Examples Of Childhood In Catcher In The Rye

The Catcher in the Rye Childhood & Adulthood Holden Caulfield is the protagonist of J.D. Salinger’s novel the Catcher in the Rye. Holden is an adolescent boy that lives in 1950’s New York City. Holden is on the verge of collapsing under the sinister and painful realities the adult world has to offer. Henceforth, Holden cares deeply about innocence, and understands that adulthood is the execution of the innocence he treasures so deeply. This foreboding breakdown is apparent due to many mentions of increasing depression that Holden expresses when confronted with these troubling aspects. Holden follows the belief that childhood is a stress-free time of purity and innocence, while adulthood is seen as a downright opposite. Thus, Holden has a narrow
Seeing the boy contently singing to himself in the midst of all the hustle and bustle of Broadway Street gives Holden and feeling of tenderness. Holden loves seeing this, for it embodies the notion of children being pure and free from adult-like troubles and
Holden’s little brother, Allie was very muched loved by Holden, and it was absolutely traumatizing when he passed away from leukemia. “I was only thirteen, and they were going to have me psychoanalyzed and all, because I broke all the windows in the garage. I don't blame them. I really don't. I slept in the garage the night he died, and I broke all the goddam windows with my fist, just for the hell of it. I even tried to break all the windows on the station wagon we had that summer, but my hand was already broken and everything” (44). Holden likes to speak of Allie during his dark periods. Allie represents love and childhood innocence. When Allie dies, he spirals out of control into a breakdown, and continually blames adulthood and growing up as being demons ever since. From this, Holden likes to invent ideas about universal childhood innocence and adulthood phoniness. “One of the biggest reasons I left Elkton is because I was surrounded by phonies. That’s all” ().Phonies are deeply offending to Holden. Holden continually labels people for being phonies for varied reasons. He never calls a child a phony, only adults and