https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HfybrTrLvo4
This is from Salinger's collection, NINE STORIES.
Plot: Seymour Glass has returned from the war, a victim of PTSD. More and more, he is unable to function in adult society and his marriage is coming apart. His wife's mother is concerned about her being alone with him at a hotel resort based on his recent behavior.
Muriel, his wife, spends her time getting ready for social occasions while Seymour haunts the beach and in particular talks to a four-year old ( There are a few scary moments when he pulls the child out to sea, but it is only when he returns to his hotel room that he carries out his real intention. Bananafish are fictional creatures who gorge themselves on bananas and then die. He entertains the child with this story, but it's reflective perhaps of his war experience.
For a short story, there are lot of tropes and metaphors in this story but they don't detract from the writing or on what you feel for a character you don't know very well at all. His name itself points out that he "sees more" and is easily broken. On finishing this audio version, I ordered the book. This is why I will always have more books than my cases can hold. Just below this link on you tube, a teacher goes through the story for her class.
9 comments:
A few years ago I went back and read all the Salinger short stories. I liked them.
Currently reading the second Art Taylor collection from Crippen & Landru, THE ADVENTURE OF THE CASTLE THIEF and Other Expeditions and Indiscretions. I liked the first collection of his stories, but I think this one is better.
My short story reading has been way down lately but I am still reading at least one story a day.
I read Nine Stories as a teenager and this was, at the time, my favourite of the collection. Though I liked most of the nine, I can only recall about five, which tells me it's due for a re-read.
My post for this wee is up: https://casualdebris.blogspot.com/2023/04/r-chetwynd-hayes-editor-tales-of-terror.html.
Thanks
Art is a great ss writer. And a really nice guy.
If I didn't have that book group book hanging over me....I would read more of everything.
I will get it up at ten. I have a zoom call right now....
Interesting. Looks like someone deleted Todd's post...
I'm having some computer Fun, but the actual post will be up shortly.
Sorry I did not have a short story for this week. Too much going on.
I enjoyed all the short stories I read by Salinger years ago. I reviewed this one on the blog in 2015, and also "For Esmé–With Love and Squalor." My copy of NINE STORIES is a very old paperback, and I don't have copies of the other books with short stories so I will look for easier to read copies of all of those.
I'm one of the few people who are not fans of Salinger's work. I didn't like CATCHER IN THE GRASS. I was left cold by Salinger's short stories. I'm sure the fault is mine.
I haven't been a fan of CATCHER, in part because it was Assigned Reading, but do like most of the rest of his work I've read. Including "Bananafish"...he didn't have the lightest hand, nor, as Joyce Maynard has informed us thoroughly, the best judgement in private life.
The pb I got is so tiny. I wonder if that was the case originally. I will find out if the adult me likes him now.
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