A Perfect Day for Bananafish Themes
Innocence
"A Perfect Day for Bananafish" contrasts the world of children (imaginative, curious, pure, and innocent) with the world of adults (materialistic, selfish, shallow). As you can see, the story glori...
Madness
"A Perfect Day for Bananafish" features a young man who has returned from his service in World War II and is experiencing what today we would call post-traumatic stress disorder. Back in the 1940s,...
Spirituality
Salinger wrote "A Perfect Day for Bananafish" when he was highly interested in Zen Buddhism. The epigraph to this story's collection suggests that we approach each tale as though it were a Zen k...
Isolation
This story explores the isolating effects of mental illness. Seymour Glass, a troubled young man just back from service in World War II, has difficulty adjusting to being home, no doubt as a result...
Sex
In "A Perfect Day for Bananafish," sex is one of the material pursuits that poses a threat to the well-being of the soul. In the Zen spirit of this work, physical pleasures have no real value and o...