Catcher in the Rye
A coming of age novel is defined in the Merriam-Webster dictionary as "the attainment of prominence, respectability, recognition, or maturity” (Merriam-Webster 2014). Throughout many novels, the main character evolves into a more mature and understanding person, and the end of the novel is victorious for overcoming their problems. However, this is not the case in the novel The Catcher in the Rye. Throughout the novel, the main character, Holden Caulfield, evolves into a mature and understanding adult who realizes nothing can be prevented from changing. Holden doesn’t want to grow up, as he fears he will not be innocent, and instead become phony. However, while walking through the Museum of Natural History, Holden realizes
…show more content…
that nothing has ever changed in the museum except for himself, resulting in the understanding that he can’t prevent anyone from growing up. In fact, Holden began to understand that growing up was an essential part life, which trying to prevent would be pointless, but then instead of being triumphant in this victory, he breaks down to a point where he places himself in a mental hospital. His breakthrough of acceptance of growing up, the need for education, and the need to stop alienating himself all led to his debacle. Holden Caulfield was someone who dreaded the idea of growing up, and becoming a “phony” adult. He wished to stay an innocent child forever, but as the novel progresses, he realizes that this isn’t possible. The first time that he began to realize that he couldn’t prevent himself from growing up, is when he went to the Museum of Natural History in search of his little sister, Phoebe. At the museum he began to reminisce about how when he was little, he would go there all the time with his school. He then had an epiphany, and he began to grasp the fact that he can’t avoid adulthood. “Nobody’d be different. The only thing that would be different would be you. Not that you’d be so much older or anything. It wouldn’t be that,exactly. You’d just be different, thats all” (Salinger, 121). Not only did he recognize the fact that he can’t prevent himself from growing up, but he also realized that he can’t prevent change in general. One of the major times that he realized this was when he was thinking about the ducks in the park in New York and where they went when the pond froze over. “So what I did, I started walking over to the park. I figured I’d go by that little lake and see what the hell the ducks were doing, see if they were around or not. I still didn’t know if they were around or not” (Salinger, 153). This quote about the ducks portrays a symbolism of his innocence. It shows how he acts as if he is a child, asking such childish questions all the time. Earlier in the novel, Holden mentions the pond beginning the freeze. The transition from the water turning into ice, can be seen as a symbol of Holden himself as he transitions from childhood to adulthood, in which he wants to prevent as much as possible. Near the end of the novel, Holden realizes that the ducks migrate to another place in the winter, which symbolizes the need for change and that Holden too, must always change. Lastly, at the end of the novel, when he is at the carousel with Phoebe, he entirely accepts the fact that he is becoming an adult. "The thing with kids is, if they want to grab for the gold ring, you have to let them do it, and not say anything. If they fall off, they fall off, but it's bad if you say anything to them." (Salinger, 211). When the children on the carousel are trying to grab the golden ring, Holden realizes that even though the children may fail or even fall, that the adults have to let this happen. The same thing goes for today, such as if a child fails at something, the parents must step out of the way a bit, and let the child solve it for themselves, and let them grow up. Holden has an epiphany, that he must grow up himself and accept the fact that Phoebe is evolving into a more mature person. Almost everyone has never wanted to grow up in their life, whether it was because they don’t want to take on responsibility, or whether they just want to be able to run around all day and eat tons of candy. The same goes for Holden Caulfield, not only has he realized that everyone has to grow up, but he also realizes the importance of education, and this recognition of these things, is a big step up in becoming a more mature person. All through Holden’s life he flunked out of school, and moved on to the next one. Holden was not one who was excited to go to school each day and learn. The only class he actually enjoyed was English, but in every other class, he put in no effort. The most recent school that he flunked out of was Pencey Prep. Even though he did not enjoy school very much, he enjoyed talking to the teachers. One in particular was Old Spencer, who was his history teacher. The night of the football game, Holden went to go talk to Old Spencer and talk to him about how he was flunking school. “In the first place, I had only written that damn note so that he wouldn’t feel to bad about flunking me… Well, you could see he really felt pretty lousy about flunking me. So i shot the bull for a while. I told him I was a real moron, and all that stuff. I told him how I would’ve done the exact same thing if I’d been in his place, and how most people didn’t appreciate how tough it is being a teacher… The funny thing is , though, I was sort of thinking about something else while I shot the old bull… I was wondering where the ducks went when the lagoon got all icy and frozen over” (Salinger, 12). This quote portrays how immature Holden is, and how he doesn’t care at all about education. As the book progresses, Holden begins to understand the importance of education, especially after talking to Mr.Antolini. During his talk with Mr. Antolini, his mind tends to go elsewhere every now and then, but he does take in the lesson that he must become more educated and find out his brain size, in order to figure out what he wants to do with his life.. Not only did he learn that he needed to become more educated, but he learned a little more on that he needs to grow up and become more mature. “‘I'm not trying to tell you,’ he said, ‘that only educated and scholarly men are able to contribute something valuable to the world. It's not so. But I do say that educated and scholarly men, if they're brilliant and creative to begin with--which, unfortunately, is rarely the case--tend to leave infinitely more valuable records behind them than men do who are merely brilliant and creative. They tend to express themselves more clearly, and they usually have a passion for following their thoughts through to the end. And--most important--nine times out of ten they have more humility than the unscholarly thinker. Do you follow me at all?’... ‘Something else an academic education will do for you. If you go along with it any considerable distance, it'll begin to give you an idea what size mind you have. What it'll fit and, maybe, what it won't. After a while, you'll have an idea what kind of thoughts your particular size mind should be wearing. For one thing, it may save you an extraordinary amount of time trying on ideas that don't suit you, aren't becoming to you. You'll begin to know your true measurements and dress your mind accordingly’" (Salinger, 209). What Mr.Antolini said to Holden really made him think about education, and actually stuck in his head for a while. He began to start caring resulting in himself becoming more mature. Almost everyday, students in the hallways at school talk about how much they dread being here, but most of them all manage to apply themselves to school and show up everyday. Unlike these students, Holden doesn’t care at all, and ends up flunking almost every single school he is in. After talking to these teachers that he cares so much about, he begins to feel guilty and feels that he should begin to apply himself. In result, he is becoming more mature. Not only has Holden become more realistic and mature in his understanding of education, but he realized that he needs to stop alienating himself. One of the main themes in this novel is “alienation in the form of self protection”, which is something that Holden does quite often.
However, instead of succeeding at alienating himself, he always felt the need to have communication with another person, so that he wouldn’t be lonely. In the beginning of the novel, he couldn’t stand most of the people that he knew. In fact the only people that he could actually stand was his sister Phoebe, Jane Gallagher, and his dead brother Allie. As the novel progresses, however, he begins to accept the fact that he can’t change what other people do, and that he can’t prevent himself growing up and becoming an adult, so he begins to let people in his life. Even though at the end of the novel he regrets letting people in his life, he has become more understanding that shutting people out will not only hurt those who are being shut out, but also himself. “I thought how it might be the last time I'd ever see her again. Any of my relatives, I mean. I figured I'd probably see them again, but not for years... I'd ask them all to visit me sometime if they wanted to, but I wouldn't insist or anything. What I'd do, I'd let old Phoebe come out and visit me in the summertime and on Christmas vacation and Easter vacation. And I'd let D.B. come out and visit me for a while if he wanted a nice, quiet place for his writing, but he couldn't write any movies in my cabin, only stories and books. I'd have this rule that nobody could do anything phony when …show more content…
they visited me. If anybody tried to do anything phony, they couldn't stay” (Salinger, 225). This is a major turning point in which Holden realized he must stop alienating himself. At the beginning of the quote, he is talking about how he will move away into a cabin in the woods and not see anyone in years, but by the end of the quote he is saying how he wants people to visit him and will invite them as much as possible as long as they aren’t phony. Even though he has come to this realization, at the end of the novel he regrets that he let people into his life, and told them things. “Don’t ever tell anybody anything. If you do, you start missing everybody”(Salinger, 234). Due to him missing everybody, he crumbled and ended up in a mental health facility. Even though Holden came face to face with reality, and became more mature, it may have not been the best for him, due to the fact that it all led to his debacle. Holden Caulfield never wanted to change, never wanted to grow up, and wanted to be alone and not have any communications with anyone.
In one aspect this is acceptable since he is being true to himself, and not changing because others want him to. However, in another aspect this is unacceptable because once reality sets in, Holden will crumble because his expectations will not be met, and he will realize that none of these are possible. As the novel progresses he begins to become aware that his wish to stay an innocent child forever will never come true and that everything must change. He begins to accept that education is necessary, and that he has to stop pushing people out of his life. However, Holden’s debacle was mainly caused due to the fact that he finally came face to face with reality. It may have been best for him to continue life the way he was living instead of changing and becoming more mature. It may have been best if Holden didn’t face reality. It may have been best if Holden didn’t learn anything those few days in New York before he went home. However, if none of this happened, the novel wouldn’t be considered a coming of age novel, and Holden wouldn’t have become the madman he is now known to be. Everything happens for a reason and there will always be “what if’s”, but humans always have to learn and evolve, just like Holden Caulfield did, even if it may not be the best thing to do. Ergo, throughout the novel, the main character, Holden Caulfield, evolves
into a mature and understanding adult who realizes nothing can be prevented from changing.
Holden does experience a rite of passage that transforms him into an adult in this novel. In the beginning of the story, he believes all adults are phonies, and he himself is scared of growing up. However, after he goes to the museum, he realizes that he is strong enough to survive as an adult: “I mean I could’ve killed myself when I hit the floor, but all I did was land on my side. It was a funny thing, though. I felt better after I passed out. I really did” (Salinger 206). The fall that Holden experience is imperative to his transformation into an adult because he realizes how important life really is to him. Once Holden accepts adulthood, he discovers that most people are not truly phonies, and that he will be able to figure out life in his own way.
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. Holden’s immaturity causes him many problems throughout the story. Although he is physically mature, he acts more like a child.
The novel The Catcher in the Rye follows Holden Caulfield for a weekend. The story begins in Agerstown, PA at Pencey Prep school with Holden standing on top of the Thomson Hill on his way to Mr. Spencer’s, his history teacher, to say good bye because Holden was expelled for not following rules. On his way to Spencer’s, Holden “felt like [he] was sort of disappearing”. (Salinger 5) The sense of symbolism with the word “disappearing” is that he feels alone and almost invisible. When Mr. Spencer starts to read Holden’s failed paper, Holden starts to daydream about “wondering where ducks went when the lagoon got all icy and frozen over” (13) in Central Park in New York. The symbolic significance in this comment is that Holden is frozen in adolescence.
Childhood is an unusually hard thing to rid yourself of when it is time for you to pass into the intensified life of adults. Personally, I have yet to overcome that challenge. The Catcher in the Rye is a well developed story about a high school boy, Holden Caulfield, who is stuck between the stages of adolescence and adulthood, and is trying to discover his identity. All his life, Holden Caulfield has refused to grow up, and as the book progresses, he is on the fine line of leaving innocence and adolescence behind and passing into adulthood, but what gives him the needed shove into the realm of adulthood was getting over his brother, Allie’s death. To Holden, Allie is the main definition of innocence. Eventually Holden comes to the decision to be the catcher in the rye. After this decision he tries to follow through with his plan and ultimately decides that he can’t keep anyone from growing up. This seems to be his breaking point in the book where he finally overcomes all his negative emotions towards Allie’s death and accepts it for what it is, knowing that he has to move on.
Throughout the book Holden admits he doesn't like change. Holden fear of growing up , becoming an adult and thinking of of it disgust him. For example the museum, Holden like it because the exterior of it did not change and says the only thing that would change would be you.In the text Luce says “Same old Caulfield.When are you going to grow up already?”(144). Holden wants things to stay how they are and how his life is. Holden considers adults phonies and he doesn’t want to be consider phony as well. When he describes the museum he says the best part about it is that it never changes, only you do.Holden bonds with his sister taking her to the zoo, museum and the carousel.He wants to Phoebe to experience what he did and to get the memories alive. “What I have to do, I would have to catch everyone if they start to go over the cliff- what I have to do, I mean if they are running and they don't look where they are going I have to come out from somewhere and catch them. That is all I have to do. I would just be the catcher in the rye”(173). This quote show how by holden is catching them from falling down the cliff which symbolizes stopping them from adulthood. “Thousand of little kids and nobody’s around- nobody big , I mean except me”(173). This quotes implies how young innocent kids won't be exerted by adults
The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger is a story of Holden Caulfield's growth as a person. Some view Holden as a static character, and say that by the end of the novel he hasn’t changed. I’d say that on the contrary Holden is an extremely dynamic character throughout the story. Holden does change and grow as a character because he lets go of wanting to protect innocence in the world, we see Holden begin to grow into what Erik Erikson believes is the stage of development for adolescents, and he starts to be willing to apply himself.
Growing up is not easy. The desire to slow down or stop the process is not unusual for adolescents. Resisting adulthood causes those who try to run away from it to eventually come to terms with the reality of life: everyone has to grow up, and fighting against it makes it much harder to accept in the end. In The Catcher in the Rye, Holden Caulfield often tries to resist the process of maturity in an effort to avoid the complicated life he might face as an adult, making him an unusual protagonist for a bildungsroman; this struggle, however, opens Holden’s eyes to the reality and inevitability of growing up, helping him realize that innocence does not last forever. Holden’s preference of a simplistic lifestyle is evident throughout the novel, but stands out especially when he visits the Museum of Natural History.
Holden and the Complexity of Adult Life What was wrong with Holden, the main character in The Catcher in the Rye, by J.D.Salinger, was his moral revulsion against anything that was ugly, evil, cruel, or what he called "phoney" and his acute responsiveness to beauty and innocence, especially the innocence of the very young, in whom he saw reflected his own lost childhood. There is something wrong or lacking in the novels of despair and frustration of many writers. The sour note of bitterness and the recurring theme of sadism have become almost a convention, never thoroughly explained by the author's dependence on a psychoanalytical interpretation of a major character. The boys who are spoiled or turned into budding homosexuals by their mothers and a loveless home life are as familiar to us today as stalwart and dependable young heroes such as John Wayne were to an earlier generation. We have accepted this interpretation of the restlessness and bewilderment of our young men and boys because no one has anything better to offer.
phonies and all he hates. By being in the stage where he is, he manages to avoid change, control his world with his own hands, yet. creates a paradox between what he is, and what he wants to be. Possibly the main reason why Holden doesn’t want to become an adult. is his perception of ”phoniness” and hypocrisy surrounding adult.
Throughout the novel, Holden leaves hints insinuating that he is distancing himself from people and society through his actions and decisions. Holden shows his hate towards the adult world by mentioning “phoniness” throughout the book, insinuating that he will never be like this, even though it’s impossible. His constant failing at school evidences that he isn’t planning to have a common future by having a job like most people would. It was evidently explained that Holden doesn’t fit in because he doesn’t want to be part of humans’ corrupted society. Regardless of how one feels about society, it is evident that its flaws made a teenager retract from accepting humans’ adult world, and instead negated to be a part of it.
In the modern world, everyone must make the transition, no matter how scary or daunting it may be, into adulthood at some point in their lives. Most individuals are gradually exposed to more mature concepts, and over time, they begin to accept that they can no longer posses the blissful ignorance that they once had as a child. Others, however, are violently thrown from their otherwise pure and uncorrupted adolescent lives through a traumatic event that hurls them into adulthood before they are ready. The novel The Catcher on the Rye written by J.D. Salinger, explores the struggle children face to adapt to adult society through the main character Holden Caulfield, a teen that lost his innocence, and is still attempting to cope with the fact that everyone grows up.
Growing up poses challenges to most people at some point in their lives. 16-year-old Holden Caufield is no exception. He is an apathetic teenager who’s flunked out of many schools. Underneath the cynical exterior though, Holden is troubled. He has different methods for escaping his problems but in the end they just cause him more problems. J.D Salinger, in his novel The Catcher in the Rye shows that often times when an individual faces problems in their life they will try to find a means to escape, instead of solving them.
It takes many experiences in order for an immature child to become a responsible, well-rounded adult. In J. D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye, Salinger’s main character Holden Caulfield matures throughout the course of the novel. In the beginning of the novel, Holden is a juvenile young man. However, through his experiences, Holden is able to learn, and is finally able to become somewhat mature by the end of the novel. In The Catcher in the Rye, Holden Caulfield’s story represents a coming of age for all young adults.
There is one event that unites all human beings. This event is the process of growing up and becoming an adult. The transition into adulthood from childhood can be very long and confusing. As a kid most of them can not wait to become an adult but once you experience adulthood you miss your childhood. The novel Catcher in the Rye shows how a teenager on the break of entering adulthood can get scared. Through the main protagonist Holden Caulfield, J.D. Salinger captures the confusion of a teenager when faced with the challenge of adapting to an adult society. Holden is faced with many problems as some teens
Holden Caulfield alienates himself from the rest of society to hopefully escape the means of growing up shown by his dialogue and behaviour. Holden doesn’t want to grow up because he doesn’t want to have to accept the responsibilities that come with it. Holden is constantly getting kicked out of different schools, “They kicked me out. on account that. I was not applying myself and all.”