Essay+(RD)

Henry Liao Patrick Czernizer 10/26/09 period 8 Annicaro/Grier

In //The Catcher in The Rye//, the red hunting hat is more than just a hat to Holden Caulfield, it is an object that makes him feel separated from the world. Holden depends on the red hunting hat to be apart from crooks and phonies. He wears the hat when he is frightened or nervous. wearing the hat makes him unique. He believes that only the purest people in the world can wear it, as in people how are not phonies and crooks.

Holden wears the red hunting hat when he is frightened and nervous. He puts it on after fighting Stradlater (Salinger 52). This support's the thesis because Stradlater is a phony to him. Stradlater always acts so perfect and clean, when he is actually hiding his bad personal hygiene habits. In another incident he puts it on when he is walking alone in New York City (Salinger 88). When Holden is walking alone at night he is very frightened. The hat gave Holden a sense of protection during that moment to separate himself from the dangerous world. When he was asking Stradlater about where he was going with his date Jane, he pulled out his hat and put it on (Salinger 34). This supports the thesis because, before this conversation started, he got nervous because he liked Jane, and now Stradlater was going on a date with her.

There is another instance when Holden wears the hat, trying to be different from crooks and phonies. In the beginning of the book Ackley was in Holden's room annoying him. At that moment Holden put on his hat and made Ackley feel unwanted and unliked (Salinger 21). This moment supports the thesis because he was trying to get Ackley away from him. To him, Ackley is a phony. After fighting Stradlater, Holden puts on his protection, which is his hat (Salinger 52). He feels that he is not as fake as Stradlater and wants to be a good person. He put it on when he was leaving the Piano Bar (Salinger 153). He wanted to show the hat-check girl the hat because the pianist reminded him of Stradlater, and he wanted to get out of the phony world again.

Holden believes that only the purest people in the world can wear the red hunting hat, as in, not phonies and crooks. He wants Phoebe to wear it, but she wants him to wear it (Salinger 212). He felt that Phoebe was someone that he loved and she was not a crook or phony, so she should be able to wear the cap. He felt comfortable around the hat-check lady and showed her his hat (Salinger 82) He felt that the lady would not judge him because she appeared to be a good person. He put it on when he was walking through the streets of NYC, because he felt that no one at that time would care, not even crooks (Salinger 88). Holden felt that there were not many phonies and crooks at the time that he put it on.

Holden depends on the red hunting hat to be separated from crooks and phonies. He wears the hat when he is frightened. He is mostly frightened by the crooks of the world. He wears the hat when he wants to be different from crooks and phonies. The crooks irritate Holden to the point that he wants to be away from them. He believes that only the purest people in the world can wear it. He believes that the good people left in this world were able to wear the hat that separates them from the crooks. Holden needed his red hunting hat throughout the story as an object to separate him from the crooks and make him feel unique.