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Hemingway’s literature by Philipp Hiebinger

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It is very essential to know about the most important facts of Hemingway’s biography, because almost all his
stories have autobiographical aspects.
His main attitudes in his works are: the attitudes of tight-lipped and stoical disillusionment in a world of senseless
and sudden violence, the absence of faith but the cultivation of composure (Gelassenheit), the code of
understatement, wry(schief,verzerrt) sardonic(zynisch), wit (Verstand) and a slightly self-pitying ‘toughness’
(leichte selbstbemitleidende Härte) .

Ernest Miller Hemingway was born on July 21

st

, 1899, in Oak Park, near Chicago. He lived there with his father,

MD Clarence E. Hemingway and his mother Grace Hemingway.

His father was a special person, above all because of one fact: he had the ability to move his eyes faster and to
see over bigger distances more clearly than other human beings. Because of this fact he was a very nervous
person, who was very sensitive and faster agitated(aufgeregt) than any other human being. From his childhood
on and during his whole life his heritage(Erbe) had a great impact on Ernest. So he got from his father the
unmistakable inclination(Neigung) to sentimentality and above all to his frightening, almost tragic loneliness,
which drove Clarence Hemingway to commit suicide.

His mother Grace had the same bold(mutige) energy and aesthetic sensitiveness as Ernest.

Every summer Hemingway’s family drove up to Walloon Lake in North Michigan and stayed there until autumn.
There far away from any form of civilisation, his very close relation to nature, which you can find in all of his
books, began to develop.

Ernest visited Oak Park High school, a very respected school. There he was a pupil who achieved sporting
performances just as well as studying seriously.
In 1915 he began to write seriously, at first only for his own and then he detected(bemerkte) his abilities and
developed them. Ernest started to write for a school magazine, sometimes he even wrote three articles in one
issue.
In this time, at the age of 17, he wrote some short stories being inspired by Jack London. For most of these
stories he digested(verwendete) the memory of his days in North Michigan.

After he had passed the final exam, he didn’t go to University as he had planned, but he became a reporter for the
‘Kansas City Star’, which even nowadays is one of the best newspapers in the United States. There Hemingway
learned to obey the famous 110 style-rules:
“The best rules I have ever learned for the craft(Fertigkeit) of writing. I have never forgotten them. Everyone
who has got a little talent, who feels and writes honestly about the things he wants to express, inevitably has to
write good things, if he keeps to these rules.” (Ernest Hemingway)

At the Star the reporters were forced to write simple and explanatory(erklärend) sentences. Some of the style-
rules said: Build short sentences! Write a short introduction! Use powerful English! And so did Hemingway as
his literature proofs.

When the first World War started Ernest wanted to take part but because of his glasses he only could do service
at the ‘Red Cross Ambulance Corps’. He became a driver of an ambulance at the Piave front in Italy where he

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suffered his famous traumatic wound. He spent three months in a hospital in Milan, was awarded with a medal
and had an unsuccessful love-affair.

Hemingway’s youth ended in 1921 when he, as a foreign correspondent of the ‘Toronto Star’, and his young wife
Hadley boarded a ship to Europe. They settled down in Paris. There Hemingway got into the circle of Gertrude
Stein and Ezra Pound, both having a pessimistic literary basic attitude. Gertrude Stein coined(prägte) the
expression ‘lost generation’ for the generation of the first World War. Hemingway was a very active member of
the Parisian-American literary scene and in these days he had the most creative and hectic years.
More and more the author Ernest Hemingway got the upper hand over the journalist Ernest Hemingway. His first
book ‘The sun also rises’, published in 1926, was a great success.
Because of his books he got rich and seemed outwardly satisfied, but inwardly Hemingway was full of
restlessness and love of adventure. Because of this, in 1933, he and his wife started a four months’ trip through
Africa. But after one month this safari was interrupted by a disease of Ernest. He was brought to hospital in
Nairobi where he first saw the snows of Kilimanjaro. The memory of this made him write ‘The Snows of
Kilimanjaro’.

During the Spanish Civil War Hemingway returned to his role as a reporter becoming war correspondent in
Spain. There he met the whole cruelty(Grausamkeit) of a war. His impressions of this war he digested in the
novel ‘For Whom The Bell Tolls’.

In 1954 Hemingway received the Nobel Prize of literature.

On July 2

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at 7 a.m., Ernest Hemingway went downstairs in his house in Ketchum to take his favourite gun,

which was specially made for him. He put the two barrels into his mouth and pulled the trigger.
The thoughts of the suicide of his father probably contributed to his decision as much as the perpetual desire to
have power over life and death.
Until today it isn’t totally clear if it has been an accident or suicide, but everyone supposes that it was suicide.

On the gravestone of a citizen of Ketchum, who died in a hunting accident is something written, that could just as
well have been written on the grave of Ernest Hemingway: “He returned to the hills he loved and he will be a part
of them forever.”

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This book contains 18 very different ‘short stories’:


The snows of Kilimanjaro:

This is the story of a person called Harry who is on a safari through Africa with his wife. He injures himself and
his wound becomes infected, but the cars of the expedition team run out of gas and so they are stuck in the desert
waiting for a plane to rescue them. Harry feels that he must die and insults(beleidigen) his wife to tell her his true
feelings. His wife Helen is very rich and he tells her that only her damned money was his amour. He complains
that the rich society has dulled(beschränkt) his ability to write and work. Despite the insulting his wife again
confesses her love for him and tries to comfort him that soon the plane will come and rescue him. But Harry
knows that he has to die, he feels tired and begins to reflect upon his former life, his numerous relations with
women and his time in the war being sorry that he doesn’t have the time to write about so many things he wanted
to write. He falls asleep and dreams of the plane coming to rescue him and during the flight he sees the snow
lying on the top of Kilimanjaro. As he dies he knows that this is the place he is going to.

This story is based on the experience of the author during a safari in Africa. In these days he felt sick with
dysentery(Ruhr), a disease most of the people died of in former days because there were no antibiotics. On the
flight to hospital Hemingway saw the snow-covered top of the Kilimanjaro for the first time. The author digested
his memory of this to the story ‘The snows Kilimanjaro’. Hemingway’s alter ego Harry, the main character of the
story has made all experiences of the author - the war, numerous relationships with women, ...
Harry's suffer is that he isn’t sure if he married his wife only because of the money. His second suffer is that he
has stopped to write about the real goods of life.
The two main actions are the quarrel between Harry and his husband and the flash-backs which are coined by the
experiences of the author, above all in Europe. These flash-backs have their tragic meanings because of the fact,
that Harry realises that there were so many worth-writing events in all these years and he neglected to write about
them.
Hemingway describes very authentically the life-threatening situation in which Harry begins to reflect upon his
former life and the things he has forgotten to do or he wanted to do in the future.
At the end of the story Hemingway uses a very beautiful picture for heaven - the impressing view of the snow-
covered top of Kilimanjaro.

Up in Michigan:

This is story of Jim Gilmore who comes to Horton’s Bay to become blacksmith and Liz Coates who falls in love
with him. But Liz is too shy to confess her feelings. After a party Jim is drunken and asks Liz to go for a walk
with him. So they walk to the harbour and Jim wants to make love with her, but during the sexual intercourse Jim
falls asleep.

This short story deals with the relationship between a man, Jim and a woman Liz. It shows a very pessimistic
view of life because Liz is very disappointed by her desire for Jim who falls asleep when they make love. It could
also be an allusion(Bezugnahme) to the author’s unsuccessful love-affair during the First World War and it could
reflect the negative basic attitude of the ‘lost generation’, which is coined by Gertrude Stein who had a great
influence on the author. In this story the experience of being tested is presented like in many other stories by
Hemingway.

Indian Camp:

Nick, his father who is a doctor and his uncle George go to an Indian camp to help an Indian woman to get her
baby. But there are complications during the birth and his father has to make a Caesarean using a normal knife.
He does the operation successfully but as they want to leave they find the father of the baby who has cut his

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throat because he couldn’t stand the crying and the pain of his wife. The doctor apologises to his son for taking
him to the camp.

The doctor and the doctor’s wife:

Nick’s father gets in a quarrel with an Indian worker who says that the wood they have to prepare for his father
has been stolen. Nick’s father gets so angry that he leaves them going home. He takes out his shotgun and goes
for a walk with Nick.

Both short stories ‘Indian camp’ and ‘The doctor and the doctor’s wife’ are very autobiographical and digest the
experiences of the author of his childhood when he spent his summer in Walloon Lake in the nature near an
Indian camp.
In ‘Indian camp’ Nick, the alter ego of Hemingway, is observing how a new life is born and how his father, the
doctor, is helping the new life to get into the world. But the happy event of the birth is overshadowed by the
tragic suicide of his father who couldn’t cope with the pain and danger of the birth. The suicide alludes to the
suicide of Hemingway’s father who also committed suicide.
‘The doctor and the doctor’s wife’ is also an autobiographical story in which the author describes his father the
doctor.

The end of something:

Nick and his girlfriend Marjorie row out to an island to fish. During the trip they begin to quarrel and Nick
confesses that he doesn't love her anymore. Marjorie leaves him and Nick is sad.

In this story Hemingway’s alter ego ends a relationship with his girl-friend. The author could have digested his
many experiences and his various relationships with women in this story.

The three day blow:

Nick visits his friend Bill who is alone at home. They enjoy themselves talking about baseball, about their
favourite literature and their fathers. During their conversation they get drunken of whiskey. Nick also talks about
his relationship with Marjorie which has ended. Later they decide to go hunting.

In this story Hemingway once again reflects through his alter ego about literature, sports and his father.

The battler:

Nick goes away from home on a train. As he gets off the train nowhere, he catches sight of a fire. He heads for
the fireplace, where an ugly looking man is sitting who was a fighter in former times. The fighter is crazy but
Nick starts a conversation with him. Later-on the friend of the fighter, a black man called Bugs, comes. They all
eat together ham and scrambled eggs. As Nick wants to cut off a slice of bread with his knife the crazy fighter
asks him to hand it to him. Bugs warns him not to hand it to him. But now the fighter gets angry and wants to
fight with Nick. But Bugs hits him on the head and he goes down losing his consciousness(Bewußtsein).
Excusing for his friend he advises Nick to leave the place before the fighter returns to consciousness.

In this story the author’s fascination for fighters and the character of the fighter, which is typical for Hemingway
and his tragic fate(Schicksal) (in former times he was successful now he is crazy because of the many punches he
had to take) is presented.

Soldier’s home:

This is the story of Krebs a soldier who returns home a few years after the end of the First World War. But he
doesn’t feel good in his home town. Nobody congratulates him and there is no solemn (feierlich) welcome. He
can’t gain(gain) foothold in his home town after so many years of war after having stayed abroad. So his parents
are concerned about his future and want him to get a job to marry a girl and to settle down. Krebs has lost his
bearings(Orientierung) and doesn’t want to fulfil the plans of his parents.

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In 'Soldier’s home' the author also tells us about his life. In this story the tragic fate of a very sensitive soldier,
who can’t live a normal life after the cruelties he has experienced during the war, is described. It could be an
allusion to Hemingway digesting his feelings after the war.

The revolutionist:

The story is about a shy Magyar who is travelling through Italy trying to convince his friends of the world
revolution. He has suffered under the fascist aggression. Leaving Italy he gets imprisoned in Switzerland.

Mr and Mrs Elliot:

This story is the description of the relationship between Mr and Mrs Elliot. The married couple has one big
desire namely to have a baby. They try it very intensively but they have no success. So they start for a journey
through Europe. In France Mr Elliot buys a Chateau where the couple settles down. Mrs Elliot invites her best
girlfriend to live with her and Mr Elliot starts to write poems and to enjoy excellent white wines. Both are very
happy and satisfied with their lives.

In this story Hemingway describes the desire of a couple for having a baby substituting it by other things (such as
the relation to a friend or working on literature) when not being able to fulfil this desire.

The cat in the rain:

An American couple is living in a hotel in Italy. It is raining outside and the man is reading a book. His wife is
looking out of the window watching the rain. She catches sight of a cat getting wet through the rain drops. She
wants to stroke it and hold it in her arms so she goes downstairs and looks for the cat. A chambermaid of the
hotel follows her with an umbrella. Not being able to find the cat she returns disappointedly to her room
complaining to her husband that she leads an unhappy life. Suddenly somebody knocks at the door. It is the
chambermaid holding the wet cat in her arms saying that the hotel keeper had asked her to bring this for the lady.

Cross-country snow:

Nick and his friend George are skiing downhill through a wonderful winter landscape. They have much fun and
finally enter an inn. In the inn a pregnant waitress is serving who reminds Nick of his girlfriend Helen who also
gets a baby. Nick and Helen will go back to the United States but they don’t really want to. George thinks that
this will be the last time they will go skiing together but Nick says that they have to go skiing again.

My old man:

This story is the description of a father given by his son. He describes the intense relationship between his father
and him: that they go jogging together to keep the weight down or that they attend horse races where his father
gets tips of the winners. Once his father himself starts in a horse race and his son watches him excitedly. But
during the race his father falls from the horse and dies.

In ‘My old man’ the author describes the intense relationship between a father and his son. But tragically the
father is taken from the son through his unexpected death. This might be an allusion to the suicide of
Hemingway’s father.

Big two - hearted river I:

This is the story of Nick who goes hiking through a burnt landscape. Tired from his long walk, he makes a camp
pitching(aufschlagen) his tent. Nick makes a fire where he boils water for his coffee and cooks beans and
spaghetti. Then he crawls into his tent to sleep.

Big two-hearted river II:

This is the sequel of part I. The next day Nick gets up in the morning and tries to catch grasshoppers as bait.
After having caught some he goes to the river for fishing. There he catches a very big trout(Forelle) which
breaks off his fishing rod(Angelrute). Thinking of another way to catch this big fish, he uses a trap in the water.
Finally he gets the trout and enjoys his success.

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Summary:
The old man and the sea is a novella, that is a long short story and is not divided into chapters or numbered
sections.
The story is about Santiago, an old Cuban fisherman who hasn’t caught a fish for eighty-four days. Because of his
bad luck Manolin, a little boy and Santiago’s friend who helped him on the boat, isn’t allowed to go fishing with
him anymore. So he goes out alone and tries to stop his run of bad luck by catching a big fish. Actually Santiago
catches a fish, bigger than his boat and because of the great dimensions and strength the fish pulls the boat
heading north. Santiago has to bear the whole weight of the fish by a line around his back. The old man
endures(erträgt) much pain and has to do with little sleep and food. For three days and two nights he has to bear
this situation. In this time Santiago begins to reflect upon his former life, upon the fish which now he calls
‘brother’ and upon nature. He dreams of lions on the coasts of Africa and is angry that he didn’t take the boy
Manolin with him whose help he could need now. But the fish also gets exhausted and on the third day Santiago
gets the fish close enough to the boat to drive his harpoon into the fish’s side. It leaps once with a crash of spray
and is dead. Even now there is labour for Santiago who has to lash the fish’s body alongside the boat. But the
blood of the fish attracts sharks which are attacking the dead fish. The old man fights against them but only the
skeleton of the fish arrives at the harbour. Santiago is very sad because there was a close relationship between
him and the fish. He lumbers to his shack and falls asleep dreaming his dream of Africa and the lions.


Characters:

Santiago:

He is old and poor; he reminisces(sich errinnern) and has his dreams, like most old men. He is
dignified(würdevoll), patient, modest and physically powerful. He has feelings of tenderness and pity - for
example for the boy, for birds, for the fish he catches. He respects the sea and the things of the sea. Santiago is
both active and contemplative(besinnlich). Sometimes he is able to stand outside his practical life and see it in
larger terms. Santiago shows a kind of pride that is almost theatrical at times, and that we might identify as being
characteristically ‘Spanish’. He is made individual, but he also embodies(Ausdruck verleihen) different kinds of
types:
something of the literary type - the daring(waghalsig) folk-hero slaying a sea-monster
the human type - the old fisherman who has seen much, is closer to nature than other people


Manolin:

The boy Manolin is a type too, not an individual. He is the faithful apprentice(Lehrnende), who looks after the
old man, studies his ways and embodies hope for the future.



Source:
The main events of the story seem to have been based on a real incident, described by Hemingway in an article
about fishing in the Gulf Stream in Esquire for April 1936:

Another time an old man fishing alone in a skiff(Einer) out of Cabanas hooked(haken) a great marlin that, on the
heavy handline, pulled the skiff far out to sea. Two days later the old man was picked up by fishermen sixty miles
to the eastward, the head and forward part of the marlin lashed alongside. What was left of this fish, less than

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half, weighed eight hundred pound. The old man had stayed with him a day, a night, a day and another night
while the fish swam deep and pulled the boat. When he had come up the old man had pulled the boat up on him
and harpooned him. Lashed alongside the sharks had hit him and the old man had fought them out alone in the
Gulf Stream in a skiff. He was crying in the boat when the fishermen picked him up, half crazy from his loss, and
the sharks were still circling the boat.

It is quite sure that the original old man has been Anselmo Hernandez, a local fisherman who was known to
Hemingway.

Interpretation:

Many critics discussed this work of Hemingway finding in it detailed Christian allegory, profound examination of
the problems of evil and suffering, existentialism, the quest for the Holy Grail and so on. It is no trivial story; but
it would be wrong to overload it with such solemn meanings. Hemingway himself wrote:

“ A serious writer is not to be confused with a solemn writer. A serious writer may be a hawk or a
buzzard, but a solemn writer is always a bloody owl.”

The story should be seen as a brilliantly simple and precise fiction.

Hemingway once described the intention in writing this story: “I tried to make a real old man, a real boy, a real
sea and a real fish and real sharks.” (Time, 13 December 1954)
Hemingway’s narration focuses on simple things and acts. He describes everything very realistically almost like a
photograph, but it is more than a photograph which only can show surfaces whereas the book is able to tell us the
“inner truth” of things and events. Hemingway also appeals to our senses, taste for example. He describes the
taste of beans and rice, with fried bananas; the taste of hot coffee out of a condensed-milk tin; the sweetness of
raw dolphin-flesh; the sweet, coppery taste of man’s own blood.
The use of colour is equally excellent. He demonstrates us how colours shift and change in their relationship.
”The clouds over the land now rose like mountains and the coast was only a long green line with the grey-blue
hill behind it. The water was a dark blue now, so dark that it was almost purple. As he looked down into it he
saw the red sifting of the plankton in the dark water and the strange light the sun made now.” (short extract of
page 27/28)

The use of colour like the use of taste, is never excessive and is used with economy.

Hemingway also emphasises touch and uses it skilfully in the episode where Santiago first hooks the fish. There
is a firm bond of touch between the old man and the fish that is only broken by the death of one. The beginning
of this firm relationship is marked in the following text:
”He reached out for the line and held it softly between the thumb and the forefinger of his right hand. He felt no
strain nor weight and he held the line lightly. Then it came again. This time it was a tentative pull, not solid nor
heavy, and he knew exactly what it was. One hundred fathoms down a marlin was eating the sardines...
... Eat them, fish. Eat them. Please eat them. How fresh they are and you down there six hundred feet in that cold
water in the dark. He felt the line delicately pulling and then a harder pull when a sardine’s head must have
been more difficult to break from the hook. Then there was nothing.
‘Come on,’ the old man said aloud. ‘Make another turn. Just smell them. Aren’t they lovely? Eat them good now
and then there is the tuna. Hard and cold and lovely. Don’t be shy, fish. Eat them.’”

In this text the amazing tense(Spannung) link between two worlds, the human world of sea-surface and light, and
the fish-world of blackness and cold, can be felt. Santiago communicated with the fish and when the sharks eat
the fish he feels as if the sharks ate a part of his own body.

Different feelings are also important elements of the story:

We find pity, admiration, a touch of nostalgia, anger, contempt(Verachtung) and many other feelings in this
story. Most of the feelings are controlled by the dominant experience of being tested. The reader shares in the
sense of certain human powers being stretched to the point of breaking. He fears himself, as he reads. He shares
in moments of relief(Erleichterung).

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There is one very important, characteristic and famous element in Hemingway’s literature - the language.
His training to become a reporter for the ‘Kansas City Star’ and its famous 110 style-rules had a great impact on
Hemingway’s language. There he was forced to write simple explanatory sentences.
His language avoids complicated syntax, and where it doesn’t use a simple, short sentence it connects the various
parts of the sentence in a straightforward, consecutive(aufeinaderfolgend) way, often linked by ‘and’. It uses
adjectives and abstract nouns sparingly, it focuses with intensity on specific details.




Here is an example of the language of ‘The old man and sea’:
He rested for what he believed to be two hours. the noon did not rise now until late and he had no way judging
the time. Nor was he really resting except comparatively. He was still bearing the pull of the fish across his
shoulders but he placed his left hand on the gunwale of the bow(Bug) and confided(anvertrauen) more and more
of resistance to the skiff itself.
His style makes us share in the story, it is the link between the reader and the story. In order to build up the world
of the figures in his literature more realistically he uses for example Spanish expressions in his novel about the
Spanish Civil War.
Hemingway’s language is famous for its uncomplicated style. The simple sentences and the repeated rhythms

take on a biblical note and hint(Hinweis

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at the profundities that the surface of the language tries to ignore. It

tells us to look with a new directness and clarity at life and it imposes itself as a distinct lens or filter between the
reader and what he observes.
In my opinion Hemingway really achieved to make the reader share in the story, to make him experience the
action of the book through his style of writing.


Literature:
Ernest Hemingway: The old man and the sea, Arrow Books
Ernest Hemingway: The snows of Kilimanjaro, Arrow Books
Secondary literature:
A. N. Jeffare/Suheil Bushrui: The old man and the sea, Longman literature guides
Georges-Albert Astre: Hemingway, Rowohlt