How we cite our quotes: Citations follow this format: (Section.Paragraph)
Quote #1
Finished tying his sneaker lace, Teddy perfunctorily gave his mother a kiss on the cheek. She in turn brought her left arm out from under the sheet, as if bent on encircling Teddy's waist with it, but by the time she had got it out from under, Teddy had moved on. (2.29)
This is not the first time Teddy avoids physical contact with his mother. His detachment from his parents is later explained in his conversation with Nicholson.
Quote #2
From the opposite end, a huge, blond woman in a starched white uniform was coming toward him, carrying a vase of long-stemmed, red roses. As she passed Teddy, she put out her left hand and grazed the top of his head with it, saying, "Somebody needs a haircut!" Teddy passively looked up from his newspaper, but the woman had passed, and he didn't look back. (3.1)
Teddy sure has the social detachment thing down pat. It seems that he has, as he later claims to Nicholson, conquered the impulse to indulge in emotions.
Quote #3
Teddy glanced briefly, objectively, at Myron. (3.17)
Objectivity is indeed an important word for Teddy. He doesn't seem to have strong opinions, positive or negative, toward anyone in this story.
Quote #4
"You're the stupidest person I ever met," Booper said to him. "You're the stupidest person in this ocean. Did you know that?"
"He is not," Teddy said. "You are not, Myron." He addressed his sister: "Give me your attention a second. Where's the camera? I have to have it immediately. Where is it?" (3.20-21)
Notice that Teddy stops to correct his sister, but he doesn't chastise her or reprimand her obviously cruel behavior. Instead, he's focused on the task at hand, which he wants to get done as quickly as possible so he can go write in his diary. Teddy really does maintain a cool detachment from events in the world around him.
Quote #5
The McArdles' four deck chairs, cushioned and ready for occupancy, were situated in the middle of the second row from the front. Teddy sat down in one of them so that – whether or not it was his intention – no one was sitting directly on either side of him. (4.2)
The narrator almost shares Teddy's sense of detachment. Notice that he describes Teddy's decision to sit with the phrase, "whether or not it was his intention." In other words, the narrator doesn't go inside Teddy's head to find out just what he did intend. This is another trademark Salinger move – the narrator dodges omniscience by limiting himself to external observation.
Quote #6
"Poets are always taking the weather so personally. They're always sticking their emotions in things that have no emotions." (4.46)
Now we understand why Teddy dislikes the poetry that Professor Mandell sent him earlier.
Quote #7
Nicholson flicked his cigarette ash off to one side. "I take it you have no emotions?" he said.
Teddy reflected before answering. "If I do, I don't remember when I ever used them," he said. "I don't see what they're good for." (4.57-8)
Again, Teddy's earlier behavior is finally explained in his dialogue with Nicholson. Now we understand why he acted toward his parents with such detachment.
Quote #8
"But the point is you feel that in your last incarnation you more or less fell from Grace before final Illumination. Is that right, or am I –"
"That's right," Teddy said. "I met a lady, and I sort of stopped meditating." He took his arms down from the armrests, and tucked his hands, as if to keep them warm, under his thighs. "I would have had to take another body and come back to earth again anyway-I mean I wasn't so spiritually advanced that I could have died, if I hadn't met that lady, and then gone straight to Brahma and never again have to come back to earth. But I wouldn't have had to get incarnated in an American body if I hadn't met that lady." (4.72-3)
Consider Teddy's behavior toward women in this story – his mother, the blonde he passes in the hall, and Ensign Matthewson – in light of this comment to Nicholson. We now see why he's so keen on avoiding women.