Engl

ish

I: Sp

ring

2012

The Catcher in the RyeThemes, Motifs, Symbols

Theme: Alienation as a Form of Self-Protection

Throughout the novel, Holden seems to be excluded from and victimized by the world around him.

As he says to Mr. Spencer, he feels trapped on “the other side” of life, and he continually attempts to find his way in a world in which he feels he does not belong.

As the novel progresses, we begin to see that Holden’s alienation is a way of protecting himself.

Continued

Just as he wears his hunting hat to express his uniqueness, he uses his isolation to prove that he is better than everyone else, and therefore, above interacting with them.

Interactions with others confuse and overwhelm him, and his cynical sense of superiority serves as a type of self-protection.

Holden’s alienation is the source of what little stability he has in his life and also the source of most of his pain.

Needs contact and love, but his own bitterness prevents him from seeking it out.

Continued

Source of Holden’s strength and the source of his problems

Longs for the type of connection that he had with Jane Gallagher, but fear prevents him from contacting her.

He depends upon his alienation, but it destroys him.

Theme: Coming of Age

Holden resists maturity itself

Holden fears change and complexity (Natural History Museum)—wants everything to be easily understandable and eternally fixed like the statues of Eskimos and Indians at the museum

Is guilty of the sins that he criticizes other for. Fears his inability to understand the world around him.

Refuses to acknowledge his fears, except in a few instances (Chapter 9—sex)

Continued

Adult world=superficiality, hypocrisy, “phoniness”

Child world=innocence, curiosity, honesty

Fantasy about The Catcher in the Rye: he imagines childhood as a big field of rye in which children romp and play; adulthood, for the children of this world, is equivalent to death—a fatal fall over the edge of a cliff

Covers himself with cynicism to avoid both worlds

Shallow conceptions

Theme: The Phoniness of the Adult World

Holden’s catch-all for the superficiality, hypocricy, and shallowness that he encounters in the world around him.

Chapter 22—all adults are inevitably phonies, but worse, they don’t see their own phoniness.

Phoniness=everything that is wrong with the world and gives him an excuse to hide behind his cynicism

Holden’s observations are not entirely inaccurate

Holden can be a highly insightful character

Continued

Holden never understands his own phoniness because he is so focused on others

The world is not has simple (and black and white) as Holden wants or needs it to be.

Motifs

Definitions: recurring structures, contrasts, or literary devices that can help to develop and inform the text’s major themes

Motif: Loneliness

Manic quest for companionship—flits from one relationship to another

Holden doesn’t understand his own mind or why he behaviors/feels the way he does

Holden messes up his own attempts at ending his loneliness because he wants to preserve his isolation to avoid getting hurt

Loneliness is the emotional proof of the alienation that Holden experiences; it is both a source of great pain and a source of his security

Motif: Relationships, Intimacy, and Sexuality

What he fears most about the adult world: complexity, unpredictability, and the potential for conflict and change

Holden projects his own idealizations about childhood on to Phoebe

Holden fears intimacy and sexuality because he in unwilling to let people get close to him

Holden continues to desperately search for relationships, but breaking them down at the last moment

Motif: Lying and Deception

Holden is most critical of those who do not recognize their own weaknesses

Lying=phoniness; indicates insensitivity, carelessness, or even cruelty

His random and repeated lying indicates his own self-deception.

Does not recognize his own shortcomings and does not acknowledge how his actions affect others

Guilty of the same phoniness that he accuses others of

Symbol: The Hunting Hat

Uniqueness and Individuality

Holden desires to be different from everyone around her

Self-conscious of the hat

Presence of the hat mirrors the central conflict in the novel: Holden’s needs for isolation versus his need for companionship

Red hat—Allie and Phoebe both have red hair (coincidence?)—A means of connecting?

Symbol: The Museum of Natural History

Displays appeal to Holden because they are frozen and unchanging

Troubled by the fact that he has changed each time he visits the museum

A world he wishes he could live in

Terrified by unpredictable nature of the world, scared of change, does not understand the senseless death of Allie, and fear interaction with others

Symbol: The Ducks in the Central Park Lagoon

Reveals a genuine and youthful side to his character

Curiosity of youth

Mysterious survival in the face of a difficult environment (parallels Holden’s own situation)

Ducks prove that some vanishings are only temporary (Holden’s fear of change)—change that isn’t permanent would be more bearable (Allie’s death is permanent)

“partly frozen, partly not frozen” (transition) Holden is between childhood and adulthood

Symbol: Radio City Music Hall

Rockettes and war memorial movie

Inauthentic (phony) art that panders to the audience

Holden is left cold by the performance

Audience is manipulated by the sentimental glorification of war and military—Holden hates this

Symbol: The Carrousel’s Golden Ring

A hope, a dream, the chances we must take to grab the gold ring

It is hard for Holden to understand the concept that children will reach for the ring and adults must let them

A part of life and part of growing up

Symbol: Allie’s Baseball Mitt

Holden’s love for Allie and his uniqueness

Left-handed

Poems in green ink

A fielder’s glove, not a catcher’s mitt?

Symbol: Pencey Prep and Elkton Hills

Phony and cruel world

School pictures and mottos are misleading

Stradlater—wants Holden to cheat, yet Holden is being expelled for failing courses

Cruelty Holden has seen at the prep schools

Holden dislikes the exclusivity and the prejudice

James Castle’s suicide at Elkton Hills

2 schools are emblematic of are corrupt system of privileged adults designed for those who want to join their ranks

Holden struggles against a system in which he was born