Chapter 11 - Holden's attitude towards Jane

Through chapter 11 all Holden seems to talk about is his memories and thoughts of Jane. The main memory he remembers is the time when he was close to 'necking' on with Jane which in modern day means that he was close to kissing Jane. He remembers sitting with her on the porch of her house playing a game of checkers then her mother's new 'fella' comes out and asks the young Jane for some cigarettes and this gets to Jane emotionally and she starts to cry so Holden feels as though he should be comforting her and gets close to kissing her on the mouth but only manages to kiss the other parts of her body. Jane refuses Holden from kissing her on the mouth and then gets up and goes and puts on a jumper that she needs and goes to the movies with Holden. Old Jane seems to come up into Holden's life quite a lot and it is as if he wants to make sure that he will never ever forget her as she is the closest that Holden has every got a girl and he wants to feel like that all over again but is unable to find another girl that is as good as Jane.

Chapter 9 - Holden and Sex

In Chapter 9, Holden is in his hotel room and is watching out of the window when he sees a man strutting around his room dressed up as a woman and a couple who are 'spitting' into each others mouth and this begins to get Holden to think about his personal sexual life. Eventually Holden admits that he is feeling horny and tries to get hold of a girl that he once met called Faith who he met through a supposed 'friend' of his, and his friend has said to Holden before that he knows Fiath will be willing to anything with you if youa sk. So Holden gives Faith a call but she does not know who Holden is and she claims it is an inappropriate time to be calling her and arranging plans so she quickly rejects his offer of meeting up with him both that night and the day after. I think Holden may only be trying to get hold of this girl because he knows what boys his age get up to, especially Stradlater and has maybe decided that he wants to be like Stradlater through jealousy, and he maybe wants to lose his virginity just so he can be like him. Possibly all Holden wants to be able to do is join in with conversations between boys about sex they have and as he has had no experience so he is unable to join in and maybe he feels even more left out than he usually do. Holden is a very stange character who does like to fit in with the crowd but tries to be like people in the crowd which is unusual, maybe as a person himself he feels as though he is unusual and feels as though he does want to feel like this anymore so is just trying to be like other teenage boys.

Chapter 5&6&7 - Holden leaving Pencey Prep

Once Stradlater returns home from his date with Jane or 'Jean', Holden starts to become quite annoying towards Stradlater. Holden starts to do things that he knows will annoy Stradlater maybe to try and get back at Holden for him goingout on a date with Jane. To start off with Holden lights a cigarette in the dorm when he knows that Stradlater would much prefer him to go down to the 'can' to smoke. Eventually Holden pushes Stradlater to the max and they both get into a big fight which consists of Stradlater coming out on top and practically beating up Holden. Holden realises enough is enough and leaves the dorm to go and speak to Ackley whilst he is trying to sleep, and it is easy to see that Ackley is just trying to get rid of Holden as he does not want to talk to him really. Once Ackley goes back to sleep Holden leaves the dorm and comes to the decision that he no longer wants to be at Pencey Prep and wants to leave to New York. Holden returns to his dorm and starts to pack up his things and walks to the station where he gets on a train to New York. He plans that he will spend a few days in New York before he returns home to see his mother who probably still hasnt heard from Dr Thurmer about the fact that Holden has been removed from the school due to 'flunking' out again for the 4th time. n

Chapter 3 - Holden Caulfield

Holden says that he doesn't like phony people in the previous chapter but right at the start of chapter 3 he starts to develop the tendency to lie a lot to people and as you get to know Holden the lies he tells become more apparent. Holden repeats both words in this chatper as he said in chapter 1 and the words are 'Very big deal' and 'That killed me.' both phrases here are somehow sarcastic and talking about things in a good way, it is kind of like a euphemism. Holden has a so called 'friend' called Ackley but whenever Holden sees this Ackley he always tries to get rid of him proving that Holden likes/prefers to be completely alone, but in some ways Holden looks up to Ackley and maybe he is jealous of him? Holden calls Ackley 'Ackley Kid' which tells me that Holden knows how to wind certain people up which could have lead to Holden being a social outcast and being alone a lot of the time.

Chapter 2 - Holden at School

'Life is a game, boy. Life is a game that one plays according to the rules.' Maybe here Dr Thurmer was trying to teach Holden that he has to go through each stage of life a certain way and these stages start with going to and completing school. We find out that Holden has not had too much of a good time with his school life as he has been expelled from 3 other school and his fourth school he had been to and expelled from was Pency Prep. Maybe Holden has been expelled from this many schools and he is an outcast and he does not fit in and maybe he takes that out on his school work and cannot be bothered to try in school anymore, the thing that tells me this is that he says he has failed 4 out of 5 of his subjects which means he can no longer stay in the school. On Page 9 in the book we see that even though Holden is growing up and getting older and it is as if his mental attitude is just stuck at being around 12, but maybe this is because Holden does not want to believe that he is growing up. We also see in this Chapter that Holden is very against people that are 'phonys' (fake).

Chapter One: Holden

Holden seems like a character who is very private about his own personal life and he does not think that he should be sharing his information with other people. Maybe he has developed this from his parents also being very secretive about their own lives. Holden is also a social outcast and does not fit in with any of the other people around him. Holden is close with one of his old teacher's called Mrs Spencer, she seems to be the only person that likes being in Holden's company. Also he might feel as though Mr Spencer is a father-like figure, possibly replacing his own father.