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Catcher In The Rye Thesis

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Jordan Snyder Ms. McConn 5 English 10H 13 September 2017 The lost goal In J.D Salinger’s book the Catcher in the Rye, Holden, a seventeen-year-old boy from Pennsylvania tells his story of trying to achieve his goal, become the catcher in the rye. As the seventeen-year-old boy is at the verge of becoming an adult he tries to become the “Catcher in the Rye’ to help children from falling off the cliff into adulthood rather than loosing their innocence. Holden does not want kids to fall off the cliff, but he is on the verge himself. Mr. Antolini brings up another picture of falling when he is talking with Holden about his actions in school. He tells Holden that he expected to fall soon. “This fall I think you’re riding for—it’s a special kind …show more content…

Holden wants kids to stay naïve and does not want them to fall into adulthood, “And I’m standing on the edge of some crazy cliff. What I have to do, I have to catch everybody, if they start to go over the cliff…” (173). As a teenager on the border of falling off the cliff, Holden does not want other kids to become phony. Holden wanting to be the catcher in the rye shows that he appreciates the younger world and wants it back. Throughout the story, Holden is faced with times where he is surrounded by phoniness, but tries to hide it from Phoebe and other young kids, but as hard as he tries, the phoniness will always find a way out. “Somebody’d written ‘Fuck You’ on the wall… I thought how Phoebe and all the other little kids would see it, and how they’d wonder what the hell it meant…” (201). Holden was worried that when Phoebe and the other little kids would see the bad words written on the wall they would get closer and closer to the edge of the cliff. Holden tried to keep the impurity out of the kid’s sight so their innocence would be preserved. Also the first thing he thought was that an impure and phony person, an adult, would write this, never a kid. Although Holden is on the verge of falling off the cliff himself, he wants to save the innocent by becoming the catcher in the rye. At a certain point, Holden takes Phoebe to a symbolic place, a

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Towards the end of the story, while having a conversation with Phoebe about what Holden wants to do with his life, he tells her, “I’m standing on the edge of some crazy cliff. What I have to do, I have to catch everybody if they start to go over the cliff…That’s all I’d do all day. I’d just be the catcher in the rye” (Salinger 173). With this, Holden further reveals his childhood fantasy of being a hero and saving everyone. In his soul, Holden is an innocent boy who does not want to grow up.

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“ I keep picturing all these little kids playing some game in this big field of rye and all. Thousands of little kids and nobody’s around - nobody big, I mean- except me and I 'm standing on the edge of some crazy cliff. What I have to do to catch everybody if they start to go over the cliff I mean if they 're running and they don 't look where they 're going I have to come out from somewhere and catch them that 's all I do all day I just be the catcher in the rye and all…”(Salinger 173). Holden doesn’t want to grow up, and he doesn’t want anyone else to grow up.

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Holden has grown out of the innocence of his childhood. Holden often finds his happiness from children as he states, “I'd just be the catcher in the rye and all. I know it's crazy but that's the only thing I'd really like to be”(Salinger, 191). What Holden means, is that he would save all the children from falling off of the cliff, which represents adulthood, preserving their innocence. Holden likes the

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Holden says that all he want to do is be the catcher in the rye protecting children from falling. The whole novel Holden makes observation around him that are taking away from children's innocence. This is what upsets him the most the fact that everyone will eventually have to grow up. While he is trying to go get Phoebe he is reminded this in the following quote. “I went down by a different staircase, and I saw another "Fuck you" on the wall.

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