products because this leads to killing living creatures, not to forget the often inhumane treatment animals go through in husbandry.

By logical extension then, I should also not drive, nor ask anyone to drive for me because such activity could lead to the death of an animal; I should oppose driving and the use of all public transportation by anyone because such activity does, on a daily basis, result in the death of animals (humans too). By virtue of this information, the mere fact of my using any form of motorized transportation knowing that it may result in the death of an animal an intentional act. So if I used a motorized method of transportation and that use resulted in the death of an animal, I intended that animal to die; hence, I have violated the First Precept.

An oh, by the way, I should oppose electricity also because the number one cause of power outages is squirrels; squirrels gnaw on the insulation around power lines, leading to the squirrel’s electrocution and loss of power to the area served by that power line. Therefore, my use of electricity frequently leads to the death of animals, so I should become Amish if I want to faithfully follow the First Precept. Except, well, hmm, I don’t know any vegetarian Amish.

In my view, the above logical extension is absurd.

There’s a discussion on Access to Insight that addresses the question, “Are Buddhists vegetarian?”

“Although the first of the five precepts, the basic code of ethical conduct for all practicing Buddhists, calls upon followers to refrain from intentional acts of killing, it does not address the consumption of flesh from animals that are already dead.”

Some may say this is a rationalization, and I don’t deny that. But even the Vinaya is cautious about how monks should act when someone drops meat into their alms bowl. And it’s clear too in this explanation in the Vinaya that the Buddha acknowledges that lay Buddhists eat meat. They had to eat meat to survive.

This, of course, raises another line of reasoning. Today, is it reasonable for people to presume that personal survival requires the consumption of meat? The obvious answer to that is no. It is much easier now to be a vegetarian than it was years ago, and it is certainly easier to be vegetarian by choice in a developed nation than in an undeveloped nation. But does that mean the First Precept requires one to have a vegetarian diet?

When I go to the supermarket, all the packages of meat I see there are going to be there whether I am a meat-eater or vegetarian. I was not personally responsible for the killing of these animals. Again, some may argue that this is a convenient rationalization. If fewer people ate meat, then less meat would be available, leading to fewer animals being raised solely for meat consumption. This leads to less suffering.

Or does it? What happens to the people employed by the meat processing industry? Will there be enough jobs for them if the one they have disappears? How does the loss of their job relieve suffering for them? What happens to the economic structure when all the ancillary businesses involved in meat production have to shut down because everyone decided that eating animals is bad? And what of the animals that were bred solely for meat production purposes? Is their suffering really alleviated when their primary protector is not longer concerned with their well-being? They have no natural defenses against predators. Many couldn’t feed themselves on their own because they are completely dependent on the food the farmer gives them. And even if the farmer, or someone, continues to feed and care for them, what economic benefit comes out of that to the farmer? How does one afford to feed all these animals? Without someone continuing to feed and protect these animals, they would continue to suffer; perhaps even more so as many would simply die of starvation.

Not so simple is it? Of course, the above scenario simply isn’t going to happen. The world isn’t going to become vegetarian. We can, as individuals, make that choice. And for many, it’s the right and good choice. For others, striving toward a completely vegetarian diet as an eventuality is the right and good choice. But to assert that vegetarianism is a sin quo non of being a Buddhist is just as much an unskillful attachment to a fabrication as is my attachment to a perfectly cooked beef tenderloin.