The song, "World Spins Madly On" by The Weepies should be placed on page 156, at the end of the first paragraph. The lyrics deal with wishing that someone would still be there, and stay with you, like Allie stays with Holden. Since Holden talks about not liking Allie's grave because people who visit him leave while he is stuck in the ground, I thought it was the perfect spot.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?
(One link has pictures of the characters from One Tree Hill [Awful show] but also has lyrics, so do not mind the pictures)
The song “World Spins Madly On” best represents Holden’s attitude towards his brother’s death, because it conveys his inability to get past Allie’s death. The third verse states, “I let the day go by, I always say goodbye. I watch the stars from my windowsill. The whole world is moving and I'm standing still.” Like when he visits Allie’s grave, he “always say[s] goodbye,” however he cannot move on. He still remains, “standing still,” because he cannot shed the need for Allie to be with him, he has not moved on. Instead of moving past the death, and moving with the world, he remains in a deep melancholy because of Allie’s death. This is why Holden gets so angry when visiting graves, because the visitors can leave and the person in the grave cannot. Symbolically, grave-visitors can move on and put a loved one out of their mind, but Holden does not have that capability. He remains attached, “[thinking] of [Allie] and where [Allie]’d gone.”
I agree with Jake, in that Holden does relate to this song through Allie's death and grave. He will remain caught on this loss for a long time. In addition, I think this song could also apply to Holden's depression in many instances as shown by the lyrics, "I woke up, and wished that I was dead...I lay motionless in bed". There are many times when Holden thinks that he is dying, and wishes for that as well, so I think those lyrics also apply to a separate dimension in his life. Overall I feel that this song connects well to Holden's state of mind and beliefs in many different ways.
ReplyDeleteI think that the correlation between Allie's grave and the song are valid, however, I noticed another place to connect the song with Holden's view of Allie. When the song says, "I thought of you and where you'd gone, And the world spins madly on..." I believe that this could underline the point of Holden understanding that Allie had gone, but he could not grasp the fact that he couldn't communicate with him because of where Allie was. Gone and death have two different meanings to Holden, and it's hard for him to hold onto Allie while his grave is blocking their communication. The lyrics support this half understanding of Holden's as pertaining to the two concepts of gone and death.
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