The Catcher In The Rye

1. The Catcher In The Rye By J. D. Salinger

2. Chapters 1 & 2 • Protagonist Holden Caulfield. • First few chapters establish the basics of his personality. • Bitterly cynical voice. • Refuses to discuss early life. • Hints that something catastrophic has happened in his life – writes from a rest home; “this madman stuff”.

3. Failed out of school; does not enjoy being confronted by his actions. • Holden is more than a cynical postwar rich kid; he connects with life on a very idealistic level; he seems to feel its flaws so deeply that he tries to shield himself with a veneer of cynicism.

4. Holden may be an innocent searching desperately for a way to connect with the world around him that will not cause him pain. • First-person point of view. • Tone, grammar and diction are consistently those of an adolescent.

5. Look for inconsistencies that make us question what he says – i.e. Holden sees Spencer’s behavior as vindictive and mean but Spencer actions clearly seem motivated by concern. • Note Holden’s aversion to falsehood: his brother D.B., Pencey posters, surrounded by “phonies” in school.

6. Chapters 3 & 4 • Establish the way Holden interacts with his peers. • Holden despises “phonies”—people whose surface behavior distorts or disguises their inner feelings. Holden is surrounded by phonies in his prep school. • Ackley and Stradlater act as Holden’s

7. immediate contrasts. But, despite their flaws, he acts with basic kindness toward them. • The pressure of adolescent sexuality—an important theme - makes itself felt here for the first time: Holden’s greatest worry is that Stradlater will make sexual advances toward Jane.

8. Note tone in which Holden describes Ackley and Stradlater. • Holden’s interactions also reveal how lonely he is – note the parallel between Ackley’s and Holden’s situations - both are isolated, and both maintain a bitter, critical exterior in order to shield themselves from the world that assaults them.

9. Holden - intimacy and interaction are what he needs and fears most. • Holden’s new hunting hat - serves as a kind of protective device, which Holden uses for more than physical warmth and comfort.

10. Chapters 5 & 6 • Holden’s actions are inconsistent with his opinions, but instead of making him seem like a hypocrite, this makes him more likable - kindness to Ackley; going to the movie. • Holden idealizes Allie, praising his intelligence and sensitivity.

11. Allie’s death was one of the most traumatic experiences of Holden’s life and may play a major role in his current psychological breakdown. Indeed, the cynicism that Holden uses to avoid expressing his feelings may result from Allie’s death.

12. Holden leaves Pencey abruptly, as though trying to escape the torment of his environment. What Holden does not yet realize, however, is that he carries his torment with him, inside himself.

13. Chapters 7-9 • A chronicle of Holden’s emotional breakdown; although, he never comments on it directly. • He describes his increasingly desperate behavior without much explanation. • The reader senses there is more to the story than what Holden admits or describes.

14. Note Holden’s behaviors that indicate a troubled mind. • His frantic loneliness and constant lying further the implication that he is not well mentally or emotionally. • Desire for human contact becomes more intense; e.g. Tries to make a date with a stranger; later he flirts with older women

15. at a night club, etc. (Immaturity and imbalance?) • Holden lies to deflect attention from himself and what he is doing. • Note the desperation, pressure and the trauma Holden endures during this difficult time in his life.

16. Chapters 10-12 • Loneliness seems to be at the heart of Holden’s problems. • Note his almost manic quest for interaction in New York (Faith Cavendish). • His thoughts are always on other people (Phoebe, Jane, people in other rooms/at other tables).

17. He never mentions himself – avoids reflecting on his own shortcomings and problems by focusing on the world around him, usually through a dismissive and critical lens. • Relationship with Jane – moments of intimacy were subtle and extremely personal, free of any phoniness. This is what Holden himself needs now. • Note Holden’s profound disconnection and isolation.

18. Note Holden’s self-delusion and unreliability as a narrator, depicting himself as a wise-beyond-his years playboy. • Holden likes to imagine he is a mature individual who sees all the hidden details around him, but in actuality he is just a kid.

19. Chapters 13-15 • During his previous expeditions, Holden maintained a distance from the people he was with, dismissing them with scorn. He protected his vision of an ideal world – daydreams about Phoebe’s innocence and Jane’s warmth.

20. Sunny represented Holden’s attempts at female companionship; she could not be more different from the idealized Jane for whom Holden yearns. Holden’s relationship with Jane brought emotional satisfaction; his relationship with Sunny is devoid of emotion.

21. Note the tension between Holden’s growing sexuality and his fragile innocence. For example, his encounter with Maurice and Sunny leaves him hurt and wounded, and was far removed from the idealized encounters he fantasizes about. • Holden takes refuge in isolation, but this isolation only deepens the pain of

22. alienation and loneliness. • There are also subtle reasons why his encounter with the nuns leaves him feeling hurt and wounded. Holden sees childhood as innocent and good, and adulthood as superficial and evil. He rationalizes his loneliness by pretending that every adult around him is phony and

23. annoying. However, the nuns are kind, intelligent and sympathetic. They don’t seem to have the phoniness that Holden expects of anything institutionalized.

24. Chapters 16-17 • Things go from bad to worse for Holden. His behavior on his date with Sally shows he is heading towards emotional collapse. • He seems unaware of his own extreme agitation; he is unable to deal with the reality in which he finds himself. • Except for Jane and Phoebe, no one in his world seems to care how Holden feels, so long as he follows social norms. Only

25. when he violates these norms does anyone notice his disturbed state, and their usual response is to criticize him. • Holden’s feelings toward Sally are irrational, but they indicate how desperate he is to find love. • After the conflict with Sally, Holden retreats into nostalgic desires to return to

26. childhood. Note: the Museum of Natural History – he wants life to also be frozen, unchanging, simple and readily comprehensible. This is rather tragic because it represents his hopeless fantasizing, his inability to deal with the real world, and his unwillingness to think about his own shortcomings

27. He protects himself with a shell of cynical comments and outlandish behavior.

28. Chapters 18-20 • Holden meets with Carl Luce. • Holden is uncomfortable with sexuality and especially uncomfortable with the idea of homosexuality. Though Luce seems to prefer women, Holden finds him slightly “flitty”, and Luce brings out an unpleasant lewdness in Holden’s behavior.

29. Holden clearly wants Luce to give him some kind of guidance and insight into adult sexuality. Luce leaves and Holden seems depressed and disappointed in himself. With each successive interaction, Holden loses more faith in himself. • As a drunk Holden walks to the duck pond, his thoughts reveal the cause of his manic behavior – he is upset at the memory of Allie’s death. Allie is gone

30. and Holden does not believe in afterlife. Holden is troubled by unexplained disappearances. He is anxious to know where the ducks have gone, since he feels extremely threatened by the idea that people and things just vanish, as Allie did.

31. Chapters 21-23 • One of the few moments of respite Holden finds from the brutality of the outside world – watching Phoebe sleep and reading through her notebook. • Phoebe insists Holden tell her one thing he likes. Holden remembers the suicide of James Castle and then responds, “Allie.” His mind is increasingly

32. preoccupied with childhood and childhood death. • Holden tells Phoebe he would like to be the catcher in the rye, saving little children from falling off the cliff. • Holden wants to protect childhood innocence from the fall into disillusionment that necessarily accompanies adulthood.

33. Holden feels that the world has let him fall over the cliff into adulthood alone.

34. Chapter 24 • Mr. Antolini seems to offer Holden his only chance of making a sympathetic connection with an adult. • The fact that Mr. Antolini is trying to prevent Holden from “a fall” parallels Holden’s image of the catcher in the rye. Holden fantasizes about protecting children from adulthood and sexuality

35. but Mr. Antolini describes the more frightening fall that will come if Holden refuses to grow up himself. • Holden snaps when he wakes up to find Mr. Antolini stroking his head. The pressure of his surging sexual feelings, combined with the nervous homophobia he exhibited around Carl Luce, make Antolini’s gesture more than Holden can handle.

36. Although Antolini’s questions about Holden’s girlfriends and calling him handsome could be taken as flirtatious, it is more likely that Antolini’s gesture was simply a tipsy sign of affection for a student in obvious pain, a student who seemed fragile and genuine. • By the end, all of Holden’s trust and faith in Antolini vanish.

37. Chapters 25-26 • Holden’s breakdown reaches its climax. As he wanders the streets, he looks at children and prays to Allie to keep him from disappearing as the ducks disappeared and as Allie himself disappeared. • He decides to run away. Phoebe demands to go with him, but it is unclear whether she needs him or whether she  

38. worries that he needs her. • Holden sees the effect his plan has on Phoebe – a first sign of true maturity. • Phoebe returns Holden’s hunting hat, reciprocating his gesture of kindness. This is the first moment of reciprocal action that Holden experiences in the novel. He and Phoebe demonstrate true

39. interaction, both selflessly giving and humbly taking from each other. This is the kind of intimacy Holden has been longing for and missing. • Watching Phoebe on the carousel, Holden feels deliriously happy. Maybe now he can begin the process of introspection and healing that he needs.

40. In the final chapter Holden fills in some missing details: he went home; he was sent to a rest home to recover from the breakdown; he is in psychotherapy; and he will go to a new school in the fall. • Holden’s final comment - ”Don’t tell anybody anything. If you do, you start missing everybody”, suggests that he is still confined with the same problems. He still seems scared and alone, and he

41. continues to dread communication. However, it does look like he has begun to shed the impenetrable skin of cynicism that he had grown around himself. He has begun to value, rather than dismiss, the people around him. His nostalgia – “missing everybody” – reveals that he is not as bitter and repressed as he was earlier in the novel.