In the novel, Catcher in the Rye, the main character Holden Caulfield is a sixteen year old Pencey Prep high school drop-out. Caulfield goes through a troubling mental breakdown due to difficulties with his transition from childhood to adulthood. Adolescence is a tremendously difficult time in any persons life. Holden takes a turn for the worst as he adamantly rejects the inevitability of coming adulthood tenfold. Change is a huge theme in the novel considering the change Holden is going through as well as the ever changing in the world around him. Holdens change physically, cognitively, and emotionally, and the desire to reject these changes provide a winding path towards a mental collapse. He attempts to help himself but finds it impossible to be done on his own.
A large portion of Holdens dissonance can be attributed to his physical changes. Holden is making a transition in adolescence moving from the middle to late phases. Sixteen is the age which puberty is nearly, yet not quite complete. However, at the same time his appearance is becoming more adult as well as the roles he is assuming. He is described as tall and thin with some gray hair which suggests he has had a growth spurt yet has not filled out into his body. The gray hair contributes to his insecurities even though he attempts to use it to his advantage when trying to get girls or a drink.
Holden is surrounded by insecurities considering his only friend, Ackley, is unpopular and withdrawn from social interactions and norms. His roommate, Stradlater, is a handsome young man who happens to date the girl Holden has strong feelings for, Jane. Competition between young men at this age brings insecurities upon Holden. To hide his own insecurities he wears a hunting hat as somewhat of a security blanket. It comforts him when he puts it on even though he takes it off when in public. This implies that he is still has a need to fit in but does not want to accept throwing something away that makes him feel safe. Whether he uses his hat to hide his hair or for his own personal needs is not made clear but it is definitely known that it is used for his own comfort.
Holdens sexual desires are intense as he finds himself in dire need of a companion. He runs away from school for New York and when he gets there he finds himself aroused by two people across the way having sex. His sexual needs are natural at this time since neurons are more sensitive to neurotransmitters thus making him seek out pleasures increasingly. The difficulty in his transition is apparent when he attempts to sleep with a prostitute, Sunny. Holden's bodily urges and cognitive emotions begin to conflict as he desires someone to sleep with. Yet he still cannot follow through with sleeping with Sunny because the only emotional satisfaction he can receive is from Jane. Sunny only provides for a superficial experience from her. The disagreement between his growing sexuality and his fragile innocence set him further into the pit of confusion.
Holdens cognitive development is skewed due to his abstract thought. He refers to the majority of people around him as phony but does not give any reasoning behind his thinking thus lacking in concrete reasoning. His personal fable creates a world that he himself cannot deal with. He is going through pain yet nobody can help him. His constant propositional thought based on no real-world circumstances makes his own idealistic view on what adulthood should be even deeper.
Holdens thoughts on the world suggest that he finds himself as being very mature for his age. He had a very intelligent vocabulary skewed with a bitter delivery. However, he shows his immaturity by constantly fabricating needless lies to take the attention away from his own problems. For example he uses a fake name to a classmates mother on the train to New York and expresses that her son is popular when he is not. He also tells a bartender his is of age when the bartender knows he is not. He later attempts to pick up women he meets at the same bar yet is mocked by them.
Holden has a variety of influences contributing to his underdeveloped cognitive state. His brother Allie died of leukemia when they were younger. He referred to Allie as the most intelligent nice and innocent member of his family. With such a drastic and hurtful change in Holdens life, it is clear that he did not want to accept any other changes in his life and he wanted everything to remain the same so he does not lose anything else. This is shown when Holden expresses his envy of a museum in New York. As he changes and gets older the museum stays the same. Also, he grew up with a father who had an authoritarian outlook on raising a child, causing Holden to live in fear of his father. He expressed that his father would kill him if he lost any money. Holdens teachers sought to help him but he seemed suspicious of accepting their advice. The people he grew up around were not much assistance to his cognitive development.
Holdens emotional development is especially cohesive with that of a mental patient. Holden acts out outlandishly and constantly reaffirming his actions as acceptable. It appears as though he is maturing late considering the fact that he is unpopular, talkative and attention-seeking. For example, a classmate offers to take him to a movie he already saw and Holden wanted to go even though he hates movies. His need for acceptance extends beyond his stingy and bitter personality. These actions are inconsistent with his opinions suggesting that he has serious identity confusion.
Holden expressed absolutely no care for the people he talked about aside from Allie, Phoebe, and Jane. Everyone around him was referred to as superficial, phony, or annoying. He constantly analyzed everyone around him so his primary concern was not his own mental state. His hate for the superficial created within him a refuge in isolation. However, this same isolation that he wanted only deepened his pain and loneliness which is what he was trying to escape. Also, it is ironic that Holden calls everyone around him phony, yet is constantly phony to fit in by making fabrications.
It was apparent that Holden attempted to reach out to people; except these people did not know how to handle it. Sally, a girl Holden took on a date, dismissed his idea of running away together which extremely agitated Holden. This should have been a door for Sally to open and find a person in need of help. However, when Holden attempts to reach out, he receives criticism or negative feedback. Stradlater used Holden for a term paper which he decided to write about his dead brother Allie. Stradlater should have seen a problem here as well but overlooked the underlying details. Many people were reached out to yet could not understand that a problem was in front of them.
Holden eventually found his sister, Phoebe, who was the one person who cared about him and knew him enough to help him. She stopped him from running away out west because she showed him that she needed him, which was all he needed. Holden ended up being admitted to a rest home for psychoanalysis. It was unclear in the end whether he would change or not but after writing the story he stated that he missed everyone he wrote about, suggesting that he has surpassed his transition of adolescence and is over his phony ways.
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