Loss Of Innocence In Catcher In The Rye

Innocence is obscure and scarcely ever seen through adults. Ingenuousness is easily tarnished by truth and grim reality. In The Catcher in the Rye, Holden withholds an obsession of persevering innocence within children and lets himself forget about his own innocence. This novel is written in the 1950s where such ideas that Salinger proposes is irrational. The protagonist, Holden, ridicules his society and views it as inauthentic. Holden almost finds education contemptible and disregards any norms of his society. Throughout Holden's journey in New York his mimic of adults he encounters is mistaken for loss of innocence. Holden struggles to counterbalance his innocence with others innocence. He is angered by the notion that with adulthood comes

His admiration for children is shown through, ‘He was singing that song, "If a body catch a body coming through the rye.’ He had a pretty little voice, too. He was just singing for the hell of it, you could tell. … It made me feel better. It made me feel not so depressed anymore.” Holden almost praises children because of how innocent they start out to be and wishes to never corrupt it with the harsh realities. Thus, feeling instant joy because he perceives the kid as pure, for singing that poem. Holden is very much obsessive over preserving innocence and the original state of what something starts out to be. He enjoys that the museum will never change and as he puts it, “The best thing, though, in that museum was that everything always stayed right where it was. Nobody's move.” Holden feels that most things in life are often best when left untouched and in its original state. Which is similar to how he feels about adolescence; it should not be tarnished by outside influences and continue to remain pure. Although he is enthralled with the idea of innocence, he cannot be the catcher in the rye because he is far too innocent himself. Holden naively believes that the lyrics of the song indicates the potential preservation of childhood innocence: “‘It's 'If a body meet a body comin thro the rye'!’ old Phoebe said. ‘It's a

Later from picking up Phoebe, Holden tells her why he came to pick her up, he is leaving and not coming back. Thus, Phoebe only wants to do as her brother is doing and leave with him. This outrages Holden because he is so used to viewing Phoebe as this “picture perfect” girl, and that image of Phoebe is dismantled when, “She wouldn't answer me. All she did was, she took off my red hunting hat--the one I gave her--and practically chucked it right in my face. Then she turned her back on me again. It nearly killed me, but I didn't say anything. I just picked it up and stuck it in my coat pocket. "Come on, hey. I'll walk you back to school," I said. "I'm not going back to school." I didn't know what to say when she said that. This is monumental to Holden’s perspective of children and how they view the world themselves. Phoebe acting out showcases the exact point that children are not as innocent as they seem, and Holden seems to be the innocent one. He is naive for not accepting Phoebe to mimic is rebellious actions that he is mimicking from the people he encounters from New York. Throughout his journey in New York, he encounters grown ups in New York who have this “disobedient” quality to them. Holden mimics them, which can easily be perceived as someone who is not innocent but it is merely an imitation of others. The red hat symbolizes a sense of protection for