Comparing Catcher in the Rye and Pygmalion and the Themes They Represent In J. D. Salinger’s novel The Catcher in the Rye, the main character, Holden Caulfield, muses at one point on the possibility of escaping from the world of confusion and “phonies” while George Bernard Shaw’s main character of Pygmalion, Eliza Dolittle, struggles to become a phony. The possible reason for this is that they both come from opposite backgrounds. Holden is a young, affluent teenager in 1950’s America who resents materialism and Eliza Dolittle is a young, indigent woman who is living in Britain during the late 1800’s trying to meet her material needs and wants.