Theme Of Innocence In Catcher In The Rye

Innocence is a key part of a child’s life as the child has not yet experienced the cruelty, violence and immorality of the adult world. In the text The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger, as a result of Holden’s fear of the adult world, this leads to his desire to protect innocence, ultimately leading to his mental breakdown. The novel shows a teenage boy’s desire to protect innocence which leads to his mental instability in attempting to deal with a world that clashes with his ideals. He only finds interest in children's innocence because they have yet not entered the phony adult world. The museum of natural history, which is unchanging, shows Holden’s desire to protect and preserve the innocence of children. Holden attempts to erase profanities

In The Catcher in The Rye, by J.D, the main character, Holden, can be seen as a troubled teenager growing up in a less than perfect society. Throughout the novel Holden struggles with the fact that many young and innocent kids will grow up and see the world from a different perspective. He naturally becomes worried for all future generations who will one day grow, as he did, and loose their innocence. The fixation of youth and innocence can be seen in the title of the book, as well as throughout the novel.

Holden’s immaturity causes him many problems throughout the story. Although he is physically mature, he acts more like a child. “All of a sudden I

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

In J.D.Salinger’s novel, Catcher In The Rye, Holden Caulfield, the main character of the novel, is a walking paradox who desires to hold onto his innocence and ,in his mind, thinks that people who lose their innocence will either turn into a “phony” or a “jerk”. During his journey towards trying to preserve his innocence Holden affected his desire to hold on to his innocence through his action, such as his experience with a prostitute named Sunny, his interaction with Sunny shows him that most of the world of adults is just an illusion. Another person who affects Holden desire is his 10 year-old sister Phoebe Caulfield, his interaction with his sister phoebe shows how it’s ok to lose your innocence because with the loss of that innocence you

He may still be a young boy but he is very independent and basically lives on his own for the entirety of the book, but his negative outlook transforms independence into isolation. He is incredibly lonely but also pushes people away when he has a chance to get close to them. Such as his date with Sally Hayes which was going very well until he pushed her away with his harsh words, “You give me a royal pain in the ass, if you want to know the truth” (Ch. 17 pg. 173). Just because Sally wouldn’t run away with him and be independent with him he pushed her away. Holden may think he wants to be free and independent but his negative outlook just feeds his loneliness and

In Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger, Holden Caulfield is a teenage boy who has been kicked out of his school, Pencey Prep. He is now back in New York City, wandering about since he didn’t tell his parents about his expulsion. Through his journey, Holden discovers the many hardships of adulthood, one of them being the loss of innocence. J.D Salinger uses tone to develop the theme that innocence is short-lived.

In J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher In The Rye, Holden Caulfield, a seventeen-year-old boy, transitions from childhood to adulthood. The death of Holden’s little brother signifies the beginning his loss of innocence and growth of maturity. As he enters adulthood, Holden views society differently from his peers by characterizing most of his peers and adults he meets as “phonies.” Thus, Holden takes the impossible challenge of preserving the innocence in children because he wants to prevent children from experiencing the corruption in society. The Catcher In The Rye embodies Holden’s struggle to preserve the innocence of children and reveals the inevitability of and the necessity of encountering the harsh realities of life.

In many novels the title of the story is more important than most people initially think. It often reveals important information about the story. In The Catcher In the Rye, Holden says that his dream job would to be the catcher in rye. This is significant to the story because of how Holden feels that adults are trying to ruin the innocence of children, and how he can be the one that saves them. Holden then realizes he cannot always be the one to save the children. This is show throughout the book but especially in the scene where Holden takes Phoebe to the carousel.This shows that Holden wants to be the catcher in the rye so that he can help keep the children their innocence from adults.

Stradlater goes on a date with her and gives Holden a very vague answer on wether or not he and Jane had sex. This enraged Holden because he wants to protect the innocence of someone he cared about so he hounded Stradlater for an answer, and ultimately did not get it. Both of these instances show Holden trying to protect someone relatively young being protected from a loss of innocence by Holden. He may have failed on Janes side of things, but there was nothing he could do if he was not with Stradlater and Jane during their

Although Holden Caulfield is known to be very whiny, judgmental and introverted, he has also displayed numerous good qualities and has reasons for why he acts the way he acts that help us understand the reasons for why he displays some of his negative qualities, which makes it possible for the readers to sympathise with him. Throughout the novel it is obvious that Holden has never gotten over the death of his younger brother Allie, which explains some of his negative traits, it is also apparent that Holden doesn’t fit in and is an introvert in a world that seems to be full of extroverts, and lastly most of his views on adults and the world, although somewhat extreme are also accurate. All these factors are what help us as the readers find sympathy for Holden.

Loss of innocence is one of the major elements of The Catcher in the Rye that make the novel so renowned. The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger is about an adolescent named Holden who wanders around New York City after being kicked out of a prestigious boarding school in eastern Pennsylvania. While learning more about himself and the adult world, he experiences alcohol, prostitution, and sexuality. Holden struggles with issues such as identity and maturity. Eventually, he realizes what it means to become an adult and accepts that maturity and development is inevitable. Holden suffers from a loss of innocence when

Before he was required to officially leave the dorms of school, Holden got in a fought with his roommate after finding out this friend and the girl he liked possibly had sexual interaction with one another. It ticked Holden off, so he threw a punch and also got one in return. After fighting his friend, Holden has the urge to leave the private school immediately. Since he didn’t tell his parents about getting kicked out of school, he decided to leave to New York. When he got to the hotel he was going to stay at, he got super lonely, so he decided to hire a prostitute only to end up trying to talk to her. He ends up getting beaten up by the prostitutes so called ‘owner’ and gets more money taken away from him than expected. Although Holden starts to contradict himself many different times, you can actually see him being genuine through his language and actions when his brother died, and he decided to break all of the windows. Its obvious he broke all of these windows because he was in so much pain and agony. He decided to go crazy and break everything since he did not have anyone to talk to. The fact that his brother had already died causes him to use “you” instead of “me.” He uses the word listen with Phoebe and this shows that he is generous, and is a great ‘big brother’ because of his

The novel “Catcher in the Rye” written by J.D. Salinger has become one of the top books in the post war literature of the USA. Despite the fact, that the main character is a teenager, this book gains particular popularity among adults, as it raises extremely important and complicated themes of innocence, death and loneliness. As a matter of fact, the theme of innocence is evident throughout the novel, as well as in the title of the book, as Holden is completely disappointed with his peers considering them to be phony and hypocritical, that is why he feels so lonely and depressive. Next to the fact, he believes that only children, in particular, his sister Phoebe are still innocent and sincere, what makes her to be the only person he can trust.

To begin with, one of the main differences, as well as one of the binary oppositions in the book is the innocence of childhood, and the experience of adulthood. Holden is still quite innocent. There are two great examples for this. First of all, he says “sex is something I just don’t understand. I swear to God I don’t.” (ch.9 pg.71) This is a great example of the innocence of childhood, on the contrary to the experience of the adult world. Holden, in his adolescence, has no sexual experience, and is quite intimidated when it comes to that topic, which clearly shows the “innocence” of childhood that he still has. This can also be related to the modern world, as people who are still virgins, or sexually inexperienced are often considered “innocent”, and often this causes a huge gap, caused by either bullying, intimidation, or any other feelings between people who have had sexual experiences and those who haven’t. Moving on from sexual experiences, Holden’s fantasies of being the “catcher in the rye” is probably the best image of these two worlds (adulthood and childhood) and how Holden imagines them. “...kids