A Question of Holden Caulfield’s Morality (The Catcher in the Rye Literary Analysis Essay Sample)

Tupac Shakur once said, “A woman brought us into this world, so we have no right to disrespect one”. To be disrespectful to any living being is wrong, especially if you treat them differently for no reason in particular. Holden is our main character and he takes it to be his right to treat women poorly, and he is frequently disrespectful and treats them inappropriately. In J.D Salinger’s novel, The Catcher in the Rye Holden Caulfield does not respect women because he is rude to them, thinks of them and treats them inappropriately, and lies to them.

Holden radiates rudeness to the women in his life on multiple occasions within this book. It seems as though every interaction he has with a girl ends with him doing something rude. When he is on a date with Sally Hayes he goes on a long rant to her about moving to Vermont and living in a cabin before telling her to leave and saying this to finish off the date,”’ You give me a royal pain in the ass, if you want to know the truth’”(148). He asks her out and takes her out to a show and seems to have a good time with her. But her not wanting to be yelled at in a public place by Holden made her want to be rude enough to the girl to make her cry and then to not even console her but to instead walk away and wander around the city. This is also seen earlier in the book with Holden’s interaction with the Nuns at the restaurant,” I was smoking a cigarette and when I stood up to say good-by to them, by mistake I blew some smoke in their face”(126). Even if it was an accident, blowing smoke in someone’s face is like spitting on them. Especially after how Holden had been thinking about the nuns in his head, it makes it even worse to do something like that. Holden is rude for his actions, whether they are intentional or unintentional.

Holden is not just rude to women he also treats and thinks of them inappropriately. A few prime examples appear from his date with Sally Hayes. When he is in the cab with her they have a little “physical interaction” and Holden has this to describe it,” We horsed around a little bit in the cab on the way over to the theater. At first she didn’t want to, because she had her lipstick on and all, but I was being seductive as hell and she didn’t have any alternative”(139). For a lack of better words, Holden just sexually assaulted Sally Hayes without her consent. Which in the state of New York can be from 3 months to a maximum of 25 years in jail and a minimum fine of 500 dollars or as it would be for Holden, 43.57$. That is just about the most inappropriate thing that a guy can do to a girl and it shows how Holden is extremely morally flawed. And later on in the date Holden is yelling at Sally and has this to say about her response,”’ Stop screaming at me, please,’ she said. Which was crap, because I wasn’t even screaming at her”(147). If someone says that you are making them uncomfortable, then you probably are. His refusal to acknowledge her as a person who may be uncomfortable with his louder tone and to just ignore her request is a violation of her personal rights. This is again an inappropriate way to treat any living thing and shows yet again that Holden is morally flawed in the way he treats women. Holden’s harassment and gross treatment of women can be seen in his moral flaws within the book.

Holden could be described as being a compulsive liar, a compulsive liar is someone who is compelled to lie about all things no matter how important they all are. Being a compulsive liar is considered a symptom of borderline personality disorder, which Holden seems to have all of the Symptoms of. One of our first chances to see Holden lie is when he is on the train from Pencey to New York and he meets the mother of a classmate. She asks him about her son and Holden lies to her about who her son is and who Holden himself is,”’ Rudolf Schmidt,’ I told her. I didn’t feel like giving her my whole life history. Rudolf Schmidt was the name of the janitor of our dorm”(61). It is one thing to not want to tell someone your name. It is another to not tell someone your name and then lie to them for hours about their kid in order to put a false image of them in their minds. This again falls into the idea that Holden could have a borderline personality disorder because the major symptoms include pathological lying and unnecessary risk-taking. Which Holden is doing both of in this instance. Another example of Holden being a liar is when he is talking to the nuns about what school he goes to. He has this to say about their conversation,” I told her Pencey, and she’d heard of it. She said it was a very good school. I let it pass(124). This is another example of Holden lying about something so simple. He could have just said that “I don’t really want to talk about that” but he instead chose to lie about where he is currently going to school. And the idea that he was “letting it pass” kind of implies that he wanted to go on a rant about the school when she asked him where he went. This brings us back to this idea of Holden being a compulsive liar because he will not even tell people the truth about what school he goes to. Holden is a compulsive liar to women and to people in general.

Holden Caulfield is rude to women, treats them inappropriately, and is a compulsive liar to them all throughout J.D Salinger’s, The Catcher in the Rye. He is disrespectful to Sally Hayes on their date, He is Rude to the nuns when he meets them, And he lies to so many people it is hard to keep track of them all. Overall it can be said that Holden Caulfield is a morally flawed person that should have some kind of therapy or correctional activities.