They are trying to raise money for children, humans that are innocent and authentic in Holden’s opinion. Nuns choose a different life than most people, which makes them less phony in Holden’s eyes. Some of his favorite adults are the three nuns he comes across while having breakfast in New york. They are genuine in his eyes and he admires them for it because he himself is losing his innocence and he doesn’t want to. Holden has a soft spot for children because he views them as innocent and pure, unaffected by the phoniness of adulthood. Allie represents all that is good about youth and innocence. The death of his younger brother Allie weighs heavily on Holden. He hires a prostitute but doesn’t have sex with her and is later robbed because of it. He knows that he wants to flirt with women, but fails every time he tries. He is obsessed with sex though he is a virgin. Although he sometimes behaves like an adult, he is innocent and naive as well. He views innocence as a virtue and the phoniness of adult life as a problem. A loss of innocence is a regular theme in coming of age stories, but Holden is a unique case. He feels alienated from everything around him, and this contributes to his deteriorating condition.Īs a 16-year-old, Holden is at a coming-of-age point where he is transitioning away from being a child and growing into an adult. Holden tries to make connections and feel less alienated, but even those efforts don’t work. Even when he tries to make conversations with taxi drivers, they seem disinterested in conversing with him. He views society as fake and feels disconnected from it as well. Despite his best efforts and intentions, women don’t seem to be attracted to him. His classmates at Pencey Prep don’t like him and he doesn’t get along with them, making him feel lonely. He sees adults as phony and fake and doesn’t respect them and feels disconnected from most of them. Holden struggles with the desire to belong, but like many people, he finds it tough to come across someone that he can connect with. He uses alienation as a way of s tanding apart and feeling special, which allows him to develop a distorted worldview one where everyone else is at faul t but he ends up with the most negative repercussions. He doesn’t want to grow up and rather than face the realities of the world, chooses to alienate himself from complicated situations. Holden feels alienated from everything in society and it is a major theme of Catcher in the Rye.