Discussion Group for January 30...........A Perfect Day For Bananafish by JD Salinger
- Thread starter Spideyman
- Start date
-
This message board permanently closed on June 30th, 2020 at 4PM EDT and is no longer accepting new members.
I'm making peanut butter and bananafish sandwiches.
Neesy
#1 fan (Annie Wilkes cousin) 1st cousin Mom's side
Just read the story - wow - surprise ending (or was it?)
A little insight:
Salinger quotes a verse from the poem The Waste Land by poet T. S. Eliot in the following exchange between Seymour and Sybil, regarding the little girl's young rival, Sharon Lipschutz:
Salinger quotes a verse from the poem The Waste Land by poet T. S. Eliot in the following exchange between Seymour and Sybil, regarding the little girl's young rival, Sharon Lipschutz:
"Ah, Sharon Lipschutz", said the young man. "How that name comes up. Mixing memory and desire." He suddenly got to his feet. He looked at the ocean. "Sybil," he said, "I'll tell you what we'll do. We'll see if we can catch a bananafish."
"A what?"
"A bananafish," he said... [emphasis added]
The stanza that contains the verse is from Section I of The Waste Land – "The Burial of the Dead":"A what?"
"A bananafish," he said... [emphasis added]
April is the cruelest month, breeding
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
Memory and desire, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain. [emphasis added]
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
Memory and desire, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain. [emphasis added]
Salinger was deeply affected by his time in WWII and this story is about telling the reader that unless you were there, you don't understand.
Tomorrow will be exactly 71 years since The New Yorker readers were introduced to this story. I first read this story in Salinger's Nine Stories. I remember liking two others from that collection and they are no less strange and mysterious as this one.
Seymour Glass. What was your gut reaction to this chracter? Initially, I felt pity for him. But after the beach scene I'm puzzled. Every time I read this story I wonder if I'm the only reader detecting a creepy tone to Seymour's behavior with the little girl. A grown man, a stranger, should not be touching a little girl. The mother even leaves her daughter alone with him. What? The story takes place after WWII so maybe people were more trusting? I go back and forth. He seems to be only capable of communicating with children, which makes him sympathetic...I mean, he's mentally wounded from the war. (By the way, I wonder what Seymour's girlfriend's mother is alluding to when she asks about his driving? Did he space out and hit a tree or was he playing erratic games to scare her?)
Second, the whole bananafish thing has a sexual undertone, I think. Seymour actually "disrobes" at the exact moment he goes into the water to show the little girl this fictitious fish. Yes, he'd naturally need to remove his robe to go into the ocean but it seemed suspect he was wearing it to begin with, his girlfriend even remarks on it.
Please tell me I don't have a dirty mind. LOL
Thoughts?
Seymour Glass. What was your gut reaction to this chracter? Initially, I felt pity for him. But after the beach scene I'm puzzled. Every time I read this story I wonder if I'm the only reader detecting a creepy tone to Seymour's behavior with the little girl. A grown man, a stranger, should not be touching a little girl. The mother even leaves her daughter alone with him. What? The story takes place after WWII so maybe people were more trusting? I go back and forth. He seems to be only capable of communicating with children, which makes him sympathetic...I mean, he's mentally wounded from the war. (By the way, I wonder what Seymour's girlfriend's mother is alluding to when she asks about his driving? Did he space out and hit a tree or was he playing erratic games to scare her?)
Second, the whole bananafish thing has a sexual undertone, I think. Seymour actually "disrobes" at the exact moment he goes into the water to show the little girl this fictitious fish. Yes, he'd naturally need to remove his robe to go into the ocean but it seemed suspect he was wearing it to begin with, his girlfriend even remarks on it.
Please tell me I don't have a dirty mind. LOL
Thoughts?
We hear a lot about veterans who go to war one man (woman), and come home something completely different. Something broken and lost. That is the case with this.
Such a sad writing.
Such a sad writing.
Sorry, didn't know we had early posts.
No, I felt the kiss on her foot was troublesome -- and I think it was to him too. It was like the last thing that made him think, I don't belong in this world. The little girl was icked out by it too, in my opinion. I think she was going to tell what happened, I think he knew she would tell, and that gave him the catalyst to complete an act that I almost think was predetermined in his mind anyway. I think the whole vacation was a last moment with his wife and I felt he intended for this to be how it ended.
Was Sharon not as little as I assumed? I'm confused. Dang, do I need to read it a fourth time?
Sharon was the little girl who sat with him on the piano bench. I think he mentioned she was 3 or 4.Was Sharon not as little as I assumed? I'm confused. Dang, do I need to read it a fourth time?
Yes, I agree. Yet, it still knocks the breath out of me...well, the first time it did.
I read someplace that the young man in Bananafish was not Seymour, but rather Salinger himself.
I thought that segment with the girl was very creepy too. I'm not sure it was meant to be though. It would be interesting to find a review from 1947 or so and see what they thought of that scene then. It might just be the difference of 70 plus years or it may have always been creepy. I'm not sure how that is supposed to be taken.
Ok, that's what I thought. I must have misread the quote.
I think it was a different time of "trust" -- adults were not fearful to leave a child unattended ( personally, I think, especially near water, that was not the best choice)
Precisely. I wonder. While I was reading it this time I tried to have an open mind but I couldn't shake that uneasiness. Putting aside his touching her ankles, it's kind of sad and sweet, especially with how the story ends.
The wife seems totally indifferent to Seymour's issues and her mom think he's crazy. Even though those two viewpoints seem opposite, they're really the same in that neither one understands anything about what Seymour is going through.
That's great insight. I never looked at it in that way.