What's it about?

The main theme throughout The Catcher in the Rye is a teenager's revolution. A revolution against school, adults, adulthood and the so called phonies. The main character, the teenager Holden Caulfield, doesn't seem to be able to adapt to the school system. He thinks that school is only to prepare the students for the fake grown up life of materialism, which in his words is adulthood. He thinks adults are unreliable and without freedom. He feels that kids, on the other hand, are honest and that they've got a free life in front of them, until they enter adulthood. They're special and unique during their childhood, and they're not just only a part of the society.

The meaning of the novel's title is that Holden feels that he's the catcher in the rye for the persons on the border of becoming adults. In his opinion, he tries to save them from the phonieness in life.

Smaller themes in the book are love and relationships. Holden feels insecure about relationships with girls, because he has never experienced an intimate one. He hasn't got any strong friendship with any boy either, and he seems to be quite lonely.
His relationship with his family is different from member to member. He thinks it's easiest to relate to his younger brother Allie (who died at a young age) and his little sister Phoebe. His older brother, D.B., is a person he looks up to. He idolizes him, more or less. His parents are not mentioned much by Holden, it seems like they haven't got a special and important relationship.

Shortly, we can say that the themes in this book are revolution, love and relationships (in case you don't want to read all of the text).

By: Jocke, Moa and Kajsa.