Holden Caulfield: Self-Perception and How Others View

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Holden Caulfield, represents a person's self-perception and how they view others.
Introduction
The book uses the main character that is Holden Caulfield who narrates different aspects of the
book (Salinger, 10). Basically, Holden is not specific about the location but he went on and
narrated a story. Holden narrates the entire story at the age of 16 and this took place between the
end of the school term and Christmas holiday (Bollini, 56). The general picture one draws from
the book is that the entire story narrated by the Holden Caulfield represents a person self-
perception and how people view others in society. The essay, therefore, discusses the key
concepts which outline how Holden portrayed the issue of self-perception and how people view
others in different endeavors (Wilson, 75).
Discussion
First, the author starts by dividing the people into different groups (Cutchins, 67). Salinger shows
that there are categories of people known as the "Phonies" and another category of people known
as the authentic (Živković, 65). In the story, the main character-Holden describes the "Phony"
category as someone who is against or discriminate other people within society. This leads to the
concept of hypocrisy as described by Holden in the book. Holden goes on and narrates how
hypocrisy has the manifestations of conformity in human beings (Williams, 175).Through this

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concept, Holden argues that the issue of gender, age, and occupation in people plays a key role.
This, in turn, is believed to affect Holden's trait as he interacts with other characters in the story.
Through this one can describe how the psychological profile of Holden is related to our topic in
the essay (Gavin,90). In the book, the author indicated how Holden perceives to be alienated
from the adult world thus subjecting himself to the issue of depression. This proves how people
do perceive different things surrounding themselves. Holden says that he is depressed to form
viewing the adult world and describing it as a phony (Hedrick, 112). Holden entirely believes
that the whole world is phony, full of superficial things and shallow. This proves his arguments
on how some people are hypocrites in our society (Achariyopas, 190). Through his assumptions,
he views the whole world and noticed how it is full of depression but he, later on, he says he will
work hard to overcome the challenges from other people and the world at large. The author in the
book says that the character is depressed because he wanted to remain a child. Holden knows
that children are pure and innocent (Kadlac, 60). He says that only children who don't see the
things happening in the world. Holden is tired of how people perceive his life.
In addition, Holden shows the issue of self-perception and how people view others through his
characteristics (Trites, 38).The story shows that Holden had a particular liking towards the
children as compared to the adults in the story. Basically, the entire book concerns with loss of
innocence which is exhibited through the characters. The book describes Holden as the character
with unique capability that is "catcher in the rye" meaning someone who saves children from
falling off. This behavior of being connected to children is a metaphor in most of the societies
that is adulthood not likely to associate with kids (Kaufman & Lisa, 87). Holden describes how
other characters are wondering about his behavior of liking young kids. In the story, one can
identify how Holden used to watch Phoebe on the carousel engaging himself with childlike

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behavior. Through the Phoebe Holden was overcome with happiness and said "damn near
bawling (Samuels, 98)."This shows how Holden started loving the behavior of children in his life
regardless of how other people said about him.
The other concept revealed by Holden about the topic is through his relationship with his family
members. Basically, the way the character acts around and reacts to different members of his
family portrays to the reader the entire direct philosophy which surrounds each member.
Generally, one can argue that Holden is not close to his family (Kertzer, 11). From this line one
fully can argue that Holden he is not fully connected with his family, "If you really want to hear
about it, the first thing you'll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy
childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that
David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don't feel like going into it," The entire line of the story
summarizes how people can relate the behavior of Holden and his family. This marks the issue
of how we as people do see the other people in our society. In addition, Holden describes how
different people argue on him. He makes a comment that is "If you want to know the truth, I am
a virgin, I really am." He says that most of the people say he is not a virgin but he told truth
(McAdams & Claudia, 71). He even went on and argued that he knows all the ways to lose his
virginity but he is yet to do so. In the story, we can notice how Holden said he is a virgin but he
made up excuses as if he was ashamed. The character proves on how people do see the other
people's life by showing his maturity when he says "I cannot really get sexy, with a girl I don't
like," He assured the other character how was not uncomfortable with opposite sex and how he
respected all people despite them interpreting his life wrongly. Through this, the character
influenced other people not to interpret others wrongly. Holden believes that the respect he has
for other characters in the story as unnatural (Pym, 12).