Catcher in the Rye Vs. I Am Sam. a Pop Culture Comparison

Just as one can find recurring topics of discourse and discussion in many different artistic representations, one is frequently able to relate such themes to the experiences they endure in life. One prime example of this can be found in the literary composition The Catcher in the Rye to the film production I Am Sam by Jessie Nelson. Both The Catcher in the Rye and I Am Sam illustrate the notion of childhood versus adulthood, and how the protagonists of each fight for the protection against maturity. Both Sam and Lucy Dawson of I Am Sam experience the values, tendencies and life situations that Holden Caulfield fights to protect throughout The Catcher in the Rye. This can be illustrated through parallel themes, the loss of innocence, and a bildungsroman archetype.

Both The Catcher in the Rye and I Am Sam provide their audiences with tangible evidence of the notion of the protection of childhood. An example of this concept in The Catcher in the Rye can be seen by looking at the evidence J.D. Salinger has placed in Holden’s surname; Caulfield. A ‘caul’ by definition is a membranous sac that encloses an embryo. This process is literally the safeguard of a fetus at birth; which is concrete evidence to illustrate the theme of protecting childhood, if one looks into the text.

Thematically, I Am Sam can also be looked upon as the protection of childhood and innocence in that of its own title. I Am Sam is based upon the Dr. Seuss series of children’s books Green Eggs and Ham, which shows the innocence and childishness of its characters. Green Eggs and Ham is referenced throughout the film to further the theme that both protagonists, a child of seven and her father of forty, both stuck in the midst of childhood and adulthood.

The Catcher in the Rye and I Am Sam can also be looked upon as an individual's understanding of the human condition. This is one of the protection of, but inevitable loss of innocence, which is correlated to the transition of a child becoming an adult. The Catcher in the Rye illustrates this point through Holden’s desire to protect his innocence against the phoniness of the adult world. This can be seen when Holden tries to erase curse words from the walls of an elementary school. Holden believes that children are innocent, and that childhood is a world of sincerity. He strives to protect this by inventing a fantasy in which symbolically, childhood is a field of rye in which children play, while adulthood is a deadly fall over the edge of a cliff. He imagines himself on such a cliff, catching innocent children who accidentally fall off the edge, bridging the gap between childhood and adulthood. Holden’s flawed perception of adulthood allows himself to be shielded with a protective shell of skepticism. However, Holden looses his own innocence while trying to maintain it on his trip in New York as he encounters characters such as Sunny and Mr. Antolini. The end of the novel expresses considerable growth for Holden, as losing

a part of childish innocence is also a part of growing up.

The characters in I Am Sam also undergo the idea of protecting, but essentially losing

childish innocence. As Lucy Dawson strives to protect her father’s innocence, she in fact looses a bit of her own, as at the age of seven, she is faced with the internal struggle of acting older than she is due to her father’s mental state. She consciously makes decisions to diminish her own intellectual capacities such as being literate, to protect her father’s naпvetй. While Lucy fights to protect her father’s childish innocence, Sam himself finds his own virtue to be compromised when he is put on the stand to testify to his parental aptness. It is this testimonial that allows Sam to justify that it doesn’t matter which world he belongs to, and that his childish tendencies have no correlation to poor parenting. I Am Sam illustrates the notion of childhood versus adulthood, and how both characters find themselves sharing middle ground between being a child and an adult.

A bildungsroman tells the story of a protagonist’s