Signs and Symbols - Interpretations

Interpretations

In a letter to Katharine White, Nabokov said that "Signs and Symbols", like "The Vane Sisters", was a story "wherein a second (main) story is woven into, or placed behind, the superficial semitransparent one." He did not say what the main story was.

Some critics have argued the story's many details can be deciphered into a message—for instance that the son has committed suicide, or that he is in an afterlife and free from his torments, or that the third phone call is from him, saying that he has escaped from the asylum. However, the predominant interpretation is that the story inveigles the reader into an attempt at deciphering the details and thus "over-reading", which is "another, milder form of referential mania".