Signs and Symbols by Vladimir Nabokov
"Signs and Symbols" by Vladimir Nabokov is a poignant short story that explores themes of mental illness, familial bonds, and the weight of existence. The narrative follows an elderly Russian émigré couple who are on their way to visit their son, who is institutionalized due to referential mania—an affliction that leads him to perceive the world as filled with personal threats and references to his life. As they navigate their journey, the couple faces a series of unfortunate events, reflecting the frustration and helplessness associated with their son’s condition.
Upon arriving at the sanitarium, they are informed that their son cannot receive them due to his recent suicide attempt, heightening the couple's sense of despair. The couple's reflections on their son's troubled past and the heavy burdens of their family history reveal the emotional toll of their situation. The story culminates in a tense moment when a series of phone calls disrupt their quiet evening, symbolizing the uncertainty of their son’s fate. Ultimately, "Signs and Symbols" delves into the complexity of love, loss, and the inexorable nature of suffering, leaving readers to contemplate the ambiguous end that suggests a tragic resolution.
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Signs and Symbols by Vladimir Nabokov
First published: 1948
Type of plot: Psychological
Time of work: Unspecified; probably the late 1940's
Locale: Boston
Principal Characters:
An elderly couple , Russian immigrants living in BostonTheir teenage son , who is institutionalized
The Story
An elderly, poor Russian émigré couple intend to pay a birthday visit to their son. He is institutionalized in a sanitarium, diagnosed as afflicted with referential mania. It is an incurable disease in which the patient imagines that everything that happens around him is a veiled reference to his personality and existence. He is certain that phenomenal nature shadows him wherever he may be, that trees can divine and discuss his inmost thoughts, that coats in store windows want to lynch him—in short, that he must be on his guard every minute of his life. The boy's most recent suicide attempt was brilliantly inventive, as he sought to "tear a hole in his world and escape."
On the parents' way to the sanitarium, the machinery of existence seems to malfunction: The subway loses its electric current between stations; their bus is late and is crammed with noisy schoolchildren; they are pelted by pouring rain as they walk the last stretch of the way. On their arrival, they are informed that because their son has again attempted suicide, their visit might unduly agitate him, so they do not see him.
While awaiting their bus on their way home, they observe a tiny, half-dead baby bird twitching helplessly in a rain puddle; it is doomed to die through no fault of its own. On the bus, they are silent with worry and defeat; the wife notices her husband's hands twitching, like the bird's body, on the handle of his umbrella.
At home, after a somber supper and after her husband has gone to bed, the wife pulls the blinds down to block out the rain and examines the family photo album, filled with the faces of mostly suffering or dead relatives. One cousin has become a famous chess player (an oblique reference to Luzhin, the protagonist of Vladimir Nabokov's 1929 novel, The Luzhin Defense, who commits suicide). She follows photos of her son's degeneration from moody toddler, to insomnia from the age of six, to his fear of wallpaper and pictures at the age of eight, to his special schooling by ten years old and, soon afterward, his disconnection with the outside world.
In the story's last section, the time is past midnight and the husband staggers into the living room, sleepless and in pain, to join his wife. The couple decide, bravely, to remove their son from the hospital and care for him at home, each intending to give up part of the night to watch him in his bedroom. Then the phone rings: a wrong number. When it rings a second time, the wife carefully explains to the same caller how she must have misdialed. The husband and wife sit down to their midnight tea. Their son's unopened birthday present shares the table with their cups. The phone rings for the third time; the story ends. Its signs and symbols suggest, in all likelihood, that this last call is from the sanitarium to announce that their son has finally succeeded in escaping this world.
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