A Farewell To Arms
by Ernest Hemingway
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Book Reviews of A Farewell To Arms
Book Review: How can one review Hemingway?
Summary: 5 Stars
The first Hemingway I read, as university freshman. Was reading during a boring English class, came to the part where blood drips onto the hero's head in an ambulance, and then I passed out temporarily. It got me out of the rest of the English class.I read in a biography that Hemingway wrote so accurately both historically and geographically that some Italian historians believed he'd witnessed the fighting in and above the Isonzo/Soca Valley personally. He didn't, he got no further east than the Piave Valley. The fighting described takes place in the Slovenian Alps, then Austria, east of Tarcento, and very far east of Belluno. In Kobarid, Slovenia, in the valley of the fighting, we visited a small war museum in 1997, maybe the world's most impressive: photos of soldiers with faces half shot off, and other carnage, very effective in curing any foolish notion that war is romantic. Nothing in the book reflects the horror of the war like the displays in this museum, which contain photos of soldiers, emplacements, and fighting far above the treeline in the Alps in the dead of winter. At the entrance of the museum hangs an enormous poster showing Hemingway's face, and you can buy A Farewell to Arms in any of five languages there.
The worst fighting of the war between the Austrians and Italians took place in the Isonzo Valley. The book remains one of my favorites, in memory. For a somewhat comical "Heimat" film made after the war, showing the fighting between the Austrian Kaiserjäger and the Italian Alpini at Col d' Lana in the Dolomites, see "Berg in Flammen" staring the popular mountaineer Luis Trenker. This fighting took place at the same altitude as the war in the Soca Valley, on very steep, high, ice and snow covered rock. You can get the video from amazon.de, but you will then need an international video player to view it (Europe uses 50/sec, not 60/sec frequency AC current).
Book Review: Book Review for Mr. Stevens History Class
Summary: 3 Stars
The book, A Farewell to Arms by Ernist Hemingway, is an emotional story about a young American ambulance driver who finds himself stuck in the middle of World War One fighting with the Italians. After being wounded in the front, young Fredric Henry is shipped to the hospital where his lover is stationed. From there he takes a long and dismal trip through self hatred, as he is constantly on the edge of lossing control and completly flipping out. The book as a whole wasn't the most attention grabbing book I've read. The writing style which Hemingway used, the short fragmented choppy structure, is not one that I am fond of, but the way HE writes it it makes it seem like a master piece. He seems incapable of doing wrong in his writing and that is what truely lead me to reading the book. Hemingway captivates your imagination into thinking beyond what you are actually reading and that to me is what makes a good book. The 3-star rating is because of the topic of the book, not one I'm fond of, but still the writing style is what kept me reading.
To me this book shows a good exaple of what it means to be an American. Fredric Henry is an American fighting in an Italian dominated army, beside people who he has never met and will probably never see again. The fact that he isn't fighting with America just proves that as Americans, we feel drawn to fight for the rights of others, and by fighting with the Italians, in World War Ones, Fredric Henry is doing just that. Once he is ingered though, he is only thinking about the day he will return to the front, which to me shows the determination of the American spirit. We will fight for what we believe to be right even when it means we might be killed or hurt in the process. This book overall shows the bravery of the human spirit as a whole, but is represented though that of an American fighter.
Book Review: fine Hemingway novel
Summary: 5 Stars
This is the best of the three Hemingway novels I've read, the other two being The Sun Also Rises and For Whom the Bell Tolls.
This is a novel of youth, best exhibited by the young nurse. It's also a novel of idealism--the ambulance driver committed to the war even as a non-combatant. But it's also a novel of reasoned youth tempering the more typical impetuous romanticism of war. Perhaps this is symbolized in his being an ambulance driver, dangerous enough, and not a combatant.
The events leading to his disillusion and consequent farewell to arms, occur not as typical youthful epiphanies, ricocheting from one extreme (idealism, romanticism) to another (disillusionment, cynicism), but as an almost inevitable and slowly acting corrosive as the war continues to unfold in front of him, brought into final play during the retreat in the Battle of Caporetto.
The description of the retreat is the highlight of the novel, beginning with its orderly nature to the joining in of refugees and its progressive disintegration into panic and lawlessness. It's brilliant and completely convincing. You can see and feel it unfold right before you.
Everyone points out that Hemingway was a former newspaperman and his use of short, terse sentences.
Sure, but the fictional prose value of most newspaper people is nowhere--just surface description with little else. Not so for Hemingway. Embedded in his short sentences is feeling, emotion, and, in few words, vivid, deep description. It's what gives the substantial meaning and value to his work well beyond the superficial surface of the news report, even while in the heritage of that style.
I mean, how many reporters win the Nobel prize for Literature as did Hemingway. Read this book and you'll have an idea why.
Book Review: Farewell to a Five-Star Review
Summary: 4 Stars
For a writer at the tender age of 30, Hemingway sure knows how to set the stage. The problem is, he doesn't know how to what to do with his characters. Lieutenant Henry and his love, Catherine, were so intangible that I hardly shed a tear at the novel's "tragic" conclusion. I just couldn't make myself relate to them. I also find that the whole "love story" was a little far-fetched. After knowing each other for over six months, Catherine asked her lover whether or not his father was alive. You would think that after such a long time, the two would have plenty of time to discuss things of such importance. Although Catherine's devotion for Mr.Henry was pretty convincing, his output seemed a little short. One wasn't sure where he made the transition from not planning to love her at all to wanting to be with her all the time. (If you want to read a really convincing love story, read Erich Segal's poignant work, "Love Story"). Not only was the couple in question rather questionable, but the minor characters lacked, well, character. It was difficult to distinguish Mr. Henry's "war buddies" from one another, having only dialouge to rely on. Having that said, "A Farewell to Arms" was overall a good read. Despite the fact that I was unable to sympathize with the characters, I found myself to be entranced with Mr. Henry's tale. It was quite exciting, and I always waited for his return to Catherine, and for their playful,(although somewhat silly) dialouge. Up until the end of the tale, I was satisfied. Only after the "tragedy" did all the minor problems come shame-facedly to the surface. I would recommend this book to any lover of classics, but if you're looking for a war story, this clearly isn't the book for you.
Book Review: Deceptively simple writing style??
Summary: 1 Stars
I'm about two thirds through this book, and it's one of the most dissapointing reads of my life. If your introduction to Hemingway was The Old Man and the Sea, my advice to you is to read him no further, because you've read his best work.Firstly, his much touted writing style is horrible! His prose is flat, toneless, jarring, passionless and distant. Frankly I'm amazed by how he can make the most simple and childlike descriptions so turgid and painful to read! Secondly, the dialogue, as has been rightly pointed out by the more honest reviewers here, is incredibly boring and repetitive, and contrary to some opinions, totally unrealistic. Thirdly, the characters are two-dimensional and uninvolving, making it harder still to bear their awful dialogue!
Just because Hemingway was spartan with his prose does not mean that he had an impressive style! Just because his style forces the reader to engage their imagination more than other, more descriptive authors does not mean he was a great writer, just a clever manipulator. To suggest that readers find his style dissapointing "because they are more used to Stephen King" is arrogance in the extreme! I find his style of writing dissapointing simply because it is bad!!
All in all, I feel that Hemingway is totally overrated and undeserving of the praise the literary establishment sees fit to lavish upon him. He is, however, the perfect post-modern author!! The birth of the reader is the death of the writer, it's the reader that attaches all the symbolism and meaning, which is perfect for Hemingway, because he conveys SO LITTLE with his writing! He leaves all the work to us! What an artful con, permeated by those who suffer from The Emperors New Clothes syndrome...
Wow, I really hate this book...