The Catcher in the Rye, a Medley of Failure

Holden is unable to accept realities of life because of his negative personality. He claims that many people are phony and that they try to do things to make them look better than they are. Holden also thinks of many things as depressing. “It was really nice sightseeing, if you know what I mean. In a way, it was sort of depressing, too, because you kept wondering what the hell would happen to all of them” (p. 123). Holden always finds a down side to a situation. He fails to recognize the good sides of life, and this prevents him from seeing advantages in adulthood that are not present in his life.

Holden as a character displays the alienation of himself through his behaviour. Holden is not the same as many people and believes that everyone is a ‘phony’. Throughout the novel Holden realises more and more that he is different and sees the world differently to others around him. Holden has created an identity for himself and doesn’t want that to be diminished therefore he alienates himself from the rest of society to decrease the chances of that happening. Holden’s old school, Pency Prep, has the motto “since 1888 we have been shaping young boys into splendid, clear-thinking men.” (pg. 2) This increases Holden’s motivation to leave the school as it will be shaping his identity into something he doesn’t want to be; a man. Holden is all about protecting those younger than him from the dangerous world of adult hood and by alienating himself he feels he has a better chance of

Antolini was trying to hinder him from going down the wrong path. Holden focuses on the little details like the gasoline rainbows in the puddles on the street and which suitcase is nicer. He overlooks the obvious, “big picture” which could better help him adjust and focuses instead on little, often-insignificant things he can handle. Moreover, Holden only pays attention to the things he’s interested in and doesn’t pay attention to the teachers or work given at school. This lack of interest has caused him to drop out of four schools and, therefore missing out on knowledge necessary for his well-being and self-discipline. Holden does not like change. Holden needs change, he needs to grow up. He needs to change his thoughts and behavior. Holden says “Certain things should stay the way they are, you ought to be able to stick them in one of those big glass cases and just leave them alone (122).”

The novel The Catcher In The Rye, by J.D. Salinger, contains many complex symbols, many of the symbols in the book are interconnected. A symbol is an object represents an idea that is important to the novel. I believe the most important symbol in this novel is Holden 's idea of being the "catcher in the rye".

 Nevertheless Holden has so much personal pride he refuses lower him to that level.  For if he does, in his eyes, he will be the same as all those other ?Phony Ivy League bastards? (85).  As a result of Holden giving up on school, he is unable to proceed with the natural evolution that must occur for him to move on in society.  Mr. Antolini later points out to him ?Learning is a beautiful reciprocal arrangement.  And it isn?t education.  It?s history.  It?s poetry? (189).  His goal for Holden being to see school as something he loves and not something he is being forced to do.  Mr. Antolini tried to give Holden a reason to be motivated and in which case not to give up so easily.

Being a teenager is hard. There are even many struggles that a person has to face throughout their adolescent years such as dating, getting good grades, and keeping a good relationship with friends and family. For Holden, the protagonist in The Catcher in the Rye, going through the traditional high school’s struggles wasn’t easy. In addition to all the ‘normal’ challenges that every teenager has, Holden also had depression. Depression cast a dark shadow that followed Holden all throughout the story. Despite all of this, Holden made his life difficult for himself by doing things such as unfairly judging people, telling numerous lies and having a pessimistic attitude. Holden’s life, and the lives of the people around him could have been much simpler if he tried using these traits in a positive way. Instead Holden’s life was unnecessarily complicated, as he forced challenges onto himself from the way he behaved.

Although Holden enjoys reading books, when it comes to doing any work beyond reading, he does not apply himself. He has flunked out of four prep schools, including Pencey, for “not applying himself.” For example, when he speaks with his history teacher who flunked him, he admits to being a “moron.” However, it is not that he is a moron, but rather that, like a child, he cannot stay focused on the task at hand: “Well you could see he really felt pretty lousy about flunking me. So I hot the bull for a while.

fall. He tries to instill the notion that Holdenmust ignore the corrupt society in order to fully experience enriching and symbiotic relationshipsin life.

In the beginning of the novel, Holden falls off the metaphorical cliff when he flunks out of school for the third time. He never applies himself to any of the schools that he went to and he admits to not liking any of the schools either. He continues to complain about the students by calling

Holden is going through teenage hood, which is a very difficult time for many people. His visualization of life is very vivid to his own limits. He fixate of being real, Holden see’s flaws in other constantly and consistently labels them as fake, as bogus. He sees those flaws through the lens of social factors and the materialistic norms. Holden conception of life is that all the people he has encounter with are not their real self, they pretend to be something other them self. Holden sees them has these people portray to the world an image. There are obvious signs that Holden seems to be troubled and unreliable. What is that Holden is running away from is it the people around, is it the materialistic society, what is he trying to get rid off.

Holden’s parents establish a set of standards for Holden while he attends fancy preparatory schools. They want him to become successful and follow the footsteps of his father, “Lawyers are all right, I guess… All you do is make a lot of dough and play golf and play bridge and buy cars and drink Martinis and look like a hot-shot… Even if you did save guys’ lives and all, how would you know you did it because you wanted to, or because you did it because what you really wanted to do was be a terrific lawyer? How would you know you know you weren’t being a phony? The trouble is, you wouldn’t” (172). This shows his unwillingness to acquiesce, and follow the standards set by his parents and society. Holden continually gets kicked out of school, because he doesn’t want to live a meaningless life. He simply has no concern about making money or achieving the American Dream, he just wants to be complacent and live a happy life. Holden is essentially rebelling against what society has taught him that was most important; wealth and power. He has created his own set of principles, which is often the cause of his alienation from the rest of his peers. While attending Pencey Prep, Holden was forced into taking an oral expression class, that forced him and his classmates to standardize the way they think and speak in order to comply with the guideline set by their teacher Mr. Vinson (183). In almost every aspect of his life, he is being continually

Holden’s ordinary world consists of struggling to apply himself in school and belief that education is “phony”. On his date with Sally, an old friend, he tells her why he refuses to apply himself, “You ought to go to a boys school sometime...Its full of phonies, and all you do is study so that you can learn enough to be smart enough to be able to buy a goddam Cadillac some day, and you have to keep making believe you give a damn if the football team loses, and all you do is talk about girls and liquor and sex all day, and everybody sticks together in these dirty

Throughout the novel Holden is rejected and exploited by the society around him. As he is conflicted with himself to find a purpose in life he constantly tries to connect with a superficial society. The ongoing failure and fake personas he meets adds to his depression and cynicism. But instead of facing the problems by growing up and to move on Holden uses this negativity and isolation to protect him. Holden tries show that he is better than everybody else as this is the little stability he has left. When in reality Holden is just scared of the interaction of people because they just submerge him with complications he doesn 't know not yet how to deal with. Holden not being be able to cope with the idea of growing up adds to his loneliness which is the core of his pain. When his encounters first interaction in the novel, Holden Caulfield is an uncaring outcast who sees no motivation in life. As he says to Mr. Spencer, he feels trapped on “the other side of life” (Salinger). Holden constant attempt to fit into society is hidden because of his detachment to people. His only stability right now is to search for his own individuality and to face adulthood himself. That is why

The story begins from Holden being flunked out of the Pencey Preparatory School, in which he failed 4 of his 5 subjects, what was the major reason of his dismissal. However, instead of being disappointed with himself, the boy was rather content with leaving the place representing everything but truth. According to Holden, this institution, which is controlled by adults is despicable and fake; for instance, the advertisements of Pencey “[show] some hot-shot guy on a horse jumping over a fence. Like as if all you ever did at Pencey was [play] polo all the time. [He] never even once saw a horse anywhere near the place” (Salinger 4). Through his attitude towards the closest people surrounding him, Holden resents the adult world and resists entry into it, even

He drinks, he smokes and rebel against both his teachers and adults. Holden is a very negative person and is constantly trashing other people, if not he is lying to them. He likes calling people ‘phonies’, even tough he acts like a phony himself. And this is his hefty scare, he is terrified of growing up, yet he realises it is time for his body is changing and turning him into a man. Holden has had an uncomplicated life if you disregard away from his brother’s death. He comes from a good family, has never lacked anything and has agreeable opportunities. An instead of using this to his advantage, he gets sucked down into a pessimistic and sad vortex. He never feels at home anyplace or feels a strong connection to people. Rebelling is an ordinary thing to go through in your adolescence and Holden has it bad. He is indeed a ‘rebel without a