Holden yearns to be the catcher in the rye. He pictures himself being almost like a God figure compared to all the “thousands of little kids” (173). He describes a situation where he would be their hero/savior. Holden is fixated on saving young people because he worries that they will have to suffer what he did. Holden shows a parental characteristic with wanting to be the catcher in the rye. When Holden narrates “I have to catch everybody if they start to go off the cliff-I mean if they’re running and they don't look where they’re going i have to come out of somewhere and catch them” (173) he describes the youth as naive and unaware of what they are doing. He knows that he has made mistakes in his past because he wasn't looking where he was going and wants to make it easier for others to not fall into his steps.…
The world of childhood is sheltered from the corrupt adult world and maturation is a sometimes difficult pathway between the two. The Catcher in the Rye, by J. D. Salinger, is a fictional novel seen through the eyes of sixteen year old Holden Caulfield after he is expelled from Pencey Prep. Holden leaves Pencey two days early to explore New York City before he has to return home. On his excursion, he meets prostitutes, nuns, his old girlfriend, and his sister Phoebe, while traveling around the city contemplating life and his future. Through the varying behaviors of Holden Caulfield, his maturity is shown to be stuck in a limbo between his imminent departure from the childhood world and his fear to move into the world of adults. Holden finds sexual activity intriguing in some situations, but also perverse and immoral. When Holden comes home,…
Holden's journey through the novel was a journey in which he searched for a purpose and a sense of finally finding that “ride or die” person he desperately needed in his life. Like many teens, he had to deal with “phony” people and felt strong emotions for someone he did not really talk to and even though students currently don’t have sleepovers at their english teachers house, “The Catcher in the Rye” is still a book that should be discussed and read in schools. This novel is still…
In The Catcher and the Rye by J.D. Salinger, the protagonist Holden Caulfield experiences myriad personal difficulties originating from the tragic event of his brother's death from cancer. Subsequently, his perspective towards the whole world has deteriorated into a pessimistic attitude, derived from his own personal sense of inferiority. As a result, Holden feels isolated and alone. In his desire to feel connected to someone, he travels home to visit his sister, Phoebe, hoping to receive emotional support. Instead, Phoebe criticizes his pessimistic attitude towards life, much to his own surprise. However, the criticism that Holden receives from his sister motivates him to improve his perspective towards life, by having become more optimistic, and leading to rapid and significant maturity within his personal development.…
Many adolescents often suffer from a lack of direction. Not knowing what they are doing or where they are headed, faced with the many obstacles of both life and adult society as they struggle to find direction in the world. Many long for acceptance and love that they do not receive. This description perfectly suits the situation befalling Holden Caulfield, the controversial protagonist and main character of J. D Salinger’s Catcher in the Rye. In the novel, after being expelled from his fourth school, Pencey Prep, Holden goes on a journey of self discovery through New York. He becomes increasingly unstable in a world in which he feels he does not belong, with the company of people he deems "phonies". Holden, not unlike a typical teenager, is also on his own quest in order to find himself, yet he resorts to ignoring his problems as a way of dealing with them. Holden tells his story from the confines of a psychiatric hospital, having been there to recover from a neurotic breakdown caused by his outlandish and often over the top actions. Holden Caulfield’s unachievable dreams, delusional fantasies, and erratic behaviour all lead to the breakdown of his character throughout the course of the novel Catcher in the Rye.…
Holden Caulfield, the novel’s protagonist, is a pivotal character in The Catcher in the Rye. Holden is characterized as an innocent, apathetic, naive teen who is seeking knowledge of life and the meaning of becoming an adult. Holden’s struggle with seeing the genuine nature of people is something that acts as a barrier for him throughout the novel. Holden is troubled and burdened throughout the story, which causes him to have a warped view on an array of subjects. Holden passes strict judgement on everyone, as he struggles to transition from adolescence to adulthood. Holden appears to be stunned when he sees how different the life of an adult is comparison to that of children. His views on topics such as, life, his future, and sex. Holden approaches each of these subjects with strict views, and feels dejected when he realizes there are more multiple perspectives to these topics.…
Holden is so caught up in all the “phonies” and people around him that annoy him ,and he ends up having a hard time focusing and taking care of himself. Everyone around him annoys him except for those who truly understand him, like Phoebe and Jane. Many people in the novel do not understand that Holden is not being raised in the environment he needs to actually learn to grow up. He requires a stable unchanging environment, in which he is not receiving because his parents are not around to guide him. Instead, they continue to send Holden to schools in which he cannot completely handle because he is surrounded by tons of people who irritate him. He latches on to his memories though, which is why he is thrilled when Stradlater has a date with Jane, because Jane means the world to him. Holden has a hard time accepting the fact things are constantly changing around him. Part of the reason for why Holden is caught in his childhood is for the reason that he wants to revisit all of the good times that he had with Allie. This is described in, “Like everybody else in the book, Antolini fails to see what ails Holden is the death of his brother, Allie, plus parental neglect. (Marks 507).…
The fantasy of “The Catcher In The Rye” is extremely important. Holden does not have a particularly easy life, but he just makes it a lot harder on himself than it has to be. He wants to stay young, but also has the conflict of trying to be seen as an adult. He can not have both, but that is what he wishes. He wishes that he could be a ladies…
Throughout the story Holden has been given many opportunities to show his mature side. He helped children by marking out the graffiti at his sister's school. He also talked to his sister about wanting to be The Catcher in the Rye is because he wants to help kids who are rushing into their adulthood and not enjoying their childhood. He wants to catch them before they make the jump into adulthood. Holden himself is a very unique character. He occasionally shows that he cares even though it is thought that he doesn’t care about anything. Holden often tries to hide his nice side in order to portray as if he doesn’t care. All of these are shown in the novel The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger he goes into detail to…
In Catcher in the Rye, the protagonist, Holden Caulfield, is introduced to the readers as a troubled young who desperately wants to protect his youthful innocence. Because Holden constantly faces harsh realities of adulthood and world, he is even more compelled to protect innocence. He wants to protect not only his, but also those around him. Holden feels that childhood is something to be saved and kept, instead of learning the truth of adulthood since the adult world is an impure place that corrupt kids and ruin their perfect perception of the world.…
Though Holden needs closeness and love in order to renew his life, he keeps driving himself further away from it in order to avoid the inevitable loss. The more he wants to experience life, the more antisocial he becomes and the more he imagines death. This paradox is part of Holden’s life: there is pain in shutting down one's feelings, and there is pain in the risk of opening oneself up again. He impossibly tries to avoid pains that are inevitable for human mortals while they live. As he starts to become mature since he says “...I said, in this very mature voice and all "Oh, I have a few qualms, all right. Sure. . . but not too many. Not yet, anyway. I guess it hasn't really hit me yet. It takes things a while to hit me. All I'm doing right now is thinking about going home Wednesday. I'm a moron." "Do you feel absolutely no concern for your future, boy?" "Oh, I feel some concern for my future, all right. Sure. Sure, I do." I thought about it for a minute. "But not too much, I guess. Not too much, I guess." "You will," old Spencer said. "You will, boy. You will when it's too late." (Page 17) Since this is the beginning of the story it does show a sense of maturity through education however another example was Holden's interactions with his little sister Phoebe show his "maturity". He acts as a role model to her, or at the least…
The more things change the more they stay the same in Holden Caulfield’s case is wrong. In the story, The Catcher in the Rye, Holden Caulfield had to go through many changes to become the person he is at the end of the story. The many changes he went through matured him into a man that accepts life. Holden in the story went through many obstacles to survive when he ran away from home. The death of his brother Allie contributed to a personality change. Also, Holden had to deal with some interesting characters including Maurice a pimp.…
Stress, depression, and confusion, has made the protagonist a interesting character. The author J.D Salinger represents Holden in The Catcher in the Rye as a failing student at Pencey Prep trying to go through life the best he can. However Holden's life has not been easy many things have happened to Holden. Throughout Holden's life many things have hurt him and many things have helped him such as adults, children, women, and peers. How ever as throughout the book Holden has changed how he interacts with people.…
Holden Caulfield, a cynical and paradoxical teenager not ready to embrace adulthood goes on a journey to explore the phoniness of the adult world. J.D. Salinger’s Catcher in the Rye published in 1951 reflects on Holden as a child as well as an adult. His neglection of adulthood and his blindness on the innocence of youth presents a great challenge in his life. The bulk of the novel displays Holden, a 16 year old teenager who just flunked out of Pencey Prep fleeing to his hometown, New York City in hope of staying at a hotel for a few days before revealing his expulsion to his parents. Throughout his stay, Holden has unusual encounters with past colleagues, his former neighbor, his sister Phoebe, and his old teachers. From these encounters, Holden acquires different perspectives on life and adulthood.…
He hasn’t started being the catcher in the rye yet, but he has the power to save the youngsters. Overall, Holden is a normal teen like the others. Teenagers like to convey their thoughts, take risks, be kind towards others, and experience things. They want to reveal what they are thinking in an honest way. Furthermore, the advantages including the enjoyment from doing things is important to them, so they do whatever it takes to get them. Teenagers are eager in what they want to do, but don’t start until later. To conclude, a typical teenager like Holden has these…