"Phoniness" is the dominating theme in The Catcher in the Rye. Holden uses this word to describe everything that goes on around him. In Chapter 22, Holden talks about how adults are phonies and worse yet, they cannot see their own phoniness.
             Holden makes sure the readers know that he is a compulsive liar, and his lies are usually without reason; also they have the tendency to be cruel. As an example of his phoniness, he notes that one of his roommates was a brilliant whistler saying:
             "Naturally, I never told him that he was a terrific whistler. I mean, you don't just go up to somebody and say 'You're a terrific whistler.'"
             When Holden says things of this nature, he is sinking to the level of phoniness of everyone else around him.
             The title itself, The Catcher in the Rye, first appears in Chapter 16, when a child that Holden admires for walking in the street instead of on the sidewalk is singing a song, "Comin' Thro' the Rye." In Chapter 22, Phoebe and Holden are talking about what he wants to do with his life and replies with his "image" of a "catcher in the rye." He talks about how he would like to catch the children, who are innocent, in the rye, from going over the cliff, which leads into "knowledge" and inevitably death.
             "What I have to do, I have to catch everybody if they start to go over the cliff- I mean if they're running and they don't look where they're going I have to come out from somewhere and catch them. That's all I'd do all day. I'd just be in the catcher in the rye and all." (Holden, Chapter 22)
             He is also always placing labels upon people as being "phonies" which gives the reader the idea that Holden thinks that others are materialistic. Holdens attempts to protect the innocence in the world is another early sign of his deteriorating state. When Holden goes to Pheobe's ...