Catcher in the Rye - Holden's Depression

Holden's Depression

At some point in everyone's life they will feel alone and depressed. Many people say they can relate to the main character, Holden Caulfield in the novel The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger. Holden is a young man that suffers from depression. He does not want to socialize and deal with the people around him. The novel revolves around his journey to find himself and him becoming happier. Although society now is different from society when the book takes place, many people can still relate to how Holden Caulfield feels.

Holden's depression is shown a few different ways throughout the novel. One of the main reasons why he is upset is because of the death of his brother Allie. Allie was not only Holden's brother but also his best friend. Holden idealized his brother. He thought everything about Allie was perfect, he was perfect. When Allie passed away from Leukemia at the age of 11 it crushed Holden. Holden would talk to Allie even years after he passed away whenever he had a problem or just needed to talk to someone.

Everyone is "phony" nobody is "real". Holden believes this statement is true which is making his depression worse. He refers to everyone as being a phony and does not see anything good about the people he comes in contact with. Holden believes that people act like someone that they are not and for that those people are considered a phony. Stadlater is Holden's roommate at Pency Prep. Holden believes that Stradlater is the biggest phony that he knows. Stadlater is a jock that gets a lot of girls and Holden believes that he only does this as an act. Seeing people act the way that his roommate does makes Holden mad. With everyone acting phony causes Holden to feel as if he has nobody to talk to and has to hold everything in. By holding all of his feeling in can cause Holden to become even more depressed. The only person Holden feels he can relate to is his younger sister Phoebe. Phoebe is still a child and Holden wants to "save" her and other children from being corrupted by society. He does not want children to grow up and become phonies like all of the adults and teenagers Holden knows.

Holden has different ways of dealing with emotions like everyone else in the world. When Holden becomes angry he takes his anger out on other people or things. When Allie passed away from leukemia, that night Holden slept in the garage and punched the windows out with his bare hands and was hospitalized. When Holden is stressed out or nervous he usually smokes. When Holden had one of the prostitutes in his room he kept offering her a cigarette because he thought that she was nervous and it was help her ease up. He was feeling alone one night so he had Maurice, the man that runs the elevator, send up a prostitute. Holden did not want to have sex with her; all he wanted to do was talk. He also starts