Holden is the protagonist in the novel, Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger (1945). Holden is a character who tries to seek for dignity, but he has some flaws holding him back. Holden is passive and unwilling to examine himself and seek his own dignity. Three reasons for his tragic flaw are: his craziness, his immaturity, and his phoniness and madman stuff.…
When someone is young, they tend to have innocence about them. As children grow up, they no longer possess this natural innocence. Exposure to all of the hatred in the world causes this loss. Holden Caulfield realizes this simple fact, as he himself grows up, and has a difficult time with the change. He experiences problems with communication as well as his school work. A common theme used throughout The Catcher in the Rye has to do with contradictions Holden makes. In J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye, first person point of view is used to highlight contradictions Holden makes throughout the novel.…
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.…
Catcher in the Rye written by Jerome David Salinger, is about Holden and his journey of trying to be accepted in the adult world. A memorable technique is symbolism to show the idea’s the ducks, red hunting hat and The Museum of Natural History. These symbols show the theme how alienation is a form of protection and how Holden likes to alienate himself from the world. By Holden wearing his red hunting hat when he feels like he doesn’t belong. The ducks run away from their problems. The Museum of Natural History is Holden’s favorite place to go ever since he was a kid.…
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.…
He sees adults and friends who succumb to these norms, and he outwardly looks down upon them and call them phonies of society. As an author, J.D. Salinger created Holden Caulfield as a character to challenge the expected norms of this time period, and as a whole, the novel addresses the challenge of accepting societal norms and diverging from norms to create a different lifestyle. For Holden, although many other reasons attribute to his refusal to accept society, he mainly believes that the 1950’s American Dream culture valuing marriage, family and education is not one that he wishes to be associated with. It is also crucial to note that by the end of the novel, Holden ends up in a mental institution, the location from which he narrates Catcher in the Rye. This element of the novel is crucial to our understanding of Holden as a character; he seems to have rejected the values and views of the post-war era so intensely, he is literally unable to function and has been…
The Catcher in the Rye written by J.D. Salinger is a reflection of his own life being shown through a teenage boy, Holden Caulfield. Like Salinger in the novel Holden jumps from prep school to prep school not finishing each time, however excels in English classes. Holden’s life in the novel shook the nation with controversy and curiosity. Illustrated in the text it conveys extreme depression, sexual tension, love, and lewd language. Holden attempts to see the “phony” world through a new light, however fails due to the type of person he is, his troubled background, sexual confusion, family issues, and fallacious world we all live in.…
In this novel, Holden Caulfield gets kicked out of his school and stays in New York for a couple of days before returning home. During his travels Holden does not maintain any relationships and he associates most adults with being phony. He is constantly trying to protect himself and his sister Phoebe from being exposed to the harsh adult world. In The Catcher in the Rye, J. D. Salinger uses rhetorical devices to explain Holden’s struggles and establish the theme of preserving his own innocence and the innocence of those around him.…
Salinger’s novel, The Catcher in Rye speaks to core of being an outsider, but beyond the anti-hero, anti-establishment persona that Holden reflects, Salinger wrote a portrait of a boy deeply troubled by the end of simplicity. Past the cynical nature and the reclusion from people, Holden is a little boy saddened by the death of his brother. Holden was never able to get closure over Allie’s death and because of this he has never been able to move on. To remember his brother and a simpler time Holden treasures innocence and has remained a child himself in many ways. Through the uses of metaphorical landscapes, a relatable anti-hero, and the setting of a repressed post-war American society Salinger depicts the journey of a young boy fighting, resisting the transition from childhood to adulthood. Holden Caulfield’s cynicism and reclusion are his defense mechanism, they warn of phony and slobs alike, but leave him lonely. He is both a figure for the youth and old alike, because Holden’s disdain of hypocrisy, longing for innocence, and his need for acceptance transcend age groups, these are human emotions that bother any age group. At the end of the novel, Holden says “Don’t ever tell anybody anything. If you do you start missing everybody” (Salinger 214). There are times when Holden comes off as neurotic, but in this case he meant that you will the way life used to be if you remember it. At the end Holden realizes that Allie’s death and his longing to go back to his childhood were holding him back, keeping him from applying himself. Many readers come away from that last line and feel that there is no happy ending for Holden, but the negative tone of the comment is less of a warning and more of a new being for Holden, meaning that Holden’s dream of being the catcher in the rye can can…
Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye. Self-inflicted isolation, portrayed by Salinger’s protagonist, Holden Caulfield, does not have the same effect on an individual as social isolation does. Self-inflicted isolation is not the most detrimental form of isolation, as it is a chosen path to take. Holden describes this state of isolation as he reflects, “ I don’t even know what I was running for-I guess I just felt like it” (Salinger 5). Running is used as a symbol to refer to this character’s chosen decline into isolation. Throughout the novel, Holden has multiple chances to regain his mental stability. These chances are symbolized by the multiple opportunities to call Jane Gallagher, the character who represents Holden’s innocence and sanity. By not taking this chance, Holden has made a choice that leads him further into isolation. Salinger made himself an example of this self-infliction as he isolated himself from…
The stories that Holden tells in the novel The Catcher in the Rye are that of a rebellious teen. He gives multiple examples of how he feels the world is against him. Holden continues to act out against those who attempt to guide him into a particular direction. For example, he has recently failed out of another school, which is the third he mentioned. Holden knows his parents will enroll him in another school the following fall, but he claims to have failed at Pency High because he has no interest in the subjects in which he was being taught. Many friends and teachers try to explain to Holden that he has a lot of potential and could excel at whatever he wanted. However, Holden, like many other young people, cannot find or identify what he wants…
To describe about Holden a little, he was a very weird guy. He has different perspective to other people, even though he has a normal appearance. He drinks, smokes and swears a lot but he is only a teenager. The way Holden talked was very funny; he used swearing words a lot. Maybe author tried to express Holden’s negative perspective against the world by using this way of speaking. Anyway, he was a typical student who had problems in schools. He failed every subject except English, and got kicked out of every school he went to. Also, he really hated “phony things”. What he meant in the word phony was like the basic manner people do every day. He also hated Hollywood movies and the actors just because he thought they were phony. I think he just hates it when people talk in a…
Significant passage: “Life is a game boy. Life is a game that one plays according to the rules” (8).…
Topic Sentence: Holden social inadequacy results in a lot of confusion, and stress in his life; therefore, he constantly has these fantasies in which he undergoes physical experiences that take him to meet his death.…
"The Catcher in the Rye" the reader can see the world through his eyes as he is the one narrating the story in first person. Holden is a young teenager, the age of sixteen who is emotionally disturbed and confused boy who is entering the journey of adulthood. Holden is a typical teenager who is rather irritated and disgusted by the society that surrounds him. To me he comes across as a witty individual because of the way he makes fun of, as he likes to call it the "phony" people in society he comes across with in the novel. He is from a family formed of two parents who seem to be quite wealthy, as they live in an expensive part of New York most people have to be wealthy to live in New York. Holden also was two bothers, D.B. and Allie, Allie whom is dead at the age of thirteen and he has a younger sister Phoebe.…