In “A Perfect Day for Bananafish” the symbols and implications of events are numerous and all are indicative of a theme of communication or more specifically the price of ineffective communication. In “A Perfect Day for Bananafish” the symbolism has extreme examples of symbolism from the obvious name of the Seymour to the less clear and obscure implications of a woman looking at his feet. The most interesting of these, however, is the  Seymour himself. He is a veteran, and seems to have come back a little different from when he left. He is distant, detached, and he may have attempted to commit suicide before. Seymour has very odd social interactions with adults. The only beings that Seymour seems to be able to interact with in a relatively normal fashion are young children. The deepest conversation that Seymour has is with a young girl named Sybil. Seymour takes Sybil out into the sea to go search for bananafish. During this excursion they converse but even then Seymour doesn’t seem to know how to carry on a normal conversation. Another odd thing is these so called “bananafish” they are fish that go into crates of bananas through small holes and are so gluttonous that they eat until they physically cannot get back  out of the crate through the holes and die of starvation. After their excursion Seymour lashes out at woman on the elevator with almost no provocation and then proceeds to kill himself.

At the beginning of the passage Muriel fails to acknowledge the fact that Seymour is not completely normal in the head and that he something unfortunate could happen. It is as if she is forcing herself to not accept the fact that Seymour isn’t ok as far as mental health is concerned. One odd choice of words is what Seymour calls Muriel, Miss Spiritual Tramp of 1948. It seems to denote that that Muriel is a stereotypical woman of the time, that is to say that she is very shallow and uninterested in anything but the superficial aspects of things. Another telling fact is when Seymour is on the beach and comments on Sybil’s blue bathing suit which, in fact yellow. This shows just how different the world that Seymour lives in is different from the rest of the world.  An interesting piece of information is that at this point of the reading the sentence structure gets much shorter and extremely choppy when Seymour becomes the primary narrator. The flow of the sentences also becomes quite erratic first asking a question of whether he likes wax and then immediately after if he likes olives. The structure of the dialogue also changes dramatically. Now in the dialogue between Sybil and Seymour there is a harsh disconnect of sorts. Seymour doesn’t really even address her by her name and always compares her to another girl or perhaps in the world that Seymour is living in he could actually be talking to this girl. Another failure of communication is in the elevator when Seymour rages at a woman who supposedly “looks at his feet”. According to Seymour, "If you want to look at my feet, say so," said the young man. "But don't be a Goddamned sneak about it."  This is of course a failure of communication in the fact that the woman was merely looking at the floor of the elevator. Finally the last gesture that points to the theme of communication and its importance is hen Seymour kills himself. He has given ample opportunity to get help, we are even led to believe that he may have tried to kill himself before.

The themes are many but all of these factors contribute to the overarching theme of communication or the lack there of. Throughout the passage characters had been given ample opportunity to deduce that something amiss, but none of them are able to figure it out. Muriel has the chance to get a psychologist involved but is more focused on his wife’s dress than Seymour. Next, the Sybil has the chance to show Seymour the innocence and beauty in life and fails in doing this and only succeeds at upsetting him for suggesting that he push Sharon off of the piano seat. Then as an exception to the rule of failed communications there is one case where a message is clearly given and received. It is when Seymour kills himself in the room right over Muriel’s sleeping form. It is a final testament to the fact that every other character had a chance to see Seymour reaching out for help but ignored him for one reason or another.