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hyper-urbanized environment full of noisy traffic and rude people, is clearly a source for
Holden's anxiety and restlessness.

Holden wishes to establish a more interactive relationship with nature, but is limited
within the confines of the city. He fantasizes about leaving the city for a rural environment, an
environment that he believes will relieve him of his anxieties, but his fantasies are deemed by
others as unrealistic and unobtainable. When Holden takes his friend, Sally, to an ice-staking
rink, he excitedly confesses his desire to escape the city: "We could drive up to Massachusetts
and Vermont [ ... ] We'll stay in these cabin camps and stuff like that till the dough runs out [ ... ].
we could live somewhere with a brook and all, and later on, we could get married or something. I
could chop all our own wood in the wintertime and all" (Salinger 146-147). Holden believes that
life will be simpler in a more rural state, and that he and Sally would be happier enveloped in
wilderness and isolated from the urban world. To Holden's disappointment, Sally dismisses his
offer, claiming that the idea is "fantastic" and unrealistic (147). Holden, in search of therapy and
relief, has equated rural landscapes with romance, innocence and healing properties, while urban
landscapes are corrupt and damaging. Scholars Leonard D. Baer and Wilbert M. Gesler claim
that "[Holden's] therapeutic landscapes are completely innocent places, and although they are
real spaces for him, they exist only in his imagination" (Baer and Gesler 407).

Holden resorts to his oversimplified nature fantasy as an escape from his overwhelming
urban environment and the responsibilities of being an adult. This is evident not only in his
desire to live in a rural environment, but also in his desire to abandon technology. He tells
Sally: "Take most people, they're crazy about cars [ ... ] I'd rather have a goddam horse. A horse
is at least human, for God's sake" (145). Of course, Holden does not mean that horses are, in
fact, human, but that horses are alive. Though he does not use ecocritical terminology, Holden