Holden Caulfield Loneliness

Since You’ve Been Gone

“It’s hard being left behind. (...) It’s hard to be the one who stays.” Audrey Niffenegger (American writer, artist, and academic). Holden (our main character) begins to emotionally withdraw himself from society after the death of his beloved brother Allie. The Catcher in the Rye, written by J. D. Salinger, illustrates the themes of innocence, melancholy, and detachment from society. Using Holden Caulfield as an instrument in his master plan, Salinger sees that the common conflict is addressed as well as the need for companionship through a first-person narrative. Salinger paints the beginning picture with Holden, all alone, “ [feeling] like [he] was sort of disappearing,” (Salinger, 8). By hinting at the plot, the
Salinger is sure to stress the importance of his loneliness all throughout his novel. Going to Mr. Antolini, a favorite teacher at a previous school -- seeking comfort, Holden receives the opposite. Before writing the name of a psychoanalyst, “Wilhelm Stekl,” Antolini tells him, “this fall [he] think[s] [he’s] riding for -- it’s a special kind of fall, a horrible kind… [the man falling] just keeps falling and falling,” (Salinger, 207). Holden, being in an irrational state of mind, does not pay any attention to the warning given to him, even though those words were proven to be true. Ignoring his former teacher’s words of wisdom, a bleary-eyed Holden staggers into the street, away from Mr. Antolini’s house. As a student, and adolescent,, Holden has no secure place in society, which in his perspective, contributes to his world being a, “bleak moral climate that destroys the soul.” Trying to find something constant in his ever-changing society, Holden fabricates a new plan, one that involves his being deaf, so that, “[he] wouldn’t have to have any more goddam stupid useless conversations with anybody,” (Salinger, 218). Needless to say, his faith in humanity is at an all-time low, and, almost forcing isolation upon himself, Holden gives up. His view of the world is clouded by his ignorant notion that nobody
D. Salinger’s novel The Catcher in the Rye is a brutal reflection upon society, guilt, mortality, sexuality, deceit, and depression, all among adolescents. Holden’s exploration of his society and molding of his own, “bleak moral climate that destroys the soul,” relates to all teenagers on one level or another. Salinger is the author of one of the first novels to ever explore adolescence from such a raw perspective. Times change, but people