Holden Caulfield

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Holden Morrissey Caulfield is a fictional character, the protagonist^[1] of J.D. Salinger's 1951 novel The Catcher in the Rye.

[edit] In The Catcher in the Rye

Holden Caulfield is the narrator and protagonist of The Catcher in the Rye. The novel relives the days following Caulfield's expulsion from Pencey Prep, a university preparatory school based loosely on either Ursinus College or Valley Forge Military Academy, Salinger's alma mater.

Holden is a 16 year old junior,whose family is financially well off. His father works but his mother does not. Despite financial comfort, he leads a somewhat troubled life. He tells his story using a casual every-day tone and frequently employing disparaging language and profanity. He often uses the word "phony" when describing people who he feels are not true to themselves nor to the rest of the world.

Some of Holden's depression is likely the result of the death of his younger brother Allie, from leukemia, when Holden was thirteen. Allie was two years younger, and dearly loved by Holden.

Holden has two other siblings: 10-year-old sister Phoebe, and older brother D.B. who is a screenwriter in Hollywood. Phoebe and Holden hold a deep affection for one another while Holden believes D.B. is a great writer who has been torn down and corrupted by society. Holden has been expelled from two schools, quit another and failed a fourth school; he has been shaken down by a pimp and beaten up; a former teacher of his whom he respects seems to make a pass at him. These events, as well as others, weigh heavily on him. "In the conclusion of the book, what is stated on the first page comes into clearer focus: Holden is in a sanitarium and has been telling his story to a psychiatrist, not simply a reader."

[edit] Namesake

Holden Caulfield's first name comes from Salinger's friend Holden Bowler. His last name "Caulfield" links to the novel's famous rye-catcher metaphor, in which Holden wants to be the person responsible for catching carefree children playing in a field of rye from obliviously falling off a nearby cliff. A "caul" is a membrane that covers and protects embryos and remains on some babies after birth, so that, in "holding caul" in his rye field metaphor, Holden Caulfield wishes for all children to retain the pure, youthful ignorance they possessed before birth (before being brought into this world)—to, figuratively, retain their caul. Through the aforementioned metaphor, Holden wants to prevent children from nearing the symbolic cliff at the edge of the field, from which they must fall, metaphorically maturing into adults and thus ultimately losing their childhood innocence.

[edit] In other works

Holden Caulfield also appears in Salinger's "Slight Rebellion off Madison". An earlier version of this story, "Are You Banging Your Head Against a Wall?" was accepted for publication by The New Yorker in October 1941, but was not published then because the editors found the tone to be too desolate for its readership. An edited version of this short story later became the basis of several chapters in the middle-late section of The Catcher in the Rye dealing with Caulfield's date with Sally Hayes, during which he confesses his desire to run away with her, he meets Carl Luce for drinks, and he makes a drunken phone call to the Hayes home. Unlike the similar sequence in the novel, Caulfield is on a Christmas break from school, and, in the story, the interlude with Sally is split into two occurrences. Also, the meeting with Carl Luce is considerably briefer in the story than in the novel.

Caulfield also figures as a character in the short story "I'm Crazy", published in Colliers (December 22, 1945), and other members of the Caulfield family are featured in "Last Day of the Last Furlough", published in The Saturday Evening Post (July 15, 1944) and the unpublished short stories "The Last and Best of the Peter Pans" (ca. 1942) and "The Ocean Full of Bowling Balls" (ca. 1945).

"I'm Crazy" is closely related to what would become the first chapter of The Catcher in the Rye. It begins with Caulfield standing on a hill at "Pencey Prep" watching a football game below, and develops as Holden visits his history teacher, Mr. Spencer, for a talk about his expulsion from school and his future. Several other details match those found in the first chapter of Catcher, including a reference to the mother of one of Caulfield's schoolmates and to his own mother sending him a gift of ice skates, but the story ends with his returning home instead of running away from school. Once home, he is not shown confronting his parents, who, according to the maid, are playing bridge. Instead, he goes to speak to Phoebe. Their dialogue is similar to what appears in the later chapters of The Catcher in the Rye. Also notable is that sister Viola gets her first, and only, mention in the Caulfield saga.

In Salinger's Seymour: An Introduction it is referenced that both Buddy and Seymour Glass played with a child by the name of Curtis Caulfield in Central Park but later died in the Pacific Theater of WWII, possibly a relative.

[edit] The Caulfield family in other works

"Last Day of the Last Furlough" relates the final day of Babe Gladwaller before he leaves to fight in World War II. Gladwaller spends part of the day with his little sister before Vincent Caulfield (later renamed D.B. in the novel arrives. At that point Vincent is a fellow soldier about to leave for the war. Vincent announces that his brother, Holden, has been declared missing in action. Gladwaller's relationship with his younger sister can be seen as a parallel to Caulfield's relationship with Phoebe.

In "This Sandwich Has No Mayonnaise" Vincent is brooding over the news that Holden is missing in action.

"The Last and Best of the Peter Pans" relates the story of Vincent's (D.B.) draft questionnaire being hidden by his mother. The events occur just after the death of Vincent's brother Allie and reveal the anxiety of Mary Moriarity, an actress and Caulfield's mother. The story is notable for the appearance of Phoebe and Vincent's statements about a child crawling off a cliff.

"The Ocean Full of Bowling Balls" is told by Vincent (D.B.) and relates the final day of Kenneth (Allie). The story, set at the Caulfield summer home on Cape Cod, is a reminiscence on the part of Vincent. Caulfield is away at camp on what will be Kenneth's final day. Several details make their way from this story into Catcher, including the characterization of Allie; Allie's poetry-inscribed left-handed baseball mitt; Vincent's girlfriend, Helen, who keeps her kings in the back row (like Jane Gallagher); and Caulfield's critical view of others. Unlike Allie, who he says died of leukemia, Kenneth is described as having an unspecified heart condition. As the story nears its end, Kenneth and Vincent are on the beach. Kenneth decides to go swimming and is overcome by a wave. Vincent races home with Kenneth's unconscious body and Kenneth dies later that night. Holden is waiting on the porch with his suitcases when Vincent arrives with Kenneth's body. This story was reportedly sold to a magazine only to be taken back by Salinger before publication.

Another short story of note with relationship to Caulfield is "The Boy in the People Shooting Hat" which was submitted to The New Yorker sometime between 1948 and 1949 but was not published. It focuses on a fight between two characters named Bobby and Stradlater over Bobby's feelings about Jane Gallagher. This story likely forms the basis for several key scenes in the first several chapters of The Catcher in the Rye.^{[citation needed]} The Catcher in the Rye is not reflected a lot in the story.

[edit] In popular culture

[edit] Quotations

The boy himself is at once too simple and too complex for us to make any final comment about him or his story. Perhaps the safest thing we can say about Holden is that he was born in the world not just strongly attracted to beauty but, almost, hopelessly impaled on it.

—Original book jacket copy, possibly partially written by Salinger^[2]

[edit] Footnotes

[edit] External links

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Holden Caulfield

Salinger's uncollected short stories

• Slight Rebellion off Madison.
• In Japan, most of the short stories are already translated into Japanese (compiled in two volumes) and still commercially available with the approval of Salinger's agents (ISBN 4-7521-0001-0 / ISBN 4-7521-0002-9). Even Hapworth 16, 1924 is available (ISBN 4-7521-0004-5).

Fan sites

• Dead Caulfields, A fan site with information on Salinger's works, including details about the uncollected and/or unpublished shorts stories.
• The Catcher in the Rye - and related matters