Ernest Hemingway

1
Ernest Hemingway
1899 -1961
2
Life

• born in Oak Park, Illinois (near Chicago)
• father a successful physician, middle class,
  love fishing and hunting mother music teacher
• a happy childhood a lover of brutal sports, such
  as boxing and football in middle school
• Though his father hoped him to be a physician,
  Hemingway refused to enter university. He chose
  to be a reporter.
• During WWI, he wanted to join the army but was
  refused because of his poor eyesight. Then
  Hemingway came to Italy to work as an ambulance
  driver. He was seriously wounded in the
  battlefield. The nightmarish war experience
  changed his life.

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Life

• After the war, he still worked as a reporter. He
  was sent to Paris and was encouraged to write.
• He also worked as a war reporter in the Spanish
  Civil War and WWII.
• He was a tough guy.
• Loved tough games boxing, hunting, deep-sea
  fishing, bullfighting.
• He was injured many times. In all the
  operations, 237 steel fragments were taken out
  from Hemingways body. He also suffered 3 car
  accidents and 2 air crushes. He was admired as a
  hero by many people.
• In 1961, Hemingway shot himself with a gun in his
  home.

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Works

• The Sun Also Rises 1926
• the life of a generation after WWI
• A Farewell to Arms 1928
• a tragic story about war and love
• For Whom the Bell Tolls 1940
• Spanish civil war - also about war and love

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Works

• The Old Man and the Sea 1952
• In 1954, Hemingway won the Nobel Prize

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Themes

• Common theme of his novels grace under
  pressure
• Hemingway heroes a noble but tragic hero
  fighting with the overwhelming force though he
  knows that he will be defeated at last, he
  decides to act like a hero

7
His Writing
Iceberg principle
1
Code hero
2
Emphasis on Emotion
3
Colloquial style
4
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Iceberg principle

• I always try to write on the principle of the
  iceberg. There is seven-eighths of it underwater
  for every part that shows. Anything you know you
  can eliminate and it only strengthens your
  iceberg. It is the part that doesn't show. If a
  writer omits something because he does not know
  it then there is a hole in the story.

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Code hero

• The Hemingway Code of manhood does not involve
  mere physical strength, sexual potency, or
  ability to accumulate (or spend) wealth.
• According to this code, a man is defined by will,
  pride, and endurance the endurance to accept
  pain, even loss-when the loss cannot be avoided
  the pride of knowing that one has done one's
  best, with the courage to act truly according to
  one's own nature and the will to face defeat or
  victory without whining on one hand or boasting
  on the other.

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Emphasis on Emotion

• He was interested in conveying a deep emotional
  feeling. He did have some realistic techniques,
  but on the whole he was not like the realistic
  writers because he was more interested in
  conveying his personal emotion.
• This the goal of many modernist writers ---
  recreate the feelings of the situation or
  experience in the reader, arouse an involuntary
  subjective response.

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Colloquial style

• influence from Mark Twain and his journalist
  career
• Concrete, specific, common words
• Simple, short sentences
• Direct, clear and positive style, yet highly
  connotative
• The Nobel Prize Committee praised Hemingways
  powerful style forming mastery of the art.