Examples Of Existentialism In Catcher In The Rye

Take a Dip: The Catcher in the Rye and Existentialism

Depression is a disease that takes over an individual’s mind, making one feel empty, lifeless, exhausted, and bitter. People who are depressed tend to view life as meaningless and have little to no interest in daily activities that once may or may not have been pleasurable. Depression can often be so severe that one may dissociate from life, activities, and peers. In relation to separation, the philosophy existentialism has similar elements; existentialists deal with frustration and isolate themselves from society because they see no final purpose of life. Such ideas are seen in J.D Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye, an existentialist novel following the main character and narrator, Holden

For example, instead of socializing, Holden disengages himself during the football game at Pencey Prep by “standing way the hell up on top of Thomsen Hill” while everyone else is together watching the game (Salinger 2). He chooses to be away from the public, unaccompanied on top of a hill. This shows how he secludes himself from the crowd. Furthermore, he often speaks of sexual fantasies and desires, but he contradicts himself and “make[s] sexual advances he cannot carry through” (Bryan 1072). For example, when the elevator guy, Maurice, offered him a prostitute while staying at a hotel in New York, he got too nervous and pushed her away once it was about to happen. Holden “just didn’t want to do it” and “felt more depressed than sexy.” (Salinger 96). This shows how Holden ends up right back to where he started, being alone in the hotel

For example, when Holden first gets off the train at Penn Station, he goes into the phone booth and starts contemplating who he should give a call; his little sister Phoebe, his brother D.B, an old friend Carl Luce or one of the two girls he finds attractive, Jane Gallagher and Sally Hayes. He one by one comes up with several excuses so he does not have to phone up anyone; as a result, he did not want to give Jane a call because “he didn’t feel like it” and he did not want to give Carl Luce a call because he “didn’t like him much” (Salinger 59). Holden does not have any serious reasoning not to call, however, he integrates anything logical he can think of in his defense to not have to communicate with anyone. In addition, towards the end of the novel, Holden decides he will leave and move away to a farm in the West “just so people didn’t know [him] and [he] didn’t know anybody” (Salinger 198). He also adds that he would pretend to be a deaf mute so he “wouldn’t have to have any goddam stupid useless conversations with anybody” (Salinger 198). This shows that Holden just wants to get away and abandon himself from everyone. Holden wanting to drop and leave everything he has in his life, including his little sister Phoebe who seems to be a main source of his happiness, shows how he even detaches himself from relevant people just so he can be