ipl-logo

Holden Caulfield Transformation

448 Words2 Pages

Through life you grow from a boy to a man or a girl to a women. You discover yourself in ways you never knew imagined. It is the begging of a journey to understand and evolve into the type of person you want to be. From J.D. Salinger 's, The Catcher in the Rye, Holden Caulfield grows up from the immature person he was to a respectable man. Throughout the book, Holden begins to evolve and understand the prospect of life of realizing and mending mistakes made. Holden truly only has feelings for Jane Gallagher, making him respect her privacy about sex. As he talks to Luce, he gets defensive about him using women and "talk about her that way" when she "[lets] you get sexy" with her. Because Holden thinks highly of Jane, it makes her special to him (Salinger 160). He acts as a mature person who wants to save himself for Jane because his morality making him a good person. Not as the type of boys who only want to have sex to get pleasure from it like Carl Luce. Holden thinks of sex as "a spiritual experience" where he can 't do it with a girl "[he] don 't like a lot" (Salinger 162) (Salinger 163). He needs to be with a girl how he has feeling for, not just a random stranger. This shows he don 't take advantage of …show more content…

Holden realizes the fallacies in his plan to run away in lighting him that it 's not so scary to grow up. Phoebe wanted to "[go] with [Holden]," but he made her stay by "not going anywhere" (Salinger 226) (Salinger 228). Holden realized that his plans effected someone other than himself who he cares about, making him not want to go. Because his sister wanted to go, he would be making a mistake because it concerns Phoebe. "I 'm going home" Holden said as he recognized what he would be doing if he actually ran away (Salinger 228). Phoebe helped him realized that he can not just run away from his problems, he needs to face them. Running away will not solve anything in life. He doesn 't leave because it includes someone he cares about, making him develop

Show More
Related
294 Words | 2 Pages

Another very common characteristic found in most teenagers, including Holden Caulfield, is obsession about sex. Throughout the story, Holden is always thinking about sex or in his own words thinking about “giving a girl a feel”. When Holden had a temporary stay at hotel in New York, he wanted to lose his virginity by calling a prostitute over his room, but after calling the prostitute over, he was afraid to have sexual intercourse with her since he never practiced it before, so he ended up rejecting the prostitute. The only thing Holden got from this experience was a punch in the stomach from a pimp. Holden also spends a lot of time fantasizing about sex with the girls he knew from school, which is very immature, but not surprising for a

Read More
1685 Words | 7 Pages

Holden thinks Jane is a great girl and that she’s the type that he likes. Holden misses her and that’s why he starts to think of her at that

Read More
2122 Words | 9 Pages

J.D Salinger’s, The Catcher in the Rye, follows the main character, Holden Caulfield, and his experiences that lead him to be talking to a mental therapist. Told through Holden’s eyes, his profane and blunt explanations of major moments in his life allow readers to see that Holden is not crazy but is actually struggling with transitioning from child to adult. Throughout the story, he fondly remembers his early childhood and is trying the best he can to run from adulthood. He fears that he, like so many around him, may become phony when he becomes an adult. This fear drives his actions and gives him a feeling of hatred toward phony adults and a feeling of obligation to shield children from the harsh adult world.

Read More
1045 Words | 5 Pages

A second fact of Holden’s personality is that his comments is his attitude toward sex. Holden is a virgin, but he is mostly interested in sex, in fact, he spends much of the story trying to lose his virginity. He feels strongly about sex, he says it should happen between “people who care deeply about and respect one another.” Also he gets upset by the realization that sex can be casual. Stradlater’s date with Jane doesn’t just make him jealous.

Read More
465 Words | 2 Pages

Often, a main character’s apparent madness and irrational behavior plays a crucial role in the development of the plot. In J.D. Salinger’s novel, The Catcher in the rye, central character Holden Caulfield reasonably exhibits eccentric, impulsive and erratic behavior as a reaction to the “phoniness” of everyone around him, the self-alienation he faces and, as a standard coping mechanism for the changes in his life. Holden acts almost solely on impulse. He is often knowingly riling up other characters in the story just because he feels justified in doing so.

Read More
134 Words | 1 Pages

Holden experiences sex in his thoughts but also in certain situations that he eventually backs out of. He encounters a situation with a prostitute named Sunny, instead of Holden actually having a sexually encounter with her he worries about her innocence. Holden is able to detect that she’s young by her word choice and the way she carries herself, when he notices this he decides not to have sex with her and to try his best to perserve her innocence. Holden fails to realizie that the girl’s innocence has already been stolen from her. Love is depicted in the story a lot and hurts Holden; He falls in love with Jane Gallagher but is crushed when he finds out Stradlater took her on a date and most likely took her innocence away from her.

Read More
656 Words | 3 Pages

The novel “The Catcher in the Rye” was about the journey of a adolescent boy finding his way to adulthood. In the book Holden Caulfield was unsuccessful in finding his way to adulthood. Holden’s attitude in the novel throughout his journey was very immature. He also can't accept the fact that innocence can’t be forever protected. Lastly, Holden calls everyone a phony when in reality he is the real phony.

Read More
806 Words | 4 Pages

Holden perceives that he is alone in the world and is searching for someone with whom he can make a meaningful connection. He is in desperate need of a person to release him from his loneliness and feelings of despair. When Holden’s strong connection with Jane Gallagher ended, his life began a downward

Read More
1354 Words | 6 Pages

“Among the girls of his acquaintance only Jane Gallagher has the inherent prerequisites for a genuine partnership. In the past Holden had experienced happy moments of spiritual harmony, of wordless understanding, with her.” (Bungert 208) This quote also shows that Jane was the only one that he was able to connect with. Jane Gallagher was always on his mind, as she was the only one that meant something to

Read More
905 Words | 4 Pages

The unavoidable transition from childhood to adulthood is often a lonely and difficult time for adolescents. Many teenagers struggle with the balance between being a child, and becoming an adult. In J.D. Salinger 's The Catcher in the Rye, the use of setting reflects Holden’s feelings about the transition from childhood to adulthood. This transition is necessary to becoming a functioning member in society. Throughout the book, Holden explores the realities of adulthood and deals with the challenges that come along with the transition from childhood.

Read More
1142 Words | 5 Pages

Adulthood is when we mature into a person that continues to live life in reality as we let our childhood and adolescence become a faint memory. The memories, however, taught us lessons of acceptance as we cannot always shape the future. Holden Caulfield in J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye takes a journey through the rite of passage by experiencing the innocence of youth and the phoniness of adulthood.

Read More
837 Words | 4 Pages

In The Catcher in the Rye, the author J.D. Salinger, introduces the protagonist; Holden Caulfield. Holden feels the sense that he cannot choose between the two worlds. For example, he makes it seem as both of them are complete opposites from each other. In the book, Holden wants to keep his innocence, but he also wants to grow up and toss that innocence away. He still keeps his childhood personality by constantly obsessing over things that shouldn’t matter.

Read More
693 Words | 3 Pages

Catcher in the Rye In the book Catcher in the Rye by J.D Salinger, the narrator and protagonist Holden Caulfield a sixteen year old junior undergoes a series of changes. Holden learns multiple life changing lessons; one of them is you must grow up. In the beginning of the novel, Holden starts out as “that kid”; the one with the parents who expect him to get into an ivy league school, and end up with a kid with no intentions of doing so. At the beginning of the book it is very apparent that Holden lacks motivation; he also has hit rock bottom.

Read More
1268 Words | 6 Pages

How Holden matured People go through rough stuff in their lives, such as losing a close sibling. It seems impossible to pull yourself out of the pain and guilt of your loss. It appeared Holden was in the same predicament, but through his experiences in the novel The Catcher In The Rye by J.D. Salinger he learns to grow up. Aside from being very immature, holden refuses to grow up and dislikes people who have grown up.

Read More
2081 Words | 9 Pages

Holden Caulfield’s story traces psychological/moral development and maturation. The conflicts that Holden deals with, shape him into a new adult. Holden learns so much on his journey, and finally accepts what society has to offer him. Society accepts him back, and Holden is rebirthed into an adult with new knowledge to benefit society. First off, Holden is portrayed as this terrible delinquent.

Read More

More about Holden Caulfield Transformation

Related Topics

Open Document