Ossenburger’s character introduces the theme of death in a comic vein. The mortician is just the sort of establishment “phony” that Holden loves to mock. He has a chain of funeral parlors, profiting from high volume at low rates and, Holden is certain, shabby service. Ossenburger’s speech at chapel is filled with “corny jokes” and clichés. He says that he is never ashamed to get down on his knees and talk to his buddy, Jesus. This humors Holden, who imagines Ossenburger asking Jesus to “send him a few more stiffs.” Marsalla’s magnificent fart, which, Holden reports, nearly “blew the roof off” the chapel, is the perfect response.
Holden opens the chapter by telling us that he loves to lie. It is unlikely that he is lying about that. Because he is the narrator, the reader might take some caution in “believing” what Holden says; he exaggerates mercilessly: Ossenburger’s speech lasts ten hours, he tells us, flavored with fifty corny jokes; his cheap funerals probably consist of shoving the deceased into sacks and dumping them in a river; Ackley, the obnoxious pest next door, barges in on Holden about eighty-five times a day; Holden asks him not to clip his nails onto the floor fifty times. The world is not big enough for Holden; he needs to blow it up a little.
However, Holden’s hyperbole and wild imaginings usually are not malicious. When he assumes a false identity or claims he is headed for the opera as he actually goes to buy a magazine, he is playing. Life is a bit boring for Holden; he just needs to liven up the action.
