In both "A Perfect Day for Bananafish" and "Down at the Dinghy," women open the story by gossiping. We as readers are only given the middle of the story to start at in order to figure out what the gossipers are talking about. Even though we hear the beginning of the conversation in "Bananafish," there is a larger context of conversations that is frequently referenced by either muriel or her mother. In "Dinghy" there is less context for us to have to guess at but we are again thrown into the middle of the "conversation.
Salinger uses the conversations like Hemingway uses those in his stories. There are no "important" details, on the surface that is. Salinger's characters in these conversation tend to speak in short snips, with the same emotional dynamics that Hemingway does. The gossiping characters sound very differently than other non-gossipy conversations. Hills like White Elephants is a good comparison for how the conversations have a subtext that is always implied. For example in Bananafish Muriel's mother keeps asking Muriel if she is alright and Muriel keeps interrupting to reassure her and change the subject which inevitably concerns Muriel's mother even more. The subtext is all but screaming at us that there might be something up with Muriel's spouse (Seymour).
In addition to giving subtext, the conversations tell us about the other characters in the stories from points of view that do not necessarily sympathize with them. In Dinghy it is the maid resenting the family that she works for, especially Lionel who overhears her whenever she wants to vent her frustrations. In Down at the Dinghy" Sandra's venting gives us background information on the family; they are staying at their vacation house for all of October (the current month just to put the story in a time period), Lionel's father is Jewish (offset by his wife's Glass style eccentricities), and how unusual Lionel standing in the dinghy is. In Bananafish, Muriel's mother is the one who is giving us information that reveals that Seymour is eccentric or possibly insane. She references events like the tree and a psychiatrist and a hospital that we do not know more about, but are obviously important. Just listening to Seymour, we would think that he is a kind of odd man but would have no background as to why he might kill himself after seeming cheerful in the elevator.
I think the gossip girls in both these stories provide us with very important information about other characters in the story. Its a very interesting technique that Salinger uses, introducing the characters through dialogue. I think the technique is rather affective and when we meet the character later in the book, we already have an idea of what to expect.
ReplyDeleteI like your observation about the "gossip girl" phenomenon (I also think it's evident in "Uncle Wiggily in Connecticut" with the conversations between Mary Jane and Eloise). In general, Salinger's dialogue is downright fantastic, and he does such a great job of using it to characterize the people in his stories. It's particularly interesting to point out the conversations taking place between women, as women are generally considered to be the more chatty of the sexes. A "gossip session" is perhaps the most efficient way to communicate a lot of information all in one conversation, and as you point out, Salinger employs this dynamic to his advantage.
ReplyDeleteSalinger's heavy reliance on dialogue to tell the story is something I really enjoy. It keeps me locked in, regardless of how interesting the plot is. We learn so much about the characters in their conversations yet he always leaves out enough for us to fill in some of the gaps. Nine Stories is my first experience of Salinger but he's quickly become one of my favorite authors.
ReplyDeleteI think that leaving the readers with questions, and even confusing them is what he intends. He doesn't want to give you all of the answers, he wants to give you the tools to figure it out for yourself. By putting us in the middle, we are forced to look at the facts and try to dissect everything else going around.
ReplyDeleteI find this "Gossip Girl" dynamic to be really interesting especially since (like Joon said) Salinger relies heavily on dialogue to tell his stories. Rather than just having a narrator-like character tell some parts of the plot to his/her friends, this "gossiping" is something that we, as readers, are probably very familiar with and is a new and refreshing way to present us with important character and plot information.
ReplyDeleteI think that once Salinger starts writing, it's actually a lot like any other story, say a random chapter from a novel. The difference is that Salinger skips the exposition, so that you have to figure out from little clues who different people are and why they are important. However, his prose doesn't leave as much hidden as Hemingway, for example, and he is much more florid with prepositions and adverbs likewise.
ReplyDeleteGoing along with Joaquin's comment, I think that Salinger keeps his mostly-dialogue heavy stories fresh by including this kind of technique. Very little actually happens in both of these stoires, "Down at the Dingy" and a "Perfect Day for Bananafish," and by stepping back and allowing us some new perspectives on the central characters, especially with the maids in "Down at the Dingy," a story that otherwise would not really have much happening develops new intricacies.
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