The Theme of Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger Essay

Throughout the story Holden emphasizes his love for childhood innocence. In a passage he says “The thing with kids is, if they want to grab for the golden ring, you have to let them do it, and not say anything.” (Salinger 211) This immediately points to his affinity for innocence and not having the limits of being and adult. The

Through Holden’s critique of others, we see that he is strongly against people who are hypocritical, conceited, and who conform to society. Phonies are more interested in putting the best version of themselves out for people to see rather than being their true

It takes most of the book before Holden begins to realize that he is helpless to stop this corruption. Finally, he realizes that not only is there nothing that he can do, but there is nowhere

In J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye, the main character, Holden, cannot accept that he must move out of childhood and into adulthood. One of Holden’s most important major problems is his lack of maturity. Holden also has a negative perspective of life that makes things seem worse than they really are. In addition to Holden’s problems he is unable to accept the death of his brother at a young age. Holden’s immaturity, negative mentality, and inability to face reality hold him back from moving into adulthood.

Throughout the novel, Holden attempts to find the true from of himself as he struggles with the social interactions around him. Due to the struggle and confusion that arouses from it,

In The Catcher in the Rye, Holden’s outlook in life is either the innocence of childhood or the cruelty of adulthood. He believes that the innocence of childhood is very valuable and it should be protected from

When we grow up we’re raised to do our best and to be mature. People know their right from wrongs. Throughout the novel The Catcher in the Rye by, J.D. Salinger the main character goes through a difficult life and time growing up. Growing up too fast is not the answer for everything. The main character Holden Caulfield is a misfit because he is very dramatic, he avoids facing things, and he shows reckless behavior.

Many novels cannot be fully understood and appreciated if only read for face value, and J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye is no exception. The abundant use of symbolism in Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye is of such significance that it “proclaims itself in the very title of the novel” (Trowbridge par. 1). If the symbolism in this novel is studied closely, there should be no astonishment in learning that The Catcher in the Rye took approximately ten years to write and was originally twice its present length. J.D. Salinger uses copious amounts

Here, Holden desperately wants to escape the phony, corrupt world, so he proclaims his love to her, and asks her to runaway with him. She tells him that he is crazy and leaves him.

Written in 1951, J.D. Salinger’s, The Catcher in the Rye continues to be a popular book amongst Americans. Although The Catcher in the Rye has been banned in many public school settings in the United States it continues to stay atop some of the greatest books of all time lists. Whether people are in their teens or in their fifties they find themselves drawn to Holden Caulfield. At some point in their life they could relate to a sense of alienation, caused by money and wealth. Humans are wired to be jealous and want what others have. Holden Caulfield has the opposite problem, he has money and wealth which he inherited from his hard working parents. However, he himself is not motivated to work hard, graduate prep school and earn his own wealth. Instead he despises hard working students at the many prep schools he drops out of. Holden also has a big number of family complications. An area to explore is how wealth can contribute to feelings of alienation and despair. Holden Caulfield has a complex relationship with money, not wanting to associate from it, but benefiting from it. A further look into the 1950’s may give an insight into the troubled mind of Holden Caulfield.

In J.D. Salinger's Catcher in the Rye, a young man named Holden Caulfield is on the edge of adulthood. He is a bright kid but struggles with many mental diseases mainly because of the passing of his brother Allie. This has caused him to not focus on school and has got him kicked out of many schools. He did not have many friends and he did not like many people. He thought of everyone as phony. Holden does not want to confront adulthood in fear of losing his childhood because of the fear of change, conformity to the phony world and the passing of his younger brother Allie.

Holden always talks about people being phony, and how he doesn’t like people for a reason. Holden is actually a phony person him self believe it or not. Holden is a liar he lies about most things that he doesn’t like or things he doesn’t feel comfortable talking about. When something goes wrong Holden immediately blames someone else for his mistakes, it’s never his fault. He hasn’t really decided what to do with his life. He wants to find out how things work and why things happen. At the same time he is insecure and also feels like he is never good enough. He thinks the adult world is phony. He wants to be an adult just like a lot of all the other people in the world but when he gets mad or they upset him he treats them as a child and runs away. He really wants to be friends with

He constantly talks down on phonies and says how he hates them and won’t ever be one. To Holden, being a phony is closely associated with being an adult. Holden sees almost everybody as a phony for stuff they do, even if the thing doesn’t necessarily make them a phony, in his eyes they’re a complete and utter phony and nothing else. He also sees guys and girls at bars as phonies because of how extremely self-entitled they are. He complains about how they never want to have an intellectual conversation with anyone. Holden dislikes the bartender at the Wicker Bar because he doesn’t bother with being nice to customers unless they’re rich or famous. He sees him as insincere and fake. In Holden’s eyes there is a bunch of phonies in every last corner of our society. He sees it as one of the most disgusting things about people. One of the main things Holden desires to do is to maintain his and his sister's innocence and protecting her from all the phonies in the world, all while keeping her from conforming to society and its

     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”.

Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye has been pronounced a literary classic for its atypical portrayal of adolescence, to effectively convey the protagonist’s alienation and confusion. The introduction of The Catcher in the Rye is underpinned by disorder and confusion through a stream-of-consciousness narration, which digresses from one subject to another. Consequently, Holden’s multitudinous thoughts and feelings appear to lack a cohesive pattern. Additionally, Holden’s prevalent ascription of other students as “phony” (Salinger, p.3) alludes to his alienation and isolation as a form of self-protection; he rejects those he does not understand. Furthermore, the vocabulary encapsulates typical adolescence dialect of the 1940s, and resultantly, alienates contemporary reader. This is typified through Holden’s use of colloquial speech, in particular, his exclamation “that killed me” (Salinger, p.42) to express his amusement. Therefore, the introduction of Holden’s disjointed monologue in The Catcher in the Rye foreshadows Salinger’s unique interpretation of adolescence.