When Holden gives his hat to Phoebe at the end of the book, he says "don't let me disappear" 198 looking up to his dead brother Allie in the sky. The passing of the hat is symbolic of his desire to protect his sister with his prized hat just as he imagined that the hat protected him. Holden's red hunting hat also symbolizes the fight between himself, wanting to remain a child forever, using all the protection it offers, and his lingering desire to enter the adults' world. First, when Holden watches Phoebe go around in the carousel, it starts raining and he himself admits that his "red hunting hat really gave [him] a sort of protection, in a way" 212-213. Holden's hat symbolizes protection from childhood - not just from the sun or weather.
He then proves that while he is watching his younger sister ride the carousel and it starts to rain. His favorite red hunting hat then shows more symbolic meaning when, “My hunting hat gave me quite a lot of protection, in a way, but I got soaked anyway. I didn’t care, though. I felt so damn happy...” (213). This proves that Holden is embracing growing older than trying to run and hide from the fact.
As he is walking down the street in the middle of the night, Holden states that “It was freezing cold, and I took my red hunting hat out of my pocket and put it on--I didn 't give a damn how I looked. I even put the earlaps down” (Salinger 88). Here, Holden doesn’t care how he looks because the only people who might spot him on the desolate street are strangers to him. His image around strangers doesn’t faze him as much as his image around people his is familiar
Holden uses his hat as an escape. When put in a situation where he feels uncomfortable, Holden puts on his hat and pretends to be blind so he can get away from it all. The hat represents a safe space for Holden, where he cannot be violated nor can his innocence be lost. The hat keeps Holden safe which is especially useful after Holden gets in a fight with Stradlater, his roommate at Pencey. He puts on his hunting hat before he leaves the school “When I was all set to go, when I had my bags and all, I stood for a while next to the stairs and took a last look down the goddam corridor.
Later in that day the date did not go so well and Holden decides to run away again, but he couldn’t possibly leave without saying goodbye to his sister Phoebe. She then convinced him to go back to the Museum of Art the following day. When the time came Holden took his sister to the zoo and watched her ride the carousel that kept going around and around as Phoebe was wearing Holden’s red hunting hat. It made Holden happy to see his little sister going around and around, even in the rain. The story ends when Holden looks back at his life so far wondering why he knew so many people and how he came to the point where he cannot control himself anymore.
Artie walks into the garage and finds his dad, he asks what he’s doing out there and he tells him, “It’s always something here I must do, I’m putting now away my old nails- The long ones separate from the short ones” (Spiegleman98). Vladek wants to avoid buying new nails, so he uses ones that have been previously made use of or some he had discovered around different places. Towards the very back of the graphic novel, Artie evens points out his dad’s hoarding of items he does not need, “Christ! You save tons of worthless shit, and you…”(Spiegleman159). Vladek burnt all the books that Anja wrote about their experiences in the Holocaust and his son got mad and pointed out that he saves every little thing he finds but then gets rid of one of the most important.
From ‘The Catcher in the Rye’ Holden Caulfield buys a red hunting hat at the start of the novel which becomes an inseparable image of Holden to the reader. The red hat symbolises the innocence that he has retained with him in order to protect himself. However, he often mentions that he doesn’t wear his hat in public, therefore this mirrors the central conflict that Holden has with growing up. His character has a final development in the end of the book as he gives his hat to little sister stating, “I took my hunting hat out of my coat and gave it to her….She didn’t want to take it, but I made her.” Salinger has cleverly embedded symbolism in order to convey Holden’s final transition from childhood into adulthood by giving his sister his “innocence” in the shape of a red hat. Likewise, Chbosky has utilised tunnels throughout his novel in order to present the ideas of maturing into an adult.
The red hunting hat plays such a role in Holden’s life. While recalling one of his numerous cab rides, Holden says “I’d put on my red hunting cap...but took it off before I checked in. I didn’t want to look like a screwball or something” (61). This seems to illustrate that Holden puts on his hunting hat when he is in a situation in which he doesn’t feel like adults will judge him. It also shows that Holden takes off the hat when he doesn’t want to look out of place among other people - he doesn’t want to draw attention to
Once made and ready to throw he begins to seek out targets but then comes to realize the unbenounced innocence and beauty of the recent snowfall and decides to not throw it. He continues with, “But I changed my mind. The car looked so nice and white. Then I started to throw it at a hydrant, but that looked too nice and white too.” (Salinger, 36). This gives us an understanding of Holden’s train of thoughts when dealing with pristine and innocent objects in the world, the world in which he thinks to be “corrupt”.
I’d just be the catcher in the rye and all” (173 Salinger). Also, Holden’s trying to save kids from making the same mistakes that he would by catching them before jumping into adulthood he doesn’t want them to grow up making the same mistakes that he did. Holden soon realizes that he can’t catch every single kid from falling into adulthood because it isn’t in his powers to help them because it’s a move they have to take. Second, Holden’s red hunting hat has another significance which is being that it’s the same color as the color of Allies hair. This demonstrates symbolism because he really didn’t have a closer relationship with Allie.