As humans we all share a certain experience during life. This experience might not be enjoyable, but it is inevitable for everyone. We refer to this experience as the transition from innocent childhood and adolescence to adulthood. The Catcher in the Rye outlines a troubled adolescent named Holden Caulfield as he makes this painful transition. The Catcher in the Rye is considered J. D. Salinger’s most successful novel. In the novel, the main character Holden Caulfield takes a two and a half day journey through New York City after he gets kicked out of his third private school, Pencey Prep. “He (Holden) represents as a spokesman for the alienated American youth” (Whitfield). Throughout Holden’s journey in The Catcher in the Rye he experiences
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Holden believes that this innocence must be sustained throughout the rest of a child’s life. To him children seem to live in a mindset of an untouched and pure world. He expresses a want for innocence to be lifelong while he is in the museum waiting for his sister Phoebe to join him: “ ‘Certain things should stay the way they are,” he says (111), like those life-size figures in the glass cases of the museum which never change their positions” (Bungert). Holden’s want for innocence and purity is most likely caused by his reluctance to enter adulthood. Even though Holden is nearly an adult and can do little to avoid that, Phoebe is still young and he wants to try everything he can to keep her innocence sustained. While visiting Phoebe late at night, Holden expresses his dream of being the “catcher in the rye.” Holden envisions many children playing in a field of rye near the edge of a cliff. His job would be to catch every child if they start to go over the cliff. This is the only thing that he would really “enjoy” being. He tells Phoebe, “That's all I'd do all day. I'd just be catcher in the rye and all.” (p. 225) This is actually a symbol used to represent Holden wanting to keep children from losing their innocence by going over the cliff and entering adulthood. Near the end of the novel, though, Holden’s attitude towards lifelong innocence seems to change. As Phoebe is riding the carousel, Holden realizes that “it is "bad" to interrupt her movement forward.” He understands now that it is not a good idea to keep a child in childhood because that would keep the child undeveloped and unmoving
Holden believes that this innocence must be sustained throughout the rest of a child’s life. To him children seem to live in a mindset of an untouched and pure world. He expresses a want for innocence to be lifelong while he is in the museum waiting for his sister Phoebe to join him: “ ‘Certain things should stay the way they are,” he says (111), like those life-size figures in the glass cases of the museum which never change their positions” (Bungert). Holden’s want for innocence and purity is most likely caused by his reluctance to enter adulthood. Even though Holden is nearly an adult and can do little to avoid that, Phoebe is still young and he wants to try everything he can to keep her innocence sustained. While visiting Phoebe late at night, Holden expresses his dream of being the “catcher in the rye.” Holden envisions many children playing in a field of rye near the edge of a cliff. His job would be to catch every child if they start to go over the cliff. This is the only thing that he would really “enjoy” being. He tells Phoebe, “That's all I'd do all day. I'd just be catcher in the rye and all.” (p. 225) This is actually a symbol used to represent Holden wanting to keep children from losing their innocence by going over the cliff and entering adulthood. Near the end of the novel, though, Holden’s attitude towards lifelong innocence seems to change. As Phoebe is riding the carousel, Holden realizes that “it is "bad" to interrupt her movement forward.” He understands now that it is not a good idea to keep a child in childhood because that would keep the child undeveloped and unmoving