Catcher in the Rye Symbols

The Catcher in the Rye

Everyone has to grow up sometime in their life, but no one can say that they haven’t longed for the innocence and simplicity of childhood again. In the novel The Catcher in the Rye, J.D. Salinger uses many symbols to portray Holden’s inner conflict of staying in childhood and innocence, or growing up and becoming an adult. This conflict is shown throughout the book, through Holden’s relationships to other people, especially his siblings Phoebe and Allie. In the novel, Salinger uses symbols such as the bus, Holden’s hotel room, and the taxi, to symbolize Holden’s journey towards the adult world, and the loss of his childhood innocence.

In The Catcher in the Rye, Holden is seen using buses a few times, as one of his means of travel. Holden rarely uses the buses, avoiding them on a regular basis, usually using taxis instead. This avoidance of the buses by Holden parallels his avoidance of growing up and entering adulthood. Towards the beginning of the novel, Holden gets onto a bus to Agerstown. Right before getting on the bus Holden is playing with snow, and makes a snowball, which the bus driver won’t allow Holden to take on the bus, making him throw it away. The snowball represents childhood innocence and fun, and is described by Holden as “very childish, but [enjoyable]” (35). Getting onto the bus represents Holden stepping into the adult world and having to let go of all the childhood innocence.

Holden rarely uses buses in the novel, taking taxis more often to get around New York. Holden uses taxis quite a few times, yet he says how “[he] didn’t want to take a cab, but [he] did” (181). The cab represents adulthood, and how Holden wants to keep his innocence and childhood and not grow up and become an adult. Yet Holden knew somewhere in his mind, that he would eventually have to grow up. Holden talks about how he hates cabs and doesn’t want to use them, yet he still uses them on a regular basis. Towards the beginning of...