Holden Caulfield Adulthood

The Catcher in the Rye, written by J.D.Salinger, is a novel written to convey the emotions of transitioning from a child to an adult. The story takes place primarily in New York City, New York, following teenage boy Holden Caulfield during a short snippet of his life. The reader travels through this time as Caulfield is kicked out of secondary school and journeys to New York shortly after. The novel’s purpose is to detail the painful experience of being a teenager through the eyes of a boy who does not understand adults and experiences withdrawal from society due to his discontent with it. This experience relates to many which is why the book is still to this day so popular and why it is a valuable piece of literature.
Caulfield does not like adults. This is very apparent throughout the whole book, as seemingly every page refers to adults or some action of theirs being considered “phony”. He does not understand the mechanisms of being an adult, such as complex relationships and jobs. When people do not understand a matter, they do not like it, and this is one reason Caulfield does not like adults. However, he has a much greater respect towards children and speaks in a much kinder tone of them, instead of his usual curse-laden dialogue. This could be because Holden has been a child, so he understands them. Caulfield is especially affectionate towards his little sister, Phoebe. He makes loving and positive comments towards her, such as “I mean Phoebe always has some dress on that can kill you. You take most little kids, even if their parents are wealthy and all, they usually have some terrible dress on. I wish you could see old Phoebe in that suit my mother bought her in Canada. I’m not kidding” and he always makes the remark that...

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...ething I just don’t understand. I swear to God I don’t” (63). What teenager does understand sex? Not one, which means everyone is going to be able to relate to Holden. The story being in first person narration also creates an intimate bond between reader and character, as the reader directly hears Holden’s thoughts as if Holden himself is talking to them. It creates the intimacy and feeling of understanding many teens crave while transitioning through a rough period in their life.
Much success has come from the novel due to its highly relatable nature and has made others’ lives easier to make sense of. The novel’s importance is that it is there to describe the rough period where one changes from a child to an adult, and accomplishes this through the blunt nature of Holden Caulfield, his lack of understanding of adults, and his dissatisfaction of life in general.