Holden's Coming of Age Conundrum

               Now that we’ve finished Catcher in the Rye, I my doubts on whether or not the “Coming of Age” part of the novel applies to Holden at all. As the book begins, Holden is reflecting back on a few days around Christmas time last year saying something crazy happened during that time. To me, that gives the sense that Holden went through something that was so momentous he can describe each day in detail to us readers. We all know he did go through some serious stuff, but he came out from those experiences pretty much as the same Holden Caulfield as the Holden who entered them. Every time someone tried to talk to him about being a part of the world and getting his life together he just shrugged off the thought of submitting to a phony world as he would put it. Mr. Spencer, Mr. Antolini, and even Phoebe were unable to make a change in him big enough for him to turn his life in another direction. I realize this is not the definition of coming of age (nobody really knows), but for Holden, I feel his coming of age would be when he finally decides to either try things in the world or just go and be secluded like he mentioned. He does neither of these. With all of that in mind, how then does this book count as a coming of age novel? Simple: the concept of coming of age.

                All of the talks given to Holden about his life and future are, in whole, conversations about coming of age. “What will you do when you grow up?” “Who do you want to be?” “Pull yourself together!” All of these are quintessential questions and statements of defining what it means when you come of age (ie what will it look like when you come of age?). Along these lines, Holden has an admiration for children and their simple and happy lives. When he’s near Phoebe for instance, he is quite content that she doesn’t need to worry about the real world yet. He’s happy she has yet to come of age. His metaphor for being a catcher in the rye fields saving kids from falling off a cliff is extremely vague, but I choose to see it as Holden saving the children from adulthood and thus coming of age because of his fascination with children and hatred of the phony adult world.  

Spiritual Rise, Worldly Fall

            Even though we briefly brought the topic up a week ago or so, the idea that Stephen seems to revert, in a way, to childhood again after becoming a devout Catholic intrigues me. It seems mildly ironic in a sense, that Stephen makes a decision of his own (which was a sign of him growing and becoming independent) to become the most devout Catholic the world has ever seen. In every sense, the decision Stephen made was one of spiritual growth. However, as he became more of a spiritual man, he seemed to lose his grip on the world around him, almost as if he forgets some of his worldly wisdom. He doesn’t care about his surroundings and what sort of beauty he can find in it as much as he used to. In addition, his language becomes simpler and he doesn’t go off on the trademark tangents that Stephen was so fond of making. In fact, it is very reminiscent of Stephen’s mind as a child at Clongowes.

            At Clongowes, Stephen was an innocent, simpler minded version of himself. He was very focused on doing whatever the “right thing” was, even though he might not know exactly why it was the right thing. A sort of faith in his decisions that they were the correct thing to do. It is almost exactly the same sort of behavior that Stephen exhibits when he decides to embrace Catholicism. A core aspect of Christianity in general is faith, the ability to trust in something you can’t see and don’t necessarily understand. Normally, this is trusting that God will get you out of a situation or put you in one, all you need to do is the “right thing”. Rarely is that even close to obvious, and oddly enough, Stephen’s younger self had just about as much knowledge on what the “right thing” or “right answer” was as any sort of faith decision: little to no clue. Also, possibly a coincidence, but the few times Stephen mentions that he knows the “right answer” as a child, he said he knew that because of his father and quite often God is referred to as Father and humans as the children. Aside from a faith in actions comparison, Stephen as a devout Catholic makes the conscious effort to be as pure and correct a person as he can be, which younger Stephen can easily be seen as a very innocent and mostly pure child. In the end, it’s almost as if Stephen has not only reverted to his younger self, but also fully embraced some of the aspects of his life that he intentionally threw away, like his innocence. Progress spiritually actually appeared to set back Stephen from maturing more in a worldly sense.