Cather in the Rye

Catcher in the Rye is Holden Caulfield's journey towards maturity. Holden's relationships with other people had a recurrent theme throughout the novel. He was always commenting on other people's phoniness and meanness. The cynicism in Holden's narration of his travels remains constant even when his location changes. Although his negative nature is not baised to one typer of person, but to almost every person he interacts with. At Pency he first remarks on how Ackely is very obnoxious because of the gross things he does, yet later in the novel he comments on how mean everyone is being towards Ackely. For Holden, how annoying an individual is, is based on when that individual is interacting with him. Holden has contrasting thought about Mr. Spencer. He dislikes seeing old sick people and gets very annoyed when Mr. Spencer drops papers, yet he also says that Mr. Spencer is a nice guy and is sincere in his effort.
Holden's relationship with his roommate Stradlater becomes hostile with the one of the few people Holden respects, Jane, goes on a date with Stradlater. Holden becomes jealous and envious so he attacks Stradlater. His immaturity is shown because he thinks the blood on his face makes him look tough. Holden seems mature because he is nonchalant with going to a bar and ordering alcohol or accepting a hooker, but he is far from mature. His relationship with Sunny is a very strange one. When she showed up to His hotel room he had already regretted accepting the offer and he didn't want to go through with it. Holden’s reaction and interaction with sunny shows how immature and lost he is through his journey. Holden thinks the people in clubs and or even people just walking on the street are being phony, yet he never calls sunny phony even when her jobs is the most superficial.
Holden’s family relationships are put on a much higher pedestal to him than those of his friends. He was extremely close to his younger brother, and his apathy towards school can be attributed to his younger brother’s death. His relationship with his sister seems to be the strongest. He is constantly commenting on how intelligent she is which contrasts to every other person that Holden meets. Phoebe is the one person in his family he goes to see during his secret trip to New York. He does not want to see his parent because his mom is a worrier. Near the end of his discussion with Phoebe he stops caring if his parent find out that he dropped out. Holden stops caring what other people do. In the beginning he was very concerned with what others did, such as with Stradlater and Jane, but near the conclusion he stopped caring.