Character Analysis Of 'Catcher In The Rye' By J. D. Salinger

The Catcher in the Rye Final Essay In J.D. salinger 's The Catcher in the Rye, the main character, Holden Caulfield, is constantly struggling life and with the idea of sacred and profane balances. Holden is a sixteen year old from New York CIty who was expelled from many schools for poor grades. James Lundquist mentions that “how to maintain a sense of the holy in the midst of obscenity is what Holden 's character development is all about”(Lundquist 49). Throughout Salinger’s novel Holden is able to accept the dual nature of life because of his memories with his deceased brother Allie, his curiosity distracts him from things that are profane, and the things that are sacred, like Phoebe, keep him from performing profane actions. Holden values his memories with his brother, Allie, almost more than anything else in the novel. Holden remembers Allie through his baseball mitt being one of the only things of Allie’s that he has. Early in the

Holden’s curiosity causes him to forget about the profane things in the world that bother him. One of the things that Holden thinks about throughout the novel are the ducks in Central Park. Holden often wonders, like a child, about where the ducks go when winter comes around. He even asks people that he meets if “[they] know [about] those ducks in the lagoon right near Central Park South” (Salinger 60). When Holden asks this he says it in a way similar to how a child would. Children seem to never have to worry about things because others take care of problems for them and they are quickly distracted by other things going on. In this part of the novel Holden copes with the dual nature of life by distracting himself with questions and thoughts that don’t matter with what is going on around him. Holden has sort of a dual nature himself because just after asking about the ducks like a kid he goes to a bar. This is Holden’s way of accepting the dual nature of life as he learns to accept the fact that he is becoming an adult as