Although Holden spends so much time and energy finding phoniness in others, he never openly observes his own phoniness. Holden Caulfield’s deceptions are generally pointless and cruel and he notes that he is a compulsive liar, for example, on the train to New York, he commits a needless prank on Mrs. Morrow. He would like us to believe that he is a virtuous model in a world of phoniness, but this is not the case. Though he would like to believe that the world is a simple place and that virtue and innocence on one side while shallowness and phoniness rest on the other, Holden is his own hostage. The world is not a simple place as he would like—and wants—it to be; even he cannot follow the similar standards with which he continually judges others and has difficulty growing up due to the limbo of two different worlds. …show more content…
Kegel, the writer of Incommunicability in Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye in Studies in J.D. Salinger: Reviews, Essays, and Critiques of The Catcher in the Rye, and Other Fiction , has said, “Like Hamlet, a “sad, screwed-up type guy” like himself, Caulfield is bothered by words and word formulas which only “seem”, which are “phony.” The honesty and sincerity which he cannot find in others, he attempts to maintain. His repeated assertions that something he has said is “really” so demonstrate his attempt to keep faith with the World. He is particularly distressed by the occasional realization that he too must be phony exist in the adult world…” (Kegel 10). Holden Caulfield’s characteristic traits are compared with Helmet, who is seen as immature since his complaints about his problems instead of changing his behavior. Hamlet is someone who also cannot make up his mind and always asking questions about his existence in a world. While, both of the characters seem lonely and