Subject: Essay: Someone in 7 Up series like Holden?
From: Suzanne Morine (suzannem@dimensional.com)
Date: Sun Jan 06 2002 - 00:31:06 GMT
The speculation about what Holden's life would have played out like
dovetails with my recently viewing "42 Up," the latest of Michael Apted's
"7 Up" series of documentaries. Maybe it's because I just recently saw this
film and in fact got quite intrigued to find that there's a companion book
at the library (that's also where I got the video) and I read that book and
have it in front of me. Also, this series always stirs up a lot of thoughts
for me as I am a similar age to the participants and I root for them in
their lives and remember them every 7 years or so. At any rate, I'm seeing
a dovetailing.
An interesting evening's perusal: comparing three participants in the 7 Up
series with Holden, taking a look ahead to see what that participant did
and seeing Holden's future in that. Would Holden have gone off into the
country and lived in a cabin, scribbling away, or would he have become a
lawyer like his father, or something else?
The "7 Up" series of documentaries is interviews with the same group of
British people once every 7 years, starting at age 7. This group of people
was born in about 1956, so they are NOT of Holden's generation, but about
23 years younger: Holden was probably born in 1933 (he was 13 in 1946 - see
page 38). Also, these people are British, not American. So there are clear
differences right at the start.
Neil
But still, there's something about Neil that came to my mind with the
discussion of realistically aging Holden. Over the years, Neil has been, by
far, the most depressing person in the films. Year after year, we saw him
in a squat or housing project somewhere, alone, jobless, directionless,
questioning everything, dissatisfied, yet confident enough in his
perspective that he's sure he's living a better life than a suburbanite.
Neil started out as a very intelligent, confident, imaginative, exuberant
kid who had dreams. He dreamed of either being an astronaut or being what I
think would be the equivalent in the US of a tour bus driver (travelling
around and pointing out pleasant and interesting sights to people). Neil
comes to my mind because like Holden, he questions things is preoccupied
with both wanderlust and a dread of living the typical life.
For me, their beginnings appear to be very positive. Holden has idyllic
memories of childhood, from vacationing with his siblings to school outings
to the museum. He seems to see children through rose colored glasses - it
doesn't occur to him that the "f*ck you" signs were carved by children, as
opposed to adults. I think this is because he tends to assume all children
are like he was.. Holden values Phoebe's imagination (Phoebe Weatherfield
Caulfield) and her warmth and consideration and spirit. I think this
suggests that he was rather like that as a kid. I see Holden as having been
a nice little kid when he was younger.
There are some differences between Holden and Neil I should mention. Holden
grew up in a very well to do part of NYC, spending at least part of his
summers with the family in the country. His father was a corporate lawyer.
Neil grew up in a middle class suburb of Liverpool. Both of his parents
were teachers. So there's a difference of class and surroundings.
Neil: "I used to play games where you just went off by yourself in the
schoolyard and imagined something happening, like America attacking Russia
or something like that. You'd be an important character in the story and
you'd rendezvous with your mates at the end of it and compare notes."
Neil @7: "We don't do much fighting in school, because we think it's
horrible and it hurts. We pretended we've got swords and make noises like
swords..."
We can't say a lot about the home life of either Holden or Neil. Holden had
a nervous mother and a father who wants him to do well in school. The
entire family has been dealing with the loss of Allie for the previous
three years and prior to that, big brother D.B. was in WWII in active
service. D.B. recently moved away and Holden has not been doing well in
anything except English in the past few years. Neil says a few things that
suggest at least neglect was going on in his childhood home. I mean, some
of the quotes below suggest to me a house not ready/accepting of children.
Neil@7: "When I go home, I come in and mummy gives me a cup of tea, and
then I go out and play. And when it starts to get dark, I come in again and
put on TV."
Neil@7: "I don't want to have any children, because they're always doing
naughty things and making the whole house untidy."
Neil@21: "I don't think I was really taught any sort of policy of living at
all by my parents. ... I was left to myself in a world which they seemed
totally oblivious of. And I found even when I tried to discuss problems
which were facing me at school, my parents didn't seem to be aware of the
nature of the problem. ... [they were ambitious for me, but only] along set
lines ... Some kind of indoor work which involved writing and reading ... I
wonder how many parents really think of their children as individual human
beings. ... [looking back at the first film] I could be happy one minute
and I could be miserable the next minute. ... Everything was so mapped out
for me."
Neil@21: "[My parents taught me to] Always think of other people first,
before yourself, to a ridiculous, neurotic degree ... I suppose it's just
basic Christianity, just sort of if somebody slaps you on one cheek, let
them do it on the other -- almost literally, which gave me a few shocks
when I tried to put it into practice."
At 16, Holden kicks against the system, lamenting the life of elevators and
busses phonies and self-doubts. This was after years of encountering
failure in school. He wants to break out into his own kind of living. Neil
attended university for one term and dropped out. At 21, he was a squatter
doing temp labor on construction sites, cutting a gaunt, uncertain figure.
Neil@21: "Maybe I went to the wrong university or maybe the university life
didn't suit me. Either way, I felt a very great need to get out of the
system. ... I was very, very bitter at the time. ... I came to London
because I think I wanted to start a new life."
Neil@28: The most you can hope to achieve is to have the right to climb
into a suburban train five or ten times a week and just about stagger back
for the weekend. ... it seems to me that this is just a slow pass to total
brainwashing. And if you have a brainwashed society, then you're heading
towards doom. ... if I was living in suburbia, I'd be so miserable, I'd
feel like cutting my throat. ... I know that when you look at a human
being, there's more to that person than just a robot."
Neil@28: "I've always had a nervous complaint. I've had it since I was
sixteen."
Neil@35: "I've had an instinctive feeling I was a writer since I was sixteen."
Now, sixteen is the age Holden was during his "madman days." And Holden
dreamed about living alone, in a remote cabin in the woods. Neil had been
squatting, then roamed Europe for seven years, then moved to the country,
as a homeless person occasionally getting work and cheap/free accomodation
for about seven more years. He continued to be a very gaunt, solitary,
independent minded figure who sometimes questioned his sanity.
The series produced a change in his life. In 42 Up we learn that Neil moved
back to London, with the help of another of the participants in the series
(Bruce). He got a fair amount of continuing education. He became active in
politics, winning an unpaid seat in an East End council. But Neil is still
not working, is still living off of the state. I think without the series,
he'd possibly be less well situated.
So would Holden have been that bad off? Would his wanderlust, rebellion,
and madness take him into a vagabond existence?
Or perhaps Holden's "madman days" were more along the lines of standard
limited teen rebellion. Also remember that Neil came of age in the 70's,
not the 50's. It's arguable that taking off on his own would have been more
of a daring move for Holden. Also, Holden did not have television, only
newsreels, radio, and newspapers. TV brings images of world news readily
into the living room. Plus coming from the higher class environment that
Holden did, the people he knew best were mostly well off people, plus the
maid, and he was socialized by their outlook more than by the fleeting
contacts with cabbies, elevator boys, people in trendy clubs, etc. Holden
did have an older brother with an unconventional career: a writer. So
thinking outside of the box regarding his future would not have been very
alien to him.
Andrew
Or maybe Holden was more like Andrew, a rich boy who went off to boarding
schools. Andrew was the only child in an easy going family. His father was
a merchant banker and newspaper columnist and his mother was the owner of a
hair salon. They had a cottage in the country but lived in London normally.
Andrew: "It was marvelous for a small boy to be able to get out in the open
spaces at the weekends and do all the things that you cannot do in London.
I have loved the country ever since."
Andrew@21: "[the appeal of skiing is] the freedom and going in the snow, in
the mountains, and the feeling of getting away from people if you can."
Childhood home life:
Andrew@7: "When I go home, I have tea. Then I practice my piano, then I
practice my recorder, and then I start watching television. ... I have my
bath at six o'clock and then go to bed at seven and read until half past
seven."
Andrew@42: "My upbringing was fairly easygoing, not too pressurized."
Andrew did have some social conscience by his teens:
Andrew@14: "When I went to Glasgow and saw the Gorbals, that rather upset
me... to think that people are living in that state when we waste things
every day."
Andrew@42: "Clearly everyone should have equal opportunity. ... I don't
suppose I can do very much, really. ... Certainly, when I'm looking at
someone who's applied for a job with me, I wouldn't look at their social
background. I would see what they'd achieved and what I thought their
potential was. ... More does need to be spent in the public sector still.
The health service is desperately short of money still; more still needs to
be spent on education."
Andrew@14: "[regarding money] Mainly to be self-sufficient -- to feel that
you don't have to owe anything to anybody."
Andrew@35: "I think so long as one has enough [money] to be comfortable,
that's really what one should aim for."
Andrew@42: "I know there are lots of people who work very hard and aren't
very well paid."
On his career:
Andrew@35: I'm not sure that I have any ambition as such now -- just to
progress with my work and so on."
Andrew@42: "... persistent. I don't like giving up, and perhaps it's also
not being too adventurous, not wanting to do anything else once you start,
you know. I've been on my job for twenty years; I haven't wanted to do
anything else."
Andrew grew up to be a lawyer, a partner in an international law firm, with
two boys living in Wimbledon, which I take it is sort of suburban. He also
has a cottage in the country. I felt he seemed a bit droning on in his
life, a bit disappointed under all of the good sense and balance. He seemed
to have a pasty complexion.
Still, Holden, unlike the final quotes above, goes off into tangents all
the time. Andrew doesn't seem as intense as Holden. Holden is quite
adventurous. Not only does he go off on his NY oddessy, but at 16 he is
already an experienced drinker and smoker and has become familiar and bored
with the nightclub scene. He dreams of hitchhiking out west. But if
Holden's life follows closer to Andrew's than Neil's, he could well have
become a lawyer like his father, the "madman days" just that: only days.
Charles
Finally, there is one more possible parallel. Charles was another rich boy.
Charles didn't participate in most of the series, so I don't have quotes:
he's not in the book. But what I remember about him at seven is "mummy has
all sorts of plans" -- so many schools were planned for him that he
couldn't remember all of them. I think he applied to Oxford and didn't get
in (the same is true of Neil) and went to another college which he came to
be happy with because he came to see the higher college route as a conveyor
belt producing robots.
At 21, Charles was in long hair and very casual clothes (Andrew was in
short-ish hair and a suit). Charles smiled at 21, envisioning his future as
"scribbling away in some London newspaper." Charles did then work for a
London newspaper, and went into working on documentaries for a TV station.
I think at 42 he was the head of a TV station's documentary division or
something like that. There are only a few later photographs of him
available: an intense man staring into the camera.
So if Holden was most like Charles, perhaps if he continued to find
stumbling blocks in school, it could open up his mind to other viable
options and let him continue questioning things and come to new points of
view.
However, Charles didn't seem to state a liking for the outdoors like Neil,
Andrew, and Holden did. Holden is a composition ace, but maybe being
outdoors was more important to him than to Charles and Andrew. After all,
with a brother as a writer, Holden would have seen his way clear to see his
future in writing if that really were his dream.
So those are three possible peeks into the future of Holden:
1. rather aimless, independent-minded, homeless guy
2. successful lawyer, perhaps a bit worn out
3. TV documentaries executive
In other words, I echo what others said, that's impossible to say really
what Holden's future realistically is. But it's still interesting to take a
look at the courses of real lives.
Suzanne
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