The Catcher in the Rye: ThemeTracker

The LitCharts ThemeTracker is a mini-version of the entire LitChart. The ThemeTracker provides a quick timeline-style rundown of all the important plot points and allows you to track the themes throughout the work at a glance.

	1	From a “rest home” Holden begins his story: Expelled from his school, Pencey Prep for failing most of his classes, he goes to say goodbye to his history teacher, Mr. Spencer, rather than attend the Pencey football game.
	2	Mr. Spencer tells him that life is a game and he should play by the rules. The lecture strikes Holden as “phony.” Holden evades Mr. Spencer’s questions about getting expelled from other prep schools, and wonders to himself where the ducks in the Central Park lagoon go during the winter.
	3	Ackley barges into Holden’s dorm room. Holden describes his red hunting cap as a “people-shooting hat.” Stradlater arrives, and announces he has a date.
	4	Holden learns Stradlater’s date is with Jane Gallagher. Holden agrees to write Stradlater’s English essay.
	5	Holden writes Stradlater’s essay about Allie’s baseball mitt. Holden mentions that he punched a glass window on the night that Allie died.
	6	Stradlater returns, reads the essay Holden wrote, and then rebukes Holden for never doing anything “the way you’re supposed to.” Stradlater also refuses to reveal any details of his date with Jane. Holden attacks Stradlater. Stradlater bloodies Holden’s nose..
	7	Ackley won’t let Holden sleep in his room. Tormented by the thought of Stradlater and Jane having sex, Holden leaves Pencey..
	8	On the train to New York City, Holden meets Ernest Morrow’s mother and lies to her about who he is.
	9	Holden decides not to call D.B., Phoebe, or Sally. On the way to the Edmont Hotel, he asks the cabbie where the ducks in the Central Park lagoon go in the winter. At the Edmont Hotel, Holden, lonely, thinks of calling Jane but instead calls Faith Cavendish.
	10	Holden describes Phoebe, and says she’s the only person who truly understands him. But he doesn’t call her. Holden goes to the hotel bar. He dances with, and hates, Bernice Krebs. He lies and says he just saw the movie star Gary Cooper.
	11	In the hotel lobby, Holden thinks of the summer he spent with Jane when he was younger. He mentions that Jane is the only person to whom he ever showed Allie’s baseball mitt. Depressed, he leaves the hotel to go to Ernie’s, a bar.
	12	On the way to Ernie’s, Holden asks the cabbie where the ducks in the Central Park lagoon go in the winter. Holden finds the scene at Ernie’s phony. He avoids Lillian Simmons by leaving the bar.
	13	Holden walks forty-one blocks back to the Edmont Hotel, where the elevator operator Maurice offers to send him a hooker for five dollars. Holden accepts, but he can’t bring himself to sleep with the prostitute when she arrives. He pays her five dollars, but she insists he owes her ten and leaves angry.
	14	Maurice demands the additional five dollars, has the hooker take the money, then punches Holden in the stomach. Afterward, Holden thinks about committing suicide. Finally, he goes to sleep.
	15	Holden makes a date with Sally Hayes. At Grand Central Station he talks with two nuns and donates $10 to them.
	16	Holden buys a children’s record for Phoebe, then while walking on the street hears a boy singing, “If a body catch a body coming through the rye.” Holden goes to the Museum of Natural History to look for Phoebe, but decides not to go inside once he arrives and instead heads for his date with Sally.
	17	Holden takes Sally to see a play. He thinks the play and a boy that Sally talks with at intermission are phony. Holden keeps describing himself as being crazy. Holden and Sally go ice-skating, then sit inside. Holden shouts that he hates everything and then suggests they run away. She refuses. He insults her and she starts to cry. Holden apologizes, then laughs, and leaves..
	18	Holden thinks about calling Jane again, but instead calls Carl Luce. While waiting to meet Luce, he goes to see a war movie and thinks that if a war were to start he would volunteer to sit on an atomic bomb..
	19	At the bar where they meet, Holden asks Carl Luce about Luce’s sex life. Luce responds that Holden needs to grow up and see a psychoanalyst. Holden insults Luce, who leaves.
	20	Holden gets drunk, thinks about calling Jane, and instead calls Sally. The phone call goes disastrously. Then Holden goes to find the ducks in Central Park. The ducks have flown away. Holden accidentally drops the record he bought for Phoebe. He cries and contemplates suicide, but decides to go see Phoebe.
	21	Holden sneaks into his family’s apartment and watches Phoebe sleep. He looks through her school books and delights in her drawings. Holden wakes up Phoebe. She starts to tell him about her life, then figures out that he must have gotten expelled and hides her head beneath a pillow.
	22	Holden tries to explain to Phoebe why he flunked out of Pencey. Phoebe challenges him to name one thing he likes. He says Allie and talking to Phoebe. She says that doesn’t count, because Allie is dead. Phoebe asks Holden what he wants to be. He tells her about the catcher in the rye. She realizes that Holden misheard the actual words of the poem.
	23	Holden calls Mr. Antolini, who invites him to stay at his house. Holden then tells Phoebe about his plan to go to Colorado. She gives him all her Christmas money, and in return he gives her his hunting hat.
	24	Mr. Antolini says that he’s worried that Holden is headed for a “terrible fall.” Holden falls asleep, but wakes suddenly as Mr. Antolini strokes his forehead. Holden thinks this is a homosexual overture, and leaves.
	25	Holden decides to go out west. He notices the words “Fuck You” scribbled on a wall of Phoebe’s school, and then again at the Museum of Art. Phoebe asks to go west with Holden. He refuses, and she angrily returns his hunting hat. Holden then promises not to go either. Phoebe rides the carousel. Holden sits and watches her, wearing his red hunting hat which protects him from the rain that has just begun to fall, and feels so happy he almost cries.
	26	From the rest home, Holden says he wishes he hadn’t told his story because now he misses everyone in it.