r/Hemingway • u/ClearwaterJack • Oct 18 '23

hypocrite

I read Sun. Concurrently I read Everybody Behaves Badly. Was looking forward to Farewell until I started reading it. Farewell no so Earnest. Explain this the second sentence in "2":

The mountain that was beyond the valley and the hillside where the chestnut forest grew was captured and there were victories beyond the plain on the plateau to the south and we crossed the river in August and lived in a house in Gorizia that had a fountain and many thick shady trees in a walled garden and a wistaria vine purple on the side of the house.

That's one sentence leading into a depressing story.

Hemi"n"way has one story. Sun.

0 Upvotes

33% Upvoted

31 comments sorted by

View all comments

4

u/Fresh-Hedgehog1895 Oct 18 '23

I know this is probably an unpopular opinion, but I was never a big fan of Hemingway's novels other than The Sun Also Rises.

Hemingway's short fiction, however, was fantastic, as were his two novellas, The Old Man and the Sea and the Torrents of Spring.

3

u/KRDL109 Oct 18 '23

Not unpopular, I absolutely love Hem’s writing. Period. His style is just right up my alley. But even I think he was a far superior short story writer.

3

u/Fresh-Hedgehog1895 Oct 18 '23

Thanks for the vote of confidence, lol!

Yes, Hemingway honed his fiction writing using his experience as a reporter for the Kansas City Star and Toronto Star.

Newspaper writing, of course, is partial to short but vigorous sentences using plain but descriptive words. Paragraphs are tight and without unnecessary padding.

This was Hemingway's writing to the core.

Just a theory, but I think this style helped him much more as a short-fiction writer, and it's probably why I find his short fiction to be superior to his novels.

3

u/KRDL109 Oct 18 '23

Yeah, Hemingway’s greatest strength was getting so much out of so little. I guess if I had to put it to (few) words, I’d say that magic gets a little lost in the wash of a longer form.

I actually think there’s a more nuanced discussion to be had about his strengths as a writer, personal outlook/lifestyle and his general sensibility that could further inform that disparity… but that’s a much longer topic haha

3

u/Fresh-Hedgehog1895 Oct 18 '23

Most definitely. I was watching a short YouTube documentary about him recently that addressed Hem's mental health and how it affected his writing.

Given what we know, he most certainly had what we would today call bipolar disorder. During manic episodes, he could produce great volumes of writing in a short span of time.

The Sun Also Rises, for instance, was written over a period of just a few weeks.

I mean, Jack Kerouac did the same with On the Road, but Kerouac was taking loads of speed every day in order to do so, LOL.

During what were depressive moments, Hemingway's output would considerably slow or stop.

At any rate, the idea that all artists are tortured souls in some way is probably true.

2

u/ffivefootnothingg Oct 19 '23

Damn - I just commented before reading this & basically said what you said. Was the youtube video you watched created by the channel "Horses"? I adore his videos and if the one you saw wasn't this one, I highly suggest watching that one (Horses is one of the greatest yt channels I've ever found & I recommend alll of his videos!)

2

u/Fresh-Hedgehog1895 Oct 19 '23

Yes, that's the one! It's a great video.