The Catcher in the Rye #8

The novel The Catcher in the Rye, does not have too much to do with the events of the time period, considering the events of the novel only take place over a four day period. You can tell parts of the tone of the era the novel was written, but that is as far as it goes. The author, J.D. Salinger, shows the relationships of the teenagers of the time period through Holden's descriptions. Holden describes the typical teenagers of the generation as "phony's". If they are too much like the generic teenager, smart, tall, built, then Holden almost automatically dislikes them. Holden also calls basically all of the adult's that he is around phony. The only people that Holden does not call phony at some point in the novel are, Jane Gallagher, his younger sister Phoebe, and his late younger brother Allie. Holden uses the term phony to apply to everyone when they do not do something, that Holden wants. If someone turns Holden down, it is just because there are phony, and so on like that.


The author had to have been influenced by his own actions when he was younger, or some people he had met. The character of Holden is so complex, it would be very hard to be able to interweave all of his feelings about life in general without someone to base the character upon. the author may have met a very sad or lonely person somewhere in his life and then dreamed up the character of Holden to continue that person's story. Throughout the book, Holden seems very alienated and far away from everyone until he meets up with Phoebe, and you see a softer more caring version of Holden with her, "The thing with kids is, if  they fall off, they fall if, but it's bad if you say anything to them" (Salinger 211). You really get a feel of how Holden's personality really is after this point.

Salinger, J. D. The Catcher in the Rye. Boston: Little, Brown, 1951. Print.