Practice Diction Analysis

In the excerpt from Catcher in the Rye, the conversational and common language and tone of the narrator helps to emphasize his apathetic views of life and the period of rebellion he has gone through. The narrator describes his parents as "quite touchy," before going right back and calling them "nice." Together his words help to show off his conflicting opinions about his parents and the period of growing that he seems to either be in the middle of or about to finish. His allusion to "all that David Copperfield kind of crap," display that while his words and phrases don't do well to portray his maturity, the fact that he pulls an allusion like that out of his hat alludes to him being more intelligent or more mature than he lets on in the first part of the book.