I'm going to answer the second half of this question first. What does the author understand about human nature? In this story, the main character is a very conflicted adolescent. He wants to find someone who will be there for him, but at the same time finds everyone in the world very annoying and not worth his time, except for a select few people. The author shows us through the conflict that he sees that we humans don't quite even understand ourselves sometimes. We get very confused very easily when we are frazzled and lonely and it shows with Holden. He is lonely and depressed and makes a lot of irrational decisions because of these emotions. J.D. Salinger shows us that when it comes to humans, emotions are one of the strongest and most influential things any of us can contemplate. When Holden learns of his brothers, Allie, death he punches out all of the windows in his garage. Now let us think. Does any sane person who isn't feeling any serious emotion do that sort of thing? No. Only someone very high off of emotion would even contemplate punching glass. A sane person would not do this because, well, it would hurt. An emotional person doesn't consider these things. In this instance, Holden is simply thinking how breakable glass is and that he wants to break something. So he does. One of the biggest themes I got out of this book was that of sadness. Throughout the whole novel, Hayden is fighting with himself trying to escape his lonely depressing state but always running away before progress can happen. So in trying to evade his sadness, he is basically creating more for himself. Ironic, right? Another theme is innocence. The entire novel, Holden is consistently bashing on the adult world and constantly calling all and any adults "phonies." Holden really only likes kids. He sees them as kind, caring, and innocent little people and generally socializes with them as opposed to the older generation when he can.
Salinger, J. D. The Catcher in the Rye. Boston: Little, Brown and, 1991. Print.
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