is
alienated from more than just the individuals he knows: he is alienated from his society as a
whole. An example of his disenchantment can be seen in the following quote from , about his
expensive hotel in downtown Manhattan:
I didn't know then
that the goddam hotel was full of perverts and morons. Screwballs all over the place.
These are not people he knows: he is making a comment about his
society as a whole being filled with undesirable people.
Holden goes on to
implicitly critique the social order in the following quote, also from chapter 9. His bellhop is
an elderly man:
what a gorgeous job for a guy around
sixty-five years old. Carrying people's suitcases and waiting around for a tip. I suppose he
wasn't too intelligent or anything, but it was terrible anyway.
This bellhop is not an individual Holden knows. Holden feels bad for his situation on
principle, criticizing a social order that would allow an older man to do heavy and demeaning
work ("waiting around for a...
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