Catcher In The Rye Phony Analysis

Throughout The Catcher in the Rye by J. D. Salinger, Holden Caulfield uses the word “phony” prolifically, using it to describe anything that hits the wrong side of his fancy. Despite Caulfield’s insistence that he hates phoniness, he himself often puts up a false front in various situations. As we will see, Caulfield’s view that most people are liars and fakes expresses disgust not with individual people but with himself and with life as a whole as well as a slightly nostalgic idealization of his memories.
Holden describes as phony anything that is, in his opinion, putting up a false front; for example, the principal at his old school or the word “grand.” Sally Hayes earns the title simply because she asked to whom she was talking on the phone. Yet despite the many things that Holden considers to be phony, he rarely is able to defend his views, often reverting to the statement that he can’t explain, and that one had to have been there to understand. For instance, he says when he is talking to Phoebe, “‘God, Phoebe! I can’t explain. I just didn’t like anything that was happening at Pencey. I can’t explain.’” (169) The fact that he is unable to elaborate points towards the idea that Caulfield’s frustration went

deeper than the individual things he accused of being phony.
Caulfield uses very similar reasoning to this when he is explaining why he likes something. Granted, he likes comparatively very few things or people, but there are a few, such as his younger siblings and Jane Gallagher, his friend of several summers previously. When describing them, he tells the readers repeatedly how much we’d like these people if we knew them. He tells stories, shares random facts about them that obviously make him happy, but he never gives any clear indication of their virtues nor does he admit that he simply likes these people apart from specific reasons. He always manages to give the impression that he has reasons, but that he’s just not in the mood to remember them at the moment. The fact that he doesn’t admit to his lack of concrete reasons again suggests that his opinions are something different than just personal preference.
There is one very striking contrast between the things Caulfield like and the things he doesn’t. That comparison is this: The things Holden calls “phony” are all things that directly pertain to his life at the time of writing. The things he likes are the things and people he knew when he was younger, before his life started falling apart. There is nothing to tarnish his memories of Allie, Phoebe, or the Museum of Natural History. On the other hand, the people he comes into contact with in the adult world are almost unfailingly classified as phony. His teachers, his roommates, even his old friend Sally Hayes, all are called fakes. Also, Holden exhibits a fear of the things in his past, as evidenced by his avoidance of Jane and her image being left to the readers’ imagination, and his reluctance to enter the Museum of Natural History He is idealizing his past, his memories, and the people in them, making himself believe that the world has not always been this hard, that he has not always been this fake.
Holden’s idealization of the past is also an idealization of a past self. He exhibits all kinds of phoniness over the course of the novel, from lying to Mrs. Morrow on the subway, to flirting with the girls at the nightclub, to pretending to listen to Mr. Antolini. He readily admits to these faults, and yet he never uses the word phony to describe himself. Some part of his subconscious sees in the people around him the things he hates about himself, and he reacts violently against it. He idealizes his past, partially because his circumstances back then were more forgiving, partially because he himself was less fake, less phony. As he has gotten older, especially after Allie’s death, life hasn’t felt the same for him, and so he blames the things around him for this accusing them of being phony.
The exception to this seems to be the nuns whom he meets in the café.

He truly enjoys their company, even though they don’t remind him of happier times. Why? The answer is, they are not a disappointment. Everything he calls a phony is something he used to or feels he should take pleasure in: school, friends, movies, plays, people. But he has no comparison for two elderly nuns travelling around, carrying the collection baskets that wouldn’t fit in their suitcases, so they can’t disappoint him. Also, Caulfield criticizes people for faults he sees in himself, such as not stopping shenanigans when people ask him to. But one would be hard pressed to find someone less like Caulfield than the nuns. He can enjoy their company because they don’t show him his own

faults.
Sally Hayes also seems to be an exception; just like Jane, she is someone whom Holden has known for a long time and who, by the reasoning that he is idealizing his past, should bring him comfort just as the thought of Jane does. However, the difference is that Holden spends time with Sally during the book, while Jane remains a figure in his memories. This means that Sally has a chance to show that she does not fit his idealized picture, that she too is a phony, so to speak, while Jane does not. Because Caulfield doesn’t meet Jane, she, just like the nuns, cannot be a disappointment.
Caulfield is searching for the pleasure life used to bring him. This is symbolized by the ducks of Central Park. Holden asks multiple people where the ducks in Central Park go in winter when the pond freezes over but never gets an answer. Holden can’t find the ducks, and Holden can’t find his childhood happiness. But the ducks, wherever they went in the winter, come back in the spring. At the end of the book, Holden no longer feels as though he is about to fall forever, and he is ready to try again.
In J. D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye, Holden Caulfield is struggling to cope with how he and his life have changed. He deals with this by calling many things and people phony, accusing them of being fake because nothing, including himself, feels real to him. He relies on his idealized memories and thoughts of his dead brother Allie to keep him afloat. He constantly uses the word “phony” because of a deeper yearning for the way he, as well as life, used to be.