A Farewell to Arms

A Farewell to Arms is a terrific and thought provoking novel written by Ernest Hemingway. It tells the somewhat story of love, death, and war that is based on Hemingway's actual war experience in the first world war. The book was published in 1929 but not in published in Italy until 1948 because the way Hemingway depicted the Italian battles were seen as anti-militaristic by the Italian government and could have been detrimental to the war effort. Hemingway wrote no less than some thirty nine different endings to the novel until he picked the one he ended up with. What makes this book great, terrific, and probably his best novel, and best known work?

Well, the book describes three different things superbly. Love, war, and death. These themes permeate the literature of the western canon and Hemingway's depiction of the first world war is probably one of the best descriptions of war in the western canon. Especially modern warfare. Remember, when this came out in 1929 there was no realistic depiction of modern warfare in fiction. You end up really living the life of this soldier, how he gets wounded, how he falls in love, how he talks to and works with his officers. You get the feeling that this was really how it was on the battlefield. A lot of the off duty time of the officers was spent on drinking, drinking, and drinking. Alcohol appears in endless scene after scene and it permeates throughout Hemingway's life, continuously leading to his suffering. 

Another important theme was love. We get the feeling at first that our young Frederic Henry is wounded and just wants a girl to pass the time until his recovery. What instead happens is that he falls in love with her, but is it really love? The circumstances of war were excruciatingly difficult especially with his war wound [a shell hit him in the leg], not to mention his surgery to his knee. So what we have is a wounded soldier and a lonely nurse. It's a match made in heaven. 

Lastly, it must be mentioned the theme of death. Death appears many times. A fellow friend and officer gets shot down out of nowhere for no reason, but when Frederic and another officer go out into the open, nobody shoots them, and they walk past both German and Italian soldiers unmolested. 

Now, the most striking part of this book for me was the ending. The nurse is pregnant and gives birth but nearly dies. Frederic hates the baby and states within himself, "I care nothing of fatherhood of it, it nearly killed its mother," which goes back to the Greeks, the idea of the father hating the son because he could take his place in the patriarch of the family. However, in this case I prefer to see it as Hemingway's allegory for war, meaning that war is a ghastly nihilism, no good will ever come of it, it brings only evil and destruction and misery. To add insult to injury, the baby ends up dying and our young father is relieved. 

That ending knocked my socks off because although it seems simple I found it to be philosophical, a display of existentialism in fiction format. It's an ending I will never forget. Something sort of like what Tolstoy did with War and Peace, it was a fictional novel but parts of it translated into philosophy, at least in my viewing. Obviously you can make the case that Hemingway's take on war is that it is terrible and must be eradicated at all costs. Although the first 140 pages focus on the romance, the rest of the novel is thrilling, moving, and mindful. A must read for the western canon, a must read Hemingway, a must read war novel, and a must read novel for all. 

Want more Hemingway? Check out my blog post about Hemingway's Spanish American war novel For Whom The Bell Tolls https://ofigueroamusic.blogspot.com/2019/03/for-whom-bell-tolls.html.

For Whom the Bell Tolls

For Whom the Bell Tolls is a novel that came out in 1940, written by Ernest Hemingway. The story is about a young American named Robert Jordan, who works as a dynamiter on his sabbatical away from college [where he works as a Spanish professor], in a Republican guerilla unit in the Spanish Civil War. His mission is to blow up a bridge. The novel is regarded as one of Hemingway's best works, along with The Sun Also Rises, A Farewell to Arms, and The Old Man and the Sea. [Wiki]

However, the cast of characters that are suppose to be helping Robert Jordan with blowing up the bridge are untrained, unschooled rebels, with their own plans on whats to happen. It takes all of Jordan's skills to get them all to work together. He meets young Maria, who after three days and three nights becomes the love of his life. Pilar is an older woman who mocks Jordan, but ultimately ends up letting Maria end up loving him. Pablo is rebel with bad intentions but in the end pulls through for the team. Anselmo is the star of the novel other than Jordan. Anselmo is this older man who dies blowing up the bridge. 

The literary style here is highly stylized. This is one of the best novels I've ever read. The prose can be very simple. Sentences start off extremely short and simplistic. Later on, as the novel develops, the style gets more complex. Especially with the dialogue of the characters. At some point Hemingway ditches exposition for complete dialogue between the characters. What the characters say is quite simple but how they say it is where things get interesting. The characters speak Spanish and have a very formal and noble way of speaking [they say thou, thee, and thy when speaking]. That is until they start cursing. However, Hemingway never uses a single curse word throughout the novel. Rather, he has the characters saying things like, "I obscenity in the milk of thy mothers". Rather than say fuck, at one point at the end we have these endless sentences where the word muck is used over and over. Also at the end, there are endless sentences that describe the inner mind of Robert Jordan, knowing that he is probably going to die and that the three days and three nights he spent on the mountains with rebels were the best days of his life. This style has been endlessly copied because its so great. 

The novel touches on a couple themes. Death for one thing.  Camaraderie and sacrifice in the face of death is another. Suicide always looms in the backyard as a way out if they get trapped. There's also exploration of political ideology and the nature of bigotry. Divination appears as an alternative in perception. Pilar [Pablo's woman] is a reader of hands and more. She claims to know things that are superstitious. 

The imagery is powerful. The automatic weapon is a strong visual element. Hemingway uses the fear of modern weaponry to destroy the romantic notions of war. Likewise, the fascist planes bombing on the characters is a sign that all is lost. There's also the soil and the earth. Jordan and Maria have sex in a meadow and then afterwards he asks María, "Did thee feel the earth move?", to which she responds affirmatively. Variants of this phrase have become a cultural cliché, often used humorously. [Wiki]

Hemingway has become a symbol of macho male charisma in the literary world. He influenced generations of American writers. He helped create the great American voice in novels. In this novel it shows. The hardness of war is so strong here that I would argue that this novel is very tough-minded, not for the thin-skinned. This is a manly novel. Even the aspect of love is manly, for Jordan knows that his love was just a three day affair. The fact that he knows he is going to die is existential and philosophical. This book is heavy. 

At nearly 500 pages this book is long. However, the prose flows effortlessly because of well written prose and challenging characters. You'll find that the book reads itself in a way.

The book is named after a poem by metaphysical poet John Donne- Meditation XVII. Hemingway quotes a section of the poem at the end of the novel. Here it is below.

No man is an Island, intire of it selfe; every man is a peece of the Continent, a part of the maine; if a Clod bee washed away by the Sea, Europe is the lesse, as well as if a Promontorie were, as well as if a Mannor of thy friends or of thine owne were; any mans death diminishes me, because I am involved in Mankinde; And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; It tolls for thee.