Set in World War I, narrated by an ambulance driver on the Italian front who gets injured and falls in love with a nurse. I did not get very far- just past the part where he was wounded and in the hospital, about sixty pages. Then started to wonder why am I using up my time reading this? I thought I could see what the author was doing- showing how casual people kept their attachments when anyone might die senselessly at any moment, how pointless the war was, how inane their conversations- but I found nothing artful in the way he did it. The dialog particularly felt very stiff. I suppose the style was intended to be the way things were, but it was hard to stay interested in the words. So brief and matter-of-fact and unemotional. I couldn’t find it in me to care about any of the characters, and I wasn’t drawn into the surroundings or events either. Another case where a classic falls totally flat for me. I think I just really do not like Hemingway. I am baffled why he is considered a great writer- honestly. Even more baffled why this edition contains not only visual reproductions of his handwritten manuscript with crossed out lines and rewritten passages- so readers can admire how he crafted the novel- but also a myraid of alternate endings in the appendix (like movie outtakes, haha). I do like studying preliminary sketches by artists- sometimes I feel like I can see how their mind was thinking to lay down certain lines- and often I even like the sketches better than the finished paintings! but reading how phrases were different before the writer committed to his final draft, I get nothing from that. Probably because I didn’t care for the final product, here.
Borrowed from the public library.
2 Responses
What a strange edition of A Farewell to Arms…not one of my favorite books of his. My personal opinion is that Hemingway was as much a “celebrity” as he was a “writer.” His generation included a few of those, I think. I do think that he’s still worth reading even, though, and The Old Man and the Sea is one of my favorites of his. Too, Hemingway seems to be one of those guys who bring out strong emotions in both his fans and his detractors…not many in between.
I admit I did like The Old Man and the Sea when I read it in high school. In college years I read For Whom the Bell Tolls and it’s still on my shelf- awaiting a re-read someday- I appreciated it then. But I have tried A Moveable Feast, The Sun Also Rises, Green Hills of Africa and now A Farewell to Arms- without getting very far. I doubt I will try anymore anytime soon.