in high school i read hemmingway's for whom the bell tolls. i expected to enjoy it. hemmingway was an interesting man. his works are famous and i assumed there must be a reason for that. however, i found the story dry and his writing style terribly boring. for years i dismissed him and all his novels.
just recently i decided to give him another chance. i picked up a collection of his short stories on a whim and was blown away. his style is direct and dry but it perfectly captures the snippets of life he portrays. i fell madly in love with his brief but insightful portraits of broken people.
this had me wondering why i enjoy him so much now when i had sincerely detested him mere years ago. i returned to for whom the bell tolls and found that, while i still did not enjoy that particular novel, it didn't grate on me as it had before. how am i different? what has changed?
i decided that it is the taste of failure that he so accurately conveys. when i first read him i was an idealistic teenager who had yet to experience the reality that life does not go the way anyone expects. i strongly believed - and part of me still does believe - that i had the strength to create the life i envision for myself. but life marches ahead without any concern for what we want or what we think we've earned. hemmingway subtly captures the embitterment of people who feel they have failed to live up to their own expectations. he observes cynicism in its purest form - disappointed idealists.
i feel that his short stories are nearly perfect in every way. his novels are also interesting. his poetry, however, is terrible. it's humorously reassuring that even hemmingway failed at some things.
Sunday, September 14
ignore me in the parking lot
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3 comments:
Alas! an update. i too was disappointed in my lack of love for hemmingway in highschool ( despite the oh so strong desire to be able to gobble up his famous works ). maybe one day i'll endeavour to dabble in his writings.
just happy to know you're alive, miss munn.
love mrs shymanski formerly miss peters
my inclination is to just be bitter. "life is what you make it." i hear those words so often i would like to kick the next person that says that to me.
there are those that sincerely believe that. I dont.
No matter how hard we articulate our dreams into action, we cannot change the all changing circumstances that smacks us in the face just when we think, "yes! this is the life i wanted."
Broken people, that's we all are.
reality is we can be positive in a horrible situation, but that still doesnt change the horrible situation. it just makes us stronger and then we learn to take more of what life throws at us, each time at least, hopefully learning a bit more about ourselves.
we can wish for the ideal situation, but usally we get to that point where it should be ideal but its not exactly what we expected, and we find ourselves planning for something different only to find out thats not really what we wanted either.
wow this has turned in to a rant. hmm ur post has triggered something in me.
ive been watching breakfast at tiffany's a lot latley. the end resinates with me.
talking about the cat before throwing him out of the taxi, we dont even belong to eachother. and building ourselves a cage without knowing it(especially with idealistic thinking), when we dont want to be trapped in someone else's.
we end up loosing lots of good things in hopes for catching our ideal lives.
i havent ranted in a while. its cuz i had tea before bed. speaking of bed!
oh erin:
hate to tell you but......your all growed up!
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