{"id":"01KG6FVEM8ZQXZ6F9N53W9F371","cid":"bafkreicrb2ultp376birawgj6e6ap3fzqz5avtx2auqx73wjymamac3lfe","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":4623,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T03:41:20.747Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 2","source_file":"01KG6FT59BXAZ3C5HRJ6SW8F58","start_line":4572,"text":"nerves when somebody's always saying things like \"So you and Pencey are no longer\none.\" D.B. does it too much sometimes, too.\n\"What was the trouble?\" Mr. Antolini asked me. \"How'd you do in English? I'll\nshow you the door in short order if you flunked English, you little ace composition\nwriter.\"\n\"Oh, I passed English all right. It was mostly literature, though. I only wrote about\ntwo compositions the whole term,\" I said. \"I flunked Oral Expression, though. They had\nthis course you had to take, Oral Expression. That I flunked.\"\n\"Why?\"\n\"Oh, I don't know.\" I didn't feel much like going into It. I was still feeling sort of\ndizzy or something, and I had a helluva headache all of a sudden. I really did. But you\ncould tell he was interested, so I told him a little bit about it. \"It's this course where each\nboy in class has to get up in class and make a speech. You know. Spontaneous and all.\nAnd if the boy digresses at all, you're supposed to yell 'Digression!' at him as fast as you\ncan. It just about drove me crazy. I got an F in it.\"\n\"Why?\"\n\"Oh, I don't know. That digression business got on my nerves. I don't know. The\ntrouble with me is, I like it when somebody digresses. It's more interesting and all.\"\n\n\n\"You don't care to have somebody stick to the point when he tells you\nsomething?\"\n\"Oh, sure! I like somebody to stick to the point and all. But I don't like them to\nstick too much to the point. I don't know. I guess I don't like it when somebody sticks to\nthe point all the time. The boys that got the best marks in Oral Expression were the ones\nthat stuck to the point all the time--I admit it. But there was this one boy, Richard\nKinsella. He didn't stick to the point too much, and they were always yelling 'Digression!'\nat him. It was terrible, because in the first place, he was a very nervous guy--I mean he\nwas a very nervous guy--and his lips were always shaking whenever it was his time to\nmake a speech, and you could hardly hear him if you were sitting way in the back of the\nroom. When his lips sort of quit shaking a little bit, though, I liked his speeches better\nthan anybody else's. He practically flunked the course, though, too. He got a D plus\nbecause they kept yelling 'Digression!' at him all the time. For instance, he made this\nspeech about this farm his father bought in Vermont. They kept yelling 'Digression!' at\nhim the whole time he was making it, and this teacher, Mr. Vinson, gave him an F on it\nbecause he hadn't told what kind of animals and vegetables and stuff grew on the farm\nand all. What he did was, Richard Kinsella, he'd start telling you all about that stuff--then\nall of a sudden he'd start telling you about this letter his mother got from his uncle, and\nhow his uncle got polio and all when he was forty-two years old, and how he wouldn't let\nanybody come to see him in the hospital because he didn't want anybody to see him with\na brace on. It didn't have much to do with the farm--I admit it--but it was nice. It's nice\nwhen somebody tells you about their uncle. Especially when they start out telling you\nabout their father's farm and then all of a sudden get more interested in their uncle. I\nmean it's dirty to keep yelling 'Digression!' at him when he's all nice and excited. I don't\nknow. It's hard to explain.\" I didn't feel too much like trying, either. For one thing, I had\nthis terrific headache all of a sudden. I wished to God old Mrs. Antolini would come in\nwith the coffee. That's something that annoys hell out of me--I mean if somebody says\nthe coffee's all ready and it isn't.\n\"Holden. . . One short, faintly stuffy, pedagogical question. Don't you think there's\na time and place for everything? Don't you think if someone starts out to tell you about\nhis father's farm, he should stick to his guns, then get around to telling you about his\nuncle's brace? Or, if his uncle's brace is such a provocative subject, shouldn't he have","title":"Chunk 2"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG6FV1MXNCHEX34S4KJ8SSPS","peer_type":"chapter","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG6FT59BXAZ3C5HRJ6SW8F58","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KFF1K6A8V452X8SQKY55DD16","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG6FVEM8JZKAXZZBRF8GTHMJ","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"prev"},{"peer":"01KG6FVEM83RMQAY0PPWKPJ2EF","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-30T03:41:20.904Z","ts":"2026-01-30T03:41:32.260Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}