The Catcher in the Rye

     The Catcher in the Rye, by J.D. Salinger, has an odd yet symbolic title. It relates to how Holden, the main character, is scared of growing up.
    
     However, the title doesn't even come clearly into play until the sixteenth chapter, where a boy is singing the song "Comin' Thro' the Rye." This song is by Robert Burns, and is about, bluntly enough, two stangers having a one night stand in a rye field. Holden doesn't really know this, and it becomes a central theme.This song appears later in the book as well, when Phoebe asks him what he wants to do with his life. He sees an image of a "Catcher in the Rye," where there's a field of rye full of childrenwith a nearby cliff.
   
     He would pull falling children back into the rye, and off the scary cliff. This signifies growing up and how Holden, the main character in the book, does not want kids to grow up. He has a bad and weary adulthood, though he is not a full-fledged grown up, and is scared of the world and things he doesn't understand.
 
     He's scared for the kids, too. Maybe he shpuldn't be. I think he's using his own life to model the lives of kids around him. Though he has their best interests at heart, perhaps kids do not need to be "catched." But then what is the point of Holden's life anyway?

     Phoebe, Holden's little sister later points out that he has misheard the song anyway. He thought a line was "if a body catch a body comin' thro' the rye," when it wasn't. It was "when a body meet a body comin' thro' the rye."