In the novel, The Catcher in the Rye, the main character, Holden, sees himself as a prophet or a saint, somehow better than everyone else. Holden uses this to look down on people and point out the phonies and the wickedness in the world around him. Ironically though, Holden seems to be the wicked and evil he hates within the world, not the good and kind that he thinks he is.
Although Holden thinks that he is the “the catcher in the rye” and will be the truth within the world to save people from all the wickedness, throughout the novel he judges those who appear to be phony or wicked, without looking inward to see the evil within himself. For example, Holden calls his headmaster, “The phoniest bastard I ever met in my life”, who “went
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around shaking hands with everybody's parents when they drove up to school. He'd be charming as hell, and all. Except if some boy had little old funny-looking parents… Then old Hans would just shake hands with them and give them a phony smile and then he'd go talk, for maybe a half an hour, with somebody else's parents” (Salinger, 14). Ironically, Holden himself is just as phony as most of the people he puts down. Like on a train ride to New York he meets the mother of a former classmate, Ernest Marrow, and cannot stop lying.
When the woman asks what Holden’s name is, he tells her the name of Pencey’s janitor, Rudolf Schmidt, and justifies the lie by saying “I didn't feel like giving her my …show more content…
whole life history.” (54). Additionally, Holden states that he is the “The most terrific liar you ever saw in your life. It's awful. If I'm on my way to the store to buy a magazine, even, and somebody asks me where I'm going, I'm liable to say I'm going to the opera” (16).This demonstrates how he is just as fake, if not more, than those he so viciously criticizes for being phony. Holden Caulfield seems to be a mere hypocrite, repulsed by such phoniness, but not at all concerned with the phoniness within himself. Similarly, Holden hates the movies, because he cant handle that they are merely artificial, but he speaks of attending them a lot anyways.
He criticizes his brother, D.B. for his work in Hollywood, writing movie scripts, “Now he’s out in Hollywood… Being a prostitute. If there’s one thing I hate, it’s the movies” (2). This tells us that Holden hates movies because they seem phony and those who are involved in making them are also phony. Despite his disinclination for the movies, throughout the novel Holden frequently mentions movies he had attended, “I had quite a bit of time to kill till ten o'clock, so what I did, I went to the movies at Radio City” (137). This demonstrates that although he hates films, Holden proceeds to go see them. Furthermore, Holden also attended the movies at Pency, "We'd take the bus into Angerstown and have a hamburger and maybe see a lousy movie" (3). This further exemplifies how Holden contradicts his thoughts on movies by avidly going to view them. Through these actions, Holden's real feelings about the movies are completely in variance when he decides to makes plans to go to the films. The image Holden presents to the world through those actions is not what he wants them to be. This further gives the world a sense that he is pretending to be something that he is not. Holden is hypocritical because he engages in events, such as movies that he openly shows extreme animosity for. Likewise, Holden is intensely disapproving of others, though he is
desolated and strongly desires for a connection with others.
Since Holden was isolated from his family, in order to not get hurt again he tries to find hypocrisy in people to stop himself from trusting others. Holden feels isolated after being sent to a boarding school that “was full of phonies” by his parents (Salinger 90). Salinger’s message to the audience with this quote is that when
Holden, before leaving for New York, attended a boarding school named Pencey Prep. He makes it clear that he thinks everyone, teachers and students alike, is a “phony.” At one point, his roommate Stradlater goes out with a girl who ends up being Jane Gallagher, a childhood friend and crush of Holden. In his eyes, this is a betrayal. Holden is annoyed
In the Story Catcher in the Rye Holden has a “ideal” view of the world that contradicts his perception in reality. Holdens “ideal” view of the world is that everyone contains childhood innocence and no one should try to break that innocence so people can just be who they want to be and not get made fun of or attacked. In Holden's mind he thinks that everyone thinks like he does and his view of reality is that all the phonies try to break childhood innocence so his reality trys to break his ideal world he has in his head. This unique way of thinking causes Holden to run into internal and external conflicts because not everyone thinks like he does.
Holden's idealism is first brought forth when he describes his life at Pency Prep. It is full of phonies, morons and bastards. His roommate, Stradlater, " was at least a pretty friendly guy, It was partly a phony kind of friendly..." (26) and his other roommate, Ackley is "a very nosy bastard" (33). Holden can't stand to be around either one of them for a very long time. Later, he gets into a fight with Stradlater over his date with Jane. Holden is upset because he thinks that Stradlater "gave her the time" and that he doesn't care about her; 'the reason he didn't care was because he was a goddam stupid moron. All morons hate it when you call them a moron' (44). Holden not only sees his roommates as phonies and bastards, but he also sees his headmaster at Pency Prep as a "phony slob" (3). This type of person is exactly what Holden doesn't want to be. He strives to be a mature adult; caring, compassionate, and sensitive.
In The Catcher in the Rye, Holden views the world as an evil and corrupt place where there is no peace. This perception of the world does not change significantly through the novel. However, as the novel progresses, Holden gradually comes to the realization that he is powerless to change this.
In the novel The Catcher In The Rye by J.D. Salinger,Holden the main character tries to take on adult and mature situations but finds himself in reality not getting very far. Holden Caulfield who goes to Pencey has failed four out of five classes and gets the notice that he is being expelled from the school. He leaves the school and goes out and tries to adventure into the real world. Holden takes on many challenges and obstacles throughout the book . Although Holden wants to be independent many people perceive Holden in numerous different ways to his actions and feelings. Faith and Stradlater both perceive Holden as irritating, when in reality he tries to distract himself from being depressed. For example when Holden was in the phone
Nobody is perfect. This makes it easy to judge people around us. In the book Catcher in the Rye by JD Salinger, the main character, Holden Caulfield, is extremely harsh when judging others. Judging people is a natural thing to do, however, you should not judge people so critically. Before judging others people should look at themselves. Holden is often pushing people away because of the unrealistic expectations he has. He doesn’t look at the problems he has, but instead looks at everyone else's problems. Holden judges people by their appearance and every little action they do. I do not admire Holden and his beliefs.
In The Catcher in the Rye, Holden views the world as an evil and corrupt place where there is no peace. His view of the world does not change much through the novel. However as the novel continues, Holden gradually comes to the realization that he is powerless to change this.
In the Catcher in the Rye, Holden is an immature boy. Holden’s immaturity cause him many problem throughout the book. He is physically mature but not emotionally mature. He acts like a child. “All of a sudden I started to cry. I’d give anything if I hadn’t, but I did” (p. 103). Holden shows his emotional unstableness.
...d to mean the world to him. Both his brother's death and parents desertion have evidently deeply impacted him. Holden pretty well lied to himself, claimed the he had no place in society, all to give him plausible reasons to isolate himself. By calling people phonies, which he frequently did, he was in all reality pushing them away before giving himself the chance to even debate getting to know them. 'Phony people' was like his own private excuse for avoiding making friends. Holden's only hope to attain happiness is to open up to others. If he refuses to, he will forever consider the world to be full of evil, corruption, and phony people. His cynicism, dishonesty and judgemental habits are like a cape that he wears to ward off the elusively hanging threat of abandonment.
that he is trying to hide his true identity. He does not want people to know who he really is or that he was kicked out of his fourth school. Holden is always using fake names and tries speaking in a tone to persuade someone to think a cretin way. He does this when he talks to women. While he is talking to the psychiatrist he explains peoples reactions to his lies like they really believe him, when it is very possible that he is a horrible liar and they are looking at him with a “what are you talking a bout?” expression. Holden often lies to the point where he is lying to him self.
Many of the times that Holden criticizes people, it is something he does himself. (Pg 13) “. one of the reasons I left Elkton was that I was surrounded by phonies.” Holden himself is many times what he refers to as a “phony”. He knows that he lies and pretends to like people that he would rather not be with.
One of the first relationships that is mentioned in the story, is Holden’s relationship with D.B., his brother. Throughout his childhood, it is obvious that Holden has idolized his older brother. Now that D.B. is a writer for Hollywood, Holden considers him a phony, and accuses him of prostituting himself by agreeing to work for the film industry.
Throughout the novel, J.D, Salinger develops Holden’s character with numerous situations. Holden makes the reader question his rectitude through his perspective of those around him, his sexual desires, his general attitude, and his chronic lying. Because Salinger permits the audience to know how situations proceed from Holden’s perspective, the audience has an alternative side of Holden available to evaluate. Without the varying traits Holden presents, The Catcher in the Rye would not thoroughly depict Holden as a suffering individual. Thus, Holden’s character is morally ambiguous and crucial to the overall development of the novel.
Holden doesn’t like the complexity of life and relationships. This is why he distances himself from his family and friends. After Holden is expelled from his school, he tries to stay away from his parents for fear of their reaction, even though learning of his expulsion is inevitable. He visits his sister Phoebe in their home multiple times throughout the novel because due to her young age, his sister and his relationship is simple. "For instance, within Holden, the desire to reject others conflicts with the desire to be accepted by others: he doesn't want to lend Stradlater his coat, but his overt actions belie this covert, warring want: he despises Ackley, but he invites him to see a movie; he hates movies, believing them to foster phoniness in society” (Mitchell). Holden struggles to “catch” others because he believes he is not accepted by others.