Hemingway

Ernest Hemingway (1899-1961) Arguably the most influential writer of our century. Ernest Hemingway is a giant figure in both America and Europe. His career spans 4 decades.

His Early Life

• Born and raised in Oak Park, Illinois, one of six children • Father: successful doctor. He taught his son how to be the ultimate outdoorsman. However, he took the more submissive role in his marriage. Father eventually committed suicide. • Mother: a music teacher. Strained relationship with Ernest. Took the more dominant role in the marriage.

Early Career • Began writing career as a reporter at the Kansas City Star after high school • Served as an ambulance driver and infantry soldier with the Italian army when an eye problem kept him out of the US Army.

The Lost Generation: • A large group of expatriate writers in Europe, including: Gertrude Stein, Sherwood Anderson, Ezra Pound and F. Scott Fitzgerald • The "Lost Generation" defines a sense of moral loss or aimlessness apparent in literary figures during the 1920s. World War I seemed to have destroyed the idea that if you acted virtuously, good things would happen. Many good, young men went to war and died, or returned home either physically or mentally wounded and their faith in the moral guideposts that had earlier given them hope, were no longer valid. • These literary figures also criticized American culture in creative fictional stories which had the themes of self-exile, indulgence (care-free living) and spiritual alienation.

Hemingway defined the Code Hero as "a man who lives correctly, following the ideals of honor, courage and endurance in a world that is sometimes chaotic, often stressful, and always painful." • The "code" dictates that the hero act honorably in the midst of what will be a losing battle. In doing so he finds fulfillment: he becomes a man or proves his manhood and his worth. The phrase "grace under pressure" is often used to describe the conduct of the code hero. • The Code Hero is typically an individualist and free-willed. He never shows emotions; showing emotions and having a commitment to women shows weakness. Qualities such as bravery, being adventuresome and travelling often also define the Code Hero. • One should court death, in the bull ring, on the battlefield, against big fish, because facing death teaches us how to live.

Code Hero Continued… • Hemingway man was a man’s man: involved in a great deal of drinking, moved from one love affair to another, who participated in wild game hunting, who enjoyed bullfights, who was involved in all of the so-called manly activities • “Don’t let’s talk about it.” After he has performed some act of bravery he will not discuss it. Talking is emotionalism; it is the action that is important. If you talk about the act too much you lose the importance of the act itself. He is man of action rather than a man of theory. • He will often stay awake at nighttime and sleep all during the day--sleep itself is a type of obliteration of the consciousness. Night is a difficult time for it symbolizes the utter darkness that man will have to face after death. Therefore the code hero will avoid nighttime. This will be the time he will drink or carouse or stay awake.

Grace Under Pressure • He never toyed with minor themes. He wrote of life and death, of time and towns (which he called cities), and of the courage he liked to call "grace under pressure." • He put his characters in situations where society had already broken down. He pictured the social order as disorder, a kind of natural catastrophe like a river in flood. The individual could save himself only by relying on himself. • Hemingway man must have fear of death, but he must not be afraid to die. He must not show that he is afraid or trembling or frightened in the presence of death.

Hemingway Style • “One true sentence…” was Hemingway’s mantra • Rejected big words as being false to experience.

• He also employed a technique by which he left out essential information of the story in the belief that omission can sometimes strengthen the plot of the novel. • He cut out the adjectives and prompting words that tell a reader how to feel and replaced them with spare, brisk monosyllables that he called the "ugly short infantry of the mind." Hemingway spliced his images together like a film editor so that the action was always advancing on the reader rather than the reader following the action.

Height of Career • Won Pulitzer Prize in 1953 for The Old Man and the Sea • Won Nobel Prize for Literature in 1954 • Other famous works include: The Sun Also Rises, A Farewell to Arms, The Snows of Kilimanjaro, For Whom the Bell Tolls, among others.

In His Writing, Hemingway Taught Us: • About war…in particular, trauma—the pain and damage to the body, as well as the dignity and courage of men • About sports…hunting, fishing, skiing, bullfighting, boxing—a confrontation with pain. Opportunity for Grace Under Pressure. • About foreign cities…like Paris, San Sebastian, Pamplona, etc.

Hemingway “Curve” moves from fresh, spare, tight-lipped early prose of the 1920’s—focusing on hunting, fishing, boxing, bullfighting, war, love, and death—to an increasingly soft, prose that seeks to recapture his original greatness.

End of career • Seriously injured in a plane crash in Africa and never fully recovered his mental health or productivity. • Committed suicide in 1961 after years of suffering from despair and paranoia.

Life After Death • He believes in "Nada," a Spanish word meaning nothing. Along with this, there is no after life. • If man cannot accept a life or reward after death, the emphasis must then be on obtaining or doing or performing something in this particular life. If death ends all activity, if death ends all knowledge and consciousness, man must seek his reward here, now, immediately. Consequently, the Hemingway man exists in a large part for the gratification of his sensual desires (eating, drinking, sex), he will devote himself to all types of physical pleasures because these are the reward of this life.