The Catcher in the Rye: What’s Up with That Red Hat?

The Catcher in the Rye is full of symbols: the ducks in Central Park, the Museum of Natural History, the very title of the book itself. But perhaps no symbol captures the many layers and the inherent contradiction of Holden Caulfield himself better than the red hunting cap. Yes, Holden’s questions about the ducks symbolize his confusion about the very murky business of growing up. Yes, the museum certainly represents his discomfort with change and desire to preserve everything (particularly innocence) just as it is. But the red hunting cap is something that Holden intentionally purchases and wears as an expression of himself. Thus, in understanding the hat, we understand Holden. So, the question becomes: What’s up with that red hat?

First and foremost, the red hat is a hunting hat. But what are the odds that Holden has ever even held a gun? His entire environment—from the hallowed halls of Pency Prep to his parents’ high-rise luxury apartment in Manhattan—is one of urban wealth and privilege. A hunting hat in New York City, and certainly within Holden’s particular social circle, is probably very uncommon. So, in this sense, the hat is a bright red mark of distinction, individuality, and it gives him a bit of confidence (even if it’s simply a mask for all of his insecurities). It says, Look at me! I’m different! And Holden certainly feels different. Everyone is a moron, except for him. Everyone is a phony, except for him. Nobody understands him. It’s Holden against the world. He even refers to his hat as his “people shooting hat.” What a tough guy!

However, the hat looks so goofy that wearing it also offers Holden an unconventional form of protection. A young man his age, wearing a hat like that, seems childish and marks him as strange, which keeps people at a distance, thereby reinforcing his feelings of alienation. But that distance also affords Holden protection: from expectations, from criticism, from rejection. In a sense, by wearing the hat, he’s abandoning people before they can abandon, which is his way of protecting himself. Seen in this light, the hat represents a sort of security blanket for Holden, something that brings comfort merely by keeping it near (or on). The hat is both a vehicle of alienation and an agent of protection against the very alienation it fosters. Ironic, huh? Sort of a confusing or contradictory, huh? Well, so is Holden.

This confusing combination of comfort, security, alienation, protection, and pseudo-confidence illustrates what a multifaceted symbol the red hunting hat becomes. It’s sort of like a Swiss army knife in its assorted utility. In a nutshell, the red hunting hat is just like Holden, and his continual desire either to put it on or to take it off represents the internal conflict, the struggle, the confusion from which Holden suffers as he attempts to figure himself out in relation to the world around him. Eventually, Holden gives up the hat to his little sister—a meaningful and symbolic passing of the torch, as he finally begins to recognize that he must inevitably leave childhood behind, and slowly inch into adulthood—he no longer needs the hat.

It’s after this symbolic gesture, in the final pages of the book, that we see Holden really begin to settle into his own skin. When he takes Phoebe to the park, he chooses not to participate, and instead simply watches her on the carousel, without interfering, from a distance, with the other adults… where he should be. It’s here that Holden finally experiences a few epiphanies: “The thing with kids is,” he says, “if they want to grab for the gold ring, you have to let them do it, and not say anything. If they fall off, they fall off, but it’s bad if you say anything to them.” He might as well be talking about himself.

And in the final chapter, Holden actually begins to reveal the sort of vulnerability that he had previously been masking with false bravado throughout the story. He’s finally beginning to let down his defenses. Such openness requires tremendous maturity: something Holden has only now begun to realize. “If you want to know the truth,” he says in the final lines of the book. “I don’t know what I think about it. I’m sorry I told so many people about it. All I know is, I sort of miss everybody I told about […] It’s funny. Don’t ever tell anybody anything. If you do, you start missing everybody.” And this is what gives the reader hope for Holden, that with this new vulnerability and far deeper understanding of himself, perhaps he might just turn out okay.