Memorable Quotes from Holden Caulfield

I’m the most terrific liar you ever saw in your life.

Goddamn money. It always ends up making you feel blue as hell.

I’m sick of not having the courage to be absolute nobody.

People always think something’s all true.

It’s funny. All you have to do is say something nobody understands and they’ll do practically anything you want them to.

If you don’t stick to your values when they’re being tested, they’re not values: they’re hobbies.

Don’t ever tell anybody anything. If you do, you start missing everybody.

The mark of the immature man is that he wants to die nobly for a cause, while the mark of the mature man is that he wants to live humbly for one.

All morons hate it when you call them a moron.

It’s no use going back to yesterday, because I was a different person then.

The best thing, though, in that museum was that everything always stayed right where it was. Nobody’d move.

Certain things they should stay the way they are. Don’t fix what ain’t broke.

Take most people, they’re crazy about cars. They worry if they get a little scratch on them, and they’re always talking about how many miles they get to a gallon, and if they get a brand-new car already they start thinking about trading it in for one that’s even newer.

People are always ruining things for you.

I am always saying ‘Glad to’ve met you’ to somebody I’m not at all glad I met.

Almost every time somebody gives me a present, it ends up making me sad.

Don’t ever tell anybody anything. If you do, you start missing everybody.

I’d rather have a goddamn horse.

What I have to do, I have to catch everybody if they start to go over the cliff.

People coming and putting a bunch of flowers on your stomach when you die. Who wants flowers when you’re dead?

Grand. There’s a word I really hate. It’s a phony. I could puke every time I hear it.

You ought to be able to stick them in one of those big glass cases and just leave them alone.

I can’t help it. You never saw such gore in your life.

Boy, when you’re dead, they really fix you up.

Things always look different when you don’t want them to happen.

Certain things, they should stay the way they are. You ought to be able to stick them in those big glass cases and just leave them alone.

Ask her if she still keeps all her kings in the back row.

I was always asking myself ‘where do ducks go in the winter?’

I thought what I’d do was, I’d pretend I was one of those deaf-mutes.

It’s no fun to be yellow. Maybe I’m not all yellow. I don’t know.

When you’re not looking, somebody’ll sneak up and write ‘fuck you’ right under your nose.

If you had a million years to do it in, you couldn’t rub out even half the ‘Fuck you’ signs in the world.

Anyway, I’m sort of glad they’ve got the atomic bomb invented. If there’s ever another war, I’m going to sit right the hell on top of it. I’ll volunteer for it, I swear to God I will.

People are always ruining things for you.

What I like best is a book that’s at least funny once in a while.

I have a feeling that you’re riding for some kind of a terrible, terrible fall.

I’m standing on the edge of some crazy cliff. What I have to do, I have to catch everybody if they start to go over the cliff.

All you need is some guy to take you to a goddam museum every once in a while.

Then, just to show you how crazy I am, when we were coming out of this big clinch, I told her I loved her and all. It was a lie, of course, but the thing is, I meant it when I said it.

It’s really hard to be roommates with people if your suitcases are much better than theirs.

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.

Among other things, you’ll find that you’re not the first person who was ever confused and frightened and even sickened by human behavior.

I am always saying Glad to have met you to somebody I’m not at all glad I met.

You’re lucky if you don’t have to make compromise with yourself, in your lifetime, and don’t have to say one thing but feel another.

Among other things, you’ll find that you’re not the first person who was ever confused and frightened and even sickened by human behavior.

All the kids kept trying to grab for the gold ring, and so was old Phoebe, and I was sort of afraid she’d fall off the goddam horse, but I didn’t say anything or do anything.

It’s no use going back to yesterday because I was a different person then.

Then what she did – it damn near killed me – she reached in my coat pocket and took out my tie.

“All you have to do is say something nobody understands and they’ll do practically anything you want them to.”

“It’s really hard to be roommates with people if your suitcases are much better than theirs.”