Your thoughts about Ernest Hemingway?

[milance2012]

Did any body see the relation of Old man and the see with Christianity? The importance of hope, because, what is it fate without hope? Isn't it hope with love the most powerful weapon and the most powerful instrumentality for salvation, for life in throughly enjoy and peace of a heart.. , also remedy for heart. So, I believe in his geting the point.

[lady_charlie]

oh, I am so old....
can't we still like macho guys?
As a student I adored Hemingway the same way I adored James Bond, heaven help me, but then I went to an actual bullfight and threw up about halfway through the afternoon, so while part of me still adores, it will have to be from afar. LIke, the ladies'...
I just don't have the guts for this kind of action apparently, although part of me still wishes I did

[DATo]

oh, I am so old....
can't we still like macho guys?
As a student I adored Hemingway the same way I adored James Bond, heaven help me, but then I went to an actual bullfight and threw up about halfway through the afternoon, so while part of me still adores, it will have to be from afar. LIke, the ladies'...
I just don't have the guts for this kind of action apparently, although part of me still wishes I did

Don't be so hard on yourself. With maturity comes illumination and wisdom. I don't know who I feel sorrier for: the man who has to prove his courage by killing a bull; the author, who voices his admiration of it; ... or the bull.

[Phoenix98]

milance, there are Christian themes in The Old Man and the Sea. His journey and conquest portray several. As he collapses on the bed at the close with outstretched arms, he symbolizes the Cross.

(I couldn't understand what you said about hope, fate, and peace.)

[sheenasmith0715]

I agree with DATo completely about The Old Man and the Sea being Hemingway's redeeming work. The thing I hate most about Hemingway's other works is his treatment of women. With The Old Man and the Sea, there are no women, and thus no reason for me to be offended! I believe Hemingway treated the women in his books as he treated the women in his life - badly. It's a shame he wasted so many years on a body of work that leaves so much to be desired and only started writing better material right before he killed himself.

[lady_charlie]

oh, I am so old....
can't we still like macho guys?
As a student I adored Hemingway the same way I adored James Bond, heaven help me, but then I went to an actual bullfight and threw up about halfway through the afternoon, so while part of me still adores, it will have to be from afar. LIke, the ladies'...
I just don't have the guts for this kind of action apparently, although part of me still wishes I did

Don't be so hard on yourself. With maturity comes illumination and wisdom. I don't know who I feel sorrier for: the man who has to prove his courage by killing a bull; the author, who voices his admiration of it; ... or the bull.

yes, you see it - I had such a romantic notion of what it was all like, probably much the same way that people feel on their way to war, until they get there.

[Asherat by the Sea]

I recently read A Farewell to Arms for school, and I have to say while I didn't really enjoy the novel, the discussion and further abstraction away from the actually text was great. While there are some novels that I just don't enjoy and can't find much to take away, at least with Hemingway, regardless of my enjoyment of his actual writing style, I still found plenty of substance.

Maybe that's why some people thought Hemingway was a genius: because those people had inferred, read-into, changed, supposed, and otherwise abstracted all sorts of different meanings away from the actual text of his books. Humm.....

oh, I am so old....
can't we still like macho guys?
As a student I adored Hemingway the same way I adored James Bond, heaven help me,

Yes, we can still like macho guys. In my humble Canadian Womans Opinion, men should refrain from wearing hot pink ties/shirts/pants/skinny jeans (of ANY color)/socks&underwear. The male gender is naturally intended to be different from the female; the trend today towards androgeny is replusive to me. I digress. In regards to Hemingway, as others have said, I believe the objection was not to masculine men, but to men who portray themselves as masculine and who are in fact---not.

[Daffers]

When I first came across Hemingway, back in the early '60s, he was one of "the" authors to read, and I have to say that at the time (as a teenager living in a very sexist world) I enjoyed the books I read. But the world moved on, and trying to read one again in my 30s was a totally different experience. I think Hemingway was simply a man of his time.

[donniedarko]

I've only read The Sun Also Rises. I liked the realistic dialogue and descriptions given. It wasn't a really quick read for me but I did enjoy the setting and mood. I want to read a few more of his novels, and I do plan to.
Sun Also Rises- 3.5/5

[suzy1124]

IMHO, overrated !...( but don't ask me, i feel the same about Ego-maniac writer Joan Didion )

[Caitlin Eliza]

The only book I have read of his is The Old Man and The Sea. I was not a fan when I read it. However, if I were to reread it, I might have a deeper appreciation for it.

[MissFantasy93]

I remember reading The Old Man and The Sea for my English lessons. At first I found it really boring but then I got used to the idea... I still have a copy of that book! I had to write a short role-play regarding that and it was quite fun actually to portray the characters in your own view.

[Leoch]

I am not a fan. I always feel that Hemingway thought himself superior to most people, and the quote below quite illustrates that. I also feel that all the hunting and shooting and drinking talk was a lot of insecure male posturing. It seemed that he was always out to prove to the world what a manly man he was.

But boy did he travel to some wonderful locations!

I agree with the insecure posturing (he admitted it in his later years), but there's no denying his talent. He is a little like Mozart: a genius mind coupled with an immature soul. Few authors could describe the human condition with all its faults as accurately as Hemingway. To this very day, many authors try to emulate him in style, economy of words, etc.

I like his short stories far more than his books. I think that at the end of the day, that's what he was: a great short story writer, not a novelist.

[Titanoboa92]

I've only read The Old Man and the Sea but I liked it. I think Ernest Hemingway was very smart in his economy of words. He knew how to take away anything unnecessary and leave readers with a seemingly simple work.

[laureng]

Personally, I hate Hemingway. His writing story was always really dry, and like someone said above, emotionless. I had to read several of his short stories as part of an assignment in college, and after that I decided that I would never read any of his books every again. His personal life was also incredibly depressing.