THE CATCHER IN THE RYE

Setting in Agerstown, Pennsylvania, Holden Caulfield shows his adolescence in its finest form. Holden is attending Pencey Prep- well should be attending Pencey Prep, except he was expelled for failing almost all his classes. Though we only get a mere glimpse at life at Pencey, we are introduced to quite the characters, for example, Robert Ackley. Ackley is a senior at the school and acts exactly as a senior, only this is a man who doesn't brush his teeth. Which, actually I guess is normal for a high school senior boy. He’s just this kid who doesn’t mind getting on your nerves, he enjoys it-Holden will banter back and forth with him for a while for his own amusement when he’s bored or until he goes away. Another is Holden's roommate, Ward Stradlater, who seems to be a ladies man with an oddly good hygiene & has his essays done by Holden, he can also be a bit of a jerk sometimes. See- Stradlater had left on a date with a girl Holden had been fond of & seemed to still be quite fond of. When Stradlater returns, Holden pounds him with questions all about the girl, Jane, but becomes filled with a rage when Stradlater teases him. They both begin attacking each other resulting in Holden being pinned to the ground with blood running down his nose. After this is when he decides he’s leaving Pencey early back to Manhattan, but he wasn’t going to tell his parents.

Hopping on a train back to Manhattan, the mother of a boy he had gone to Pencey with sat beside him. And this is what makes me laugh about him, he had hated the kid but to pass time and continue the conversation, he talked him right up to her. Talking about how nice of a kid he was and all that what not. It makes me laugh cause he interacts with many people this way and offers them all a drink or a cigarette during or afterwards, even though he's only 17 and almost everyone he encounters seems to be well over the drinking age. 

From here we follow Holden around as he walks around the city, in hotel bars, dancing with older women and getting left with checks, getting beat up twice in the same day for not paying a prostitute, going back and forth wanting to call Jane, all while going through cigarettes like its gum. But here is when we learn of some new names, like Sally Hayes. Sally is an old fling, he rings her up the next day and when they meet he claims she is snobby but looking for a sense of adrenaline he announces the idea that the two of them should run off together. Shortly after their meeting Holden runs off to surprise his little sister, Phoebe, she's only 10 but has already developed her own personality. Holden will act and talk as if everything he sees and encounters is “phony” but he doesn't see Phoebe as this, the way he described her in the book, he really quite adored her. 

Having not wanted his parents to know he was back early for not the greatest reasons, he sneaks into his house to wake up Phoebe. Though she's beyond ecstatic to see Holden, she is snart and almost right away knows he was kicked out of school. Phoebe's pretty funny too because she really gives Holden a new one, she's more stressed out for him than he is himself. He expresses to her that he may not stay, he wants to leave the city and venture west away from all the phonies. Having hated the idea, Phoebe turns her head and pouts for a good while. They arrange to have lunch on Monday before Holden has to quickly sneak out because his parents had come home early and made their way to check on Phoebe supposably “asleep’. Leaving his house successfully but having little money, he makes his way to a telephone where he calls up one of his favorite teachers and asks if he could stay with him. It takes a spin when in the middle of the night he is woken up in an odd way and flees the house almost immediately and ends up catching the rest of his Z’s at Grand Central Station. 

On that Monday, Holden leaves a note for Phoebe at her school saying to meet him at a Museum before he leaves. Afterwards he heads to the Museum of Art. He waits around for a while but due to his lack of sleep from the past nights he ends up falling asleep in a bathroom. As he walks out back to see if Phoebe had come he begins to worry because she hadn't been there, she's very pristine on things she does so he thought maybe no one had given her the note. To his surprise, she's walking up the stairs with her own suitcase stating that she was going with him. Holden’s taken back and they back and forth on whether she's coming or not and whether he's going or not. It makes me actually a little sad to read the way Phoebe was pleading to go with him, like she didn't want to lose another sibling. Finally Holden makes up his mind to stay for her, I think he also saw how insanely absurd the whole plan was in the first place. Instead of going west, they go to the zoo. He watches as Phoebe goes around on the carousel with the red hunting hat he had given her, missing all the people he was never too fond of.