Posted by Fallax at r-144.17.alltel.net on October 09, 2000 at 02:07:45:
In Reply to: Inauthentic... posted by Sir James Lacaita on October 08, 2000 at 23:22:00:
Of course it's tragic. That's the point: life is life, there is no happy ending, there's just life (and eventually death). Holden CANNOT get past Alyssa's preponderance of experience since it, as an external (public) trait, punctures the contrived macho armor covering his hidden insecurity; and he cannot love her the way she deserves to be loved until he gains a more solid sense of himself. No matter how much he loves her (and it is really a mistake to try to separate "love" from all these other emotional processes which it interacts with; it is better to think of them as a whole) he cannot change his fundamental image of who he is merely by wishing it were otherwise. He has to deal with it. He must take action to assert his individuality or otherwise lose all personal integrity. This leads him into his fundamental error of the threesome proposal. And I don't think anyone here would suggest that the proposal could have turned out differently without irretrievably transforming the characters into unrecognizable form. Basically Holden is asking Alyssa to humiliate herself in exchange for his love by acting as his plaything. And I think it is obvious that their relationship could never be the same after this request. She is looking for "the one" not someone wants to abuse her trust. And losing the relationship is what allows Holden to learn how superficial he is and how much it is costing him. That's what makes it authentic to me.