Relationships Between Adults and Children in Nine Stories

            Many of the short stories in the collection Nine Stories by J.D. Salinger deal with relationships between adults and young children. The first story in the collection, “A Perfect Day for Bananafish” features an interaction between a grown man and a young girl as a major part of the plot. The jaded modern reader may interpret this scene as a disturbing and predatory interaction, but a closer examination of the text seems to suggest that it is actually very innocent. In class we discussed how the traumatic events Seymour experienced in the war left him uncomfortable in adult situations and happy in a carefree conversation with a child.

            While it is not the only other story in the collection dealing with adult-child relationships, I would like to first draw a parallel between “A Perfect Day for Bananafish” and “Down at the Dinghy.” The conversation between Boo Boo and Lionel shares many similarities to the interaction between Seymour and Sybil in “A Perfect Day for Bananafish.” The distinguishing factor is that “Down at the Dinghy” portrays a mother-son relationship, whereas “Bananafish” is about an unattended young girl and an older man who is a complete stranger. Because of this, the reader does not experience any feelings of distrust or disgust when reading “Dinghy.” However in both stories the adult figure behaves in roughly the same way. Seymour makes up the story of the titular bananafish, and Boo Boo talks at length about her qualifications as an admiral. Both adults introduce some form of make believe into the conversation. In both cases the adults make physical contact with the children—Seymour kissing Sybil’s foot and Boo Boo kissing Lionel’s ear, but again this is much more acceptable coming from a mother than from a complete stranger.

            A discussion of adult-child relationships in this book would not be complete without mentioning “The Laughing Man.” This story tells of an afterschool program for grade school boys run by a local law student known to the boys as “the Chief”. The boys view “the Chief” almost as a god, contradicting the narrator’s more realistic description of him looking back on the events: 

            "The Chief’s physical appearance in 1928 is still clear in my mind. If wishes were inches,   all of us Comanches would have had him a giant in no time. The way things go, though, he was a stocky five three or four—no more than that. His hair was blue-black, his hair-line extremely low, his nose was large and fleshy, and his torso was just about as long as his legs were. In his leather windbreaker, his shoulders were powerful, but narrow and sloping. At the time, however, it seemed to me that in the Chief all the most photogenic features of Buck Jones, Ken Maynard, and Tom Mix had been smoothly amalgamated."

            The reverence the boys exhibit for this man is challenged later in the story when they confront the fact that the Chief is simply human. This becomes evident when the Chief’s girlfriend is introduced and begins spending time with the afterschool program. The Chief’s godlike façade crumbles when the boys see him in obvious distress after the end of his relationship with her.

            Each story is different, of course, but each focuses on an emotional exchange between children and adults. They are not peers, but the relationship is perhaps more memorable and gripping because of the differences in age and understanding.

Married Woman Seeks Cat

“The Cat in the Rain” by Ernest Hemingway is a simple story about a young American couple vacationing in Europe. Although their marriage appears unexceptional, several aspects of the story suggest a flawed relationship beneath the couple’s façade of happiness. The conversation between the husband and wife begins innocently enough as the woman indicates she wants to rescue a stray cat in the street below from the inclement weather. It does not take long before the conversation escalates into an argument that shows the wife’s extreme dissatisfaction with her life. However, at the end of the story the tensions dissipate as the cat is brought to the hotel room, and the wife is at least temporarily appeased.

            When the woman first mentions the titular “cat in the rain,” her husband responds, “I’ll go get it,” without making any move to get up from the bed or put down his book. His apathy begins to hint at the underlying problems in their marriage. After his wife’s initial failure in finding the cat, tensions begin to run high. His wife expresses her general frustrations with her current life:

            “I want to pull my hair back tight and smooth and make a big knot at the back          that I can feel,” she said. “I want to have a kitty to sit on my lap and purr when I stroke her.”

            “Yeah?” George said from the bed.

            “And I want to eat at a table with my own silver and I want candles. And I     want it to be spring and I want to brush my hair out in front of a mirror and I       want a kitty and I want some new clothes.”

            “Oh, shut up and get something to read,” George said. (…)

            While the wife’s many wants may initially seem to be frivolous, a careful reading reveals something of substance. Her repeated desire for a cat implies that she feels a lack of companionship with her husband. This theory is clearly supported by his curt responses. Moreover, earlier in the story she mentions that she dislikes her short hair, despite the fact that her husband emphatically states that he prefers it short. She repeats this complaint in the quoted passage. I think it is possible that her desire to let her hair grow out suggests her yearning to break free of the control of her husband.

            At the end of the story, the woman calms down. She says, “(…) If I can’t have long hair or any fun, I want a cat.” Almost as soon as she makes this proclamation, there is a knock at the door and her wish is granted by a maid holding a cat, presumably the one she noticed in the rain.

            This story, though quite distinct and seemingly simple, has the same thread of disillusion and loss that runs through most of the stories in Hemingway's In Our Time. Again and again, Hemingway deals with a character's disillusionment, whether with love, marriage, war, faith, or, ultimately, life.  He somehow manages to present big emotions in simple scenes, as in this one about a woman who wants a cat.

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A few weeks ago when we were still reading The Things They Carried I stumbled across this website that talks about a current exhibition about the book, and I figured I would share it now:

http://www.nvam.org/AboutEducation-ThingsCarried.xml