Catcher in the Rye Portfolio   

At the conclusion of our study of The Catcher In The Rye, you will compile a hyperlinked webfolio of writings which you have done while reading the book and afterwards.  All of these writings should be peer reviewed and edited and only final revisions should be included.  Your writings will then be put on a webpage with the pieces hyper-linked to each other.

Your portfolio must contain:

1.     A piece of fan fiction derived from the book.

2.     At least one poem about Holden from the point of view of another character.

3.     A Poem by an established author and your explanation of how the poem illustrates a theme in the book. 

Portfolio requirements:

A       1,2,3 
    1.  All final revisions, peer reviewed and edited.
    2.  All of A quality. 

B.  1,2, 

         1.  All final revisions, peer reviewed and edited.
          2.  All of A or B quality. 

C.      1,2,
          1.  All final revisions, peer reviewed and 
        edited.
          2.  All of  C quality. 

D.        1, and 2 

         1.  All final revisions, peer reviewed and
         edited.
          2.  All of at least D quality.

Fan Fiction 

Fan Fiction is an Internet phenomenon.  There are actually people who do this kind of writing without being assigned!  I hope that you’ll enjoy this assignment as though you were doing it just for the fun of it, and not because I’m holding something called a grade over your head! 

Here’s how it works: 

Pick a character from the book.  (It should be a character that is full of possibilities—maybe someone we don’t know a lot about.)  For this assignment, though, Holden is off limits.  Now think about the life of this character before and after the book.  How old is the character when we meet her in the book?

 Then you might write about him when he’s younger than that.  Does the character come in and out of the story?  You might write about what’s going on in her life while we don’t see her. 

Here’s the tricky part

Your fiction has to be a logical preview or extension of what we know about the character in the book.  In other words, you probably shouldn’t write about how Maurice was a choir boy when he was 12.  It just wouldn’t follow that he became the man he is in the book.  It would be all right though to write about some relationship, which could account for the brutality he displays today.

Anyway, you write your story.  It should be full of Salinger sentences, with as much slang as you can think of though it would be a good idea to watch the profanity.  Remember, Holden is the only one who swears that much in the book.  It can be funny, serious, whatever.  You just do your very best.  Make sure to describe things in detail and use lots of dialogue.  

          If you would like to see an example of fan fiction over The Catcher in the Rye, Click on this link:  http://www.geocities.com/exploring_citr/finds.htm#fiction

And for several examples of  fan fiction on other books you have read try fanfiction

The first one is the best.  Number 2 and 4 are from Holden’s viewpoint. All three do a good job of imitating Salinger’s style. 

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Catcher in the Rye Character poems

 Compose a series of poems and/or songs in the voices of characters from The Catcher in the Rye (listed below).  (You may want to imagine that you have been hired to turn the novel into a musical or even a modern opera). 

Picture the character at a specific moment in the novel. Imagine what he/she is thinking and feeling at that moment about Holden, about that present time and place, about his/her life.  What is the character hoping or fearing or regretting?  What is the character looking at or hearing, and what does it cause him/her to think about? 

The title for each poem/song should contain the character’s name and at least one prep phrase indicating where or when that character is speaking (e.g. “Holden Caulfield in his room at the Edmont”.)  Be creative.  The scene can extend beyond the literal settings of the novel (e.g. “D.B. in his jaguar on the way to visit Holden”).  The scene can occur before or after an actual moment in the novel (e.g. “Horwitz in his cab after Holden leaves”). 

The poem/song does not have to be long, but it should communicate clearly the thought or mood of that character at that moment in a voice and language appropriate to that character.  The poems should be presented in chronological order.

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Sample Poem

A Terrific Writer
 by Harris Macklin
(on hearing Holden Caulfield, an old roommate, is in a sanitarium in California)

i never told him
he was a
terrific writer.

some things
you can’t just
go up to somebody and say.

he would tell me
i made him half-crazy,
but i knew he was all crazy all by himself.

one moment,
he was up on Everest
talking about kettle drums and checker boards.

the next moment,
he was disappearing and sinking
into madness and melancholy.

he was a duck
swimming in carrousel-like circles
in his own lagoon.

Sometimes when I would hang my clothes,
he would hang his thoughts up
in his book of unlined paper.

he would write for a long time
and didn’t want to be bothered with my words.
so i would whistle.

he never seemed to mind.
in fact, when i stopped whistling, he would stop writing.
perhaps, i should have never stopped.

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