Catcher in the Rye by J. D. Salinger Holden's Use of the Word Phony

Holden’s Use of the Word Phony

It’s a little known fact that people change. Everyone evolves from experiences they have had and what other people have gone through. These events mold us into the people that we are. In the book The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger, the main character, Holden, often expresses how he feels that people are being phony. His usage of the word phony shows his frustration with the society in which he lives, his desire for no one to ever have to really grow up, and just how much of a phony he really is.

Throughout the book Holden complains bitterly of how phony the world it. At one point woman sits next to Holden on a train and she ends up striking up a conversation with him. After a few moments of friendly exchange, she asks him his name. '"Rudolph Schmidt," I told her. I didn't feel like giving her my real whole life history. Rudolph Schmidt was the name of the janitor of our dorm (Salinger, 54).' Though Holden complains constantly about how phony the world is, he is not an exception to this stereotype. Because he constantly lies about his life to people he is not any better than any of the phonies that he is so irritated by.

Holden accuses Sally of being a phony several times in the book. After waking up without an idea of what to do, Holden decides to call a girl he knows named Sally. Her father picks up the phone and hands it over to Sally. “‘Yes- who is this?” she said. She was quite a little phony. I already told her father who it was (Salinger, 106).” Holden is bothered by Sally's response because she is trying to act all prim and proper by asking him who he is when she knows very well that it is Holden. It's actually rather strange that he calls her a phony in his narration of the conversation because he decides to still go out with her later. If her being a phony is so irritating to Holden, it makes him a phony for willingly associating with her.

Holden has this intense fear of what the society...