Seymour Glass is a fictional character in several of J. D. Salinger's short stories. He is the oldest brother in the Glass Family (the protagonists of the stories in which they appeared). A poet influenced by Taoism and Vedanta philosophy, Seymour — in typical Salinger style — was deeply intellectual and precocious.
Childhood
Seymour's closest family member was his younger brother Buddy, who is the narrator of most of the stories about Seymour. Buddy always greatly admired his elder brother, even identifying him as the most intelligent and the "undefeatable champion talker" of the group. All of the children regularly appeared on the radio show "It's a Wise Child" under the pseudonym "Black." But it was only during Seymour's main days on the show (as Billy Black) that the question-and-answer format was changed primarily to a panel discussion.
Adulthood
Seymour was married in June 1942 to his girlfriend Muriel. He was often accused, especially by his in-laws, of not relating to anyone and of being slightly anti-social. On one occasion, when asked by his future mother-in-law as to what he saw himself doing after the end of World War II, he responded by saying that he'd like to be a dead cat. This worried Muriel and her mother, though he later had the opportunity to clarify the remark's ties to a belief in Zen Buddhism, specifically that a dead cat is the most valuable of all things because it cannot be given a price. More seriously, Muriel's family had considerable doubts about Seymour's sanity, believing him to be schizoid and a latent homosexual. To appease his wife and her family, Seymour agreed to be psychoanalysed, which his youngest brother Zooey believed may have led to his death. Seymour committed suicide while he was on vacation with his wife in Florida in 1948, as detailed in the story "A Perfect Day for Bananafish", after an encounter with a young girl named Sybil. The same story indicates that there was an incident in which Seymour attempted to drive his in-law's car into a tree. His participation in the "It's a Wise Child" program was considered by his wife's matron of honor to be a key cause/indicator of his mental instability.
Appearances
Seymour looms large in many of the stories in the Glass family saga, notably Raise High The Roof Beam, Carpenters, Seymour: An Introduction, Franny and Zooey. The last published Salinger story Hapworth 16, 1924 (The New Yorker, June 19, 1965), is the only published story to be written in Seymour's first person narrative, and it records his experiences at camp as a seven-year-old.
