Holden had "quite a bit of gray hair" and when he met a woman on a train he "showed her [his] gray hair" because it "fascinated the hell out of her". The fact that his personality is wandering between a child and an adult suggests that he is physically ready for a change, but he does not want to accept it. Holden is ready to show his adult side in situations in which it would give him some advantage, like in this case, make him look older in front of a mother of one of the other students in Pencey. However, he is afraid of the responsibility and falseness of adulthood, and that is why he keeps running away from it. His hiding of his gray hair shows his situation - having power and being afraid to use it unless it is for a little while and it gives him an advantage in the moment.
I mean not wait till Wednesday or anything. I just didn’t want to hang around anymore. It made me too sad and lonesome.” (p. 49) As the protagonist suddenly decides to leave his dislikeable school behind, it is quite obvious that he has no real sense of direction in life; his decision is hasty and irresponsible and could be interpreted as an act of sudden desperation. Firstly, this confusion is reflected in Salinger’s description of the main character’s thread of cogitation. In an instant and without a moment’s hesitation, Holden changes his mind from thinking that he ‘might go down and see what old Mal Brossard was doing’ to deciding ‘what [he’d] really do,’ which is to ‘get the hell out of Pencey.’ This gives the impression that Holden is extremely rash in his decisions and that he relies on gut feeling alone to take action.
All the reader knew up until that point was that he disappeared and no one ever saw him again. But it turns out that earlier in the novel; there was a body that Jim would not let Huck see. The reader always that Jim thought it was because it was too mangled for Huck to see. This is situational irony because it is a complete different view on what happens after the novel ends. Now, Huck can get his money and never worry about returning to the awful care of Pap.
I remember hearing about a train accident when I was little. The barrier didn’t work right and so the guy didn’t even think to check if a train was coming and just went around it anyway, and right when he did the opposite side barrier went down and he was trapped and killed on impact. I don’t want to ever be in that type of situation where I’m defenseless, so I plan on heeding the flashing lights whenever their on and doing my best to follow all the precautions that come with railroad safety. Some people might think that they can go faster than the train but after watching that video and realizing how fast trains are really going I’m pretty sure that nine times out of ten the train is faster. I’m happy that this chapter has outlined these precautions for me to follow, I already feel safer with them and I haven’t even really used them yet but I definitely plan to.
I didn’t have anything else to do” (Salinger 61). He had no one to spend time with so he had nothing to do. The lyrics “Sometimes I sleep, sometimes it's not for days/and the people I meet always go their separate ways/Sometimes you tell the day/by the bottle that you drink/and times when you're alone all you do is think” (Bon Jovi) from the song “Wanted Dead or Alive” fits Holden’s character very well. The song is about how he is when he’s alone he thinks and his relationships never last and how he drinks to forget everything. This is very much accordant to Holden’s character in the sense that he is alone through most of the book and he is quite the alcoholic.
2. When Holden steps off the curbs he begins to feel as if he was never going to get to the end of the street and that he is just endlessly falling down and nobody will ever see him again. 3. With all the bag language that Holden uses, he was so upset that curse words were written on a school wall because curse words are not part of his whole idea of childhood and innocence and the fact that they are written on the school walls, it worries Holden that the kids will read it, ask what it means and then spend time worrying about it. 4.
This hat is referred to a lot in the book whether Holden is taking it off and on or just changing the position of the hat. Since this red hunting hat is rarely ever off of Holden’s head, it represents a type of security blanket for the boy. In the book Holden says, "I took my red hunting hat […] and put it on – I didn't give a damn how I looked.” This shows that he may not care how he looks in the hat, but he always puts the hat on when he was feeling vulnerable or when he is in an uncomfortable situation. The next important piece of symbolism in this novel would be the carousel in the last chapter of the book. While Pheobe was riding the carousel Holden talks about how happy it made him to watch his little sister so calm and innocent looking while riding on the carousel.
He has also lost his senses on how he should act cool in order to give Daisy the fake impression he has been building up in the past five years. Instead of facing Daisy like he face all the other guests, he walk off leaving Daisy in the room alone because he was embarrassed. The quote can also foreshadow Gatsby's death; how he is hollow can also mean the he is lifeless. 'You're acting like a little boy... Not only that, but you're rude.' Nick's dialogue gave himself a mature image, where within this quote, he was the one in control, but Gatsby wasn't, being called 'a little boy'.
The first reason that Holden thought about suicide was because of all the loneliness he has to face. Right from the beginning of the book, Holden talks about being lonely, for example when he was at the football game he said “practically the whole school was there..” (p.2) Instead of sitting in the stands and hanging out with everyone else Holden sat on top of the hill to watch the game alone. Also, when Holden is in the lavender room, he gets mad
The book clearly states that "it has been happening for years" but still the town's people do not want to have anything to do with him. His strange hermit-like behavior, and peculiar looks and clothing prevent him from conversing in interactions with other townspeople because they find him abnormal and refuse to associate