Examples Of Fear In Catcher In The Rye

Many people live their lives in fear, whether its fear of heights, fear of death, or fear of the dark. Fear has the capability to alter ones perspective on life and impact the way they live. In J.D. Salinger’s, Catcher in the Rye, Holden Caulfield, the protagonist, is an exemplary example of this idea. Holden is afraid of the realities of his life; he is constantly in fear of losing the people around him, he fears the loss of faith in himself, and he fears the loss of innocence. He starts to change his behavior and acting in order to avoid facing these inevitable realities. It is this fear of loss that is the root cause of Holden’s downfall.
Firstly, Holden fears the loss of those around him, whether by death or emotional abandonment. From a young age, Holden experiences what the feeling of loss is through the death of his younger brother, Allie. Allie died from Leukemia at only eleven years old and his death continues to affect Holden and he never gets over it. Through this tragedy, Holden not only loses Allie, but he also emotionally loses the rest of his family. His older brother, D.B., moves away to become an author and doesn’t keep in contact with Holden much, his father is always at work

and doesn’t have time for him, and his sister, Phoebe, is growing up and Holden feels he loses her as she does. Holden also states that his mother was never the same after Allie died so she became emotionally distant from everyone: “I felt sorry as hell for my mother and father. Especially my mother, because she still isn’t over my brother Allie yet.” (Salinger, 171) This all leaves Holden feeling alone and unable to connect with his loved ones. The only other person outside of his family that Holden trusts is Jane Gallagher. Jane and Holden were once very close as kids and he misses seeing her every day. He has not seen Jane in a long time and fears he is losing her too. When he learns that she and Stradlater are going on a date, he wants to go and talk to her, but decides not too because he does not feel up to it. He reminisces about him and Jane as kids playing checkers, but does not want to face the reality that she and he have grown apart. These examples show how Holden fears losing those he cares about and wishes times were the same as they once were.
Secondly, Holden fears the loss of faith; both in himself and in humanity. Holden has come to a point in his life where he has realized it is better for him to not try and fail, than to try and not succeed. By allowing himself to purposely fail, he avoids letting himself down when he truly tries his best and fails. Holden has been kicked out of multiple schools over the past few years and has stopped putting in effort:
I forgot to tell you about that. They kicked me out. I wasn’t supposed to come back after Christmas vacation on account of I was flunking four subjects and not applying myself at all. They gave me frequent warning to start applying myself—especially around midterms, when my parents came up for a conference with Old Thurmer—but I didn’t do it. So I got the ax. (Salinger, 6)
This quotation demonstrates how Holden understands that he is not doing the best he can, but he does not seem to care. Also, Holden is starting to lose faith in humanity as well. When he takes a trip down to the Phoebe’s school, he notices graffiti on the walls. The provocative language used angers Holden and makes him question people and how someone could write that where all the children would see. The idea of Phoebe, or any child, seeing and thinking about the word drives him crazy: “Somebody’d written ‘Fuck you’ on the wall. It drove me damn near crazy. I thought how Phoebe and all the other little kids would see it…” (Salinger, 221) This all explains how and why Holden is afraid of losing faith in not only himself, but humanity as well.
Lastly, Holden fears the loss of innocence and does everything in is power to protect it.

He fears this loss to such an extent that he goes out of his way to preserve and protect it for everyone and everything. It has become such a big part of him that he feels it is what defines him and if he doesn’t succeed, he feels he is failing himself more than he already does. Holden does his best to protect his own innocence as well as everyone else. One way Holden tries to protect his own innocence is shown by his incident with the prostitute. Holden likes the idea of being sexually pleased and agrees to receiving services from a pimp, but when it becomes real and the girl shows up, he can no longer follow through. The reality of his situation hits him as seen in this

quotation:
I certainly felt peculiar when she did that. I mean she did it so sudden and all. I know you’re supposed to feel pretty sexy when somebody gets up and pulls her dress over her head, but I didn’t. Sexy was about the last thing I was feeling. I felt much more depressed than sexy. (Salinger, 106)
By losing his virginity, Holden would also be experiencing loss of his innocence and that goes against everything he stands for. Another example of how Holden tries to protect innocence is by trying to protect his younger sister, Phoebe. Holden knows that Phoebe is growing up even though he wishes she would not. When Holden thinks about his past trips to the Museum of Natural History, he states how nothing ever changed, which is why he likes it. “Certain things they should stay the way they are. You ought to be able to stick them in one of those big glass cases and just leave them alone.” (Salinger, 136) This quotation shows us how he wishes he could leave his sister in the museum, so that she would never change or experience other factors that would cause her to lose her innocence. These are two examples of how Holden demonstrates his fear of loss of innocence and why he wishes he could preserve it.
As you can see, Holden Caulfield is a perfect example of how your life can deteriorate when you let fear control it. The losses he has experienced throughout his life have led him to have such a strong fear of loss in general and eventually leads him to his downfall. He allowed his fears of loss to shape his personality and behaviours. Holden starts acting in such a way that he protects himself from any form of disappointment by not allowing himself to make an effort in many aspects of his life as well overprotecting those around him. He plans out his failures because disappointment is easier to handle when it is the goal, he tries to keep everyone close and remember them for the good times, and he does everything in his power to protect the innocence of himself and everyone else. These are the ways in which Holden Caulfield allows his fears of loss to overpower who he is.