Section Three  The Lost Generation and Ernest Hemingway(1899-1961)
I. The Lost Generation
       It is a term in frequent use after the First World War in reference to the young men who had survived physically but were afterwards spiritually and morally adrift. This term was coined by Gertrude Stein and was used as a preface to Hemingway's novel "The Sun Also Rises." Major writers of the Lost Generation are Scott Fitzgerald, Ernest Hemingway, John Dos Passos, William Faulkner and E.E. Cummings etc. They lived in a special period of American history--the 1920's. During the decade, people lived a luxurious life and enjoyed money-making and pleasure seeking. And they doubted what was going to happen in the U. S. A.
       The group of American young writers moved to Paris of France. They were dissatisfied with American society for American society could not value their artistic works. They shared the belief that they would find personal and artistic fulfillment in an older civilization. The group of young people lost their American ideals and America lost their finest young writers. Though they were not satisfied with American society, they went back to their country later.
II. Ernest Hemingway (1899-1961)
1. Life and Literary Career
        Ernest Hemingway is generally regarded as the spokesman for the Lost Generation. He is famous for his novels and short stories written in intense prose with short sentences and very specific details. Almost all his stories deal with the theme of courage in face of tragedy. They reveal man's impotence and despairing courage to assert himself against overwhelming odds.
        Hemingway was born on July 21 in Oak Park, Illinois, one of six children in the family. His father was a highly respected doctor who was fond of hunting and fishing. His mother was a singer and music teacher. Young Hemingway was an outstanding student at high school, and he already wrote some short stories at that age. After graduation from Oak Park High School in 1917, instead of attending university, Hemingway worked briefly as a journalist, for the star in Kansas City. And he really wanted to take part in the First World War. But when the U.S. Army rejected him because of one bad eye, he volunteered first as an ambulance driver in France, and then as a soldier in the Italian infantry. He was badly wounded at the age of 18. While he lay in an Italian hospital, he fell in love with a Red Cross nurse, but she refused his proposal of marriage.
         In 1919 Hemingway returned to Chicago to complete his recovery and there he met and married his first wife. As soon as he was fully recovered, they left for Paris as a correspondent for a Canadian newspaper, and as an assistant for an American literary magazine. But his main purpose was to write his own stories.
        Hemingway met Gertrude Stein, Ezra Pound and Sherwood Anderson in Paris who encouraged him and helped him to develop his characteristic style. With their help he published his first collection of 15 short stories, In Our Time in 1925. In 1926, his full-length novel, The Sun Also Rises, met with great success. It was about the disillusionment of the lost generation. A second novel, A Farewell to Arms, firmly established his reputation in 1929. This novel shows that not only war threatens people, but the very texture of life itself involves violence and death. In Paris he divorced his first wife in 1927 and married the second one.
       During the 1930s he wrote less because he had a strong desire for adventure. He spent a large part of his time in deep-sea fishing near Cuba, big game hunting in Africa, or following bullfights in Spain. Hemingway’s own adventurous life provided much raw material for his strongly masculine stories.
       In 1936 he took part in the Spanish Civil War as a journalist, strongly supporting the losing Republican side against the Fascist forces of Franco (1892-1975). He predicted that the Spanish Civil War would be a prelude to the Second World War. While he was in Spain, he met and fell in love with a writer and journalist whom he married, after divorcing his second wife. His experiences provided material for one of his best novels, For Whom The Bell Tolls (1940). This is a love story of great appeal, and this is also a war novel containing the message that all liberals must help each other, must act collectively, if good is to endure. Then Hemingway and his third wife traveled together to China, as journalists, to report on the Japanese invasion, and then returned to Cuba.
      At first, Hemingway created an organization to report on German spies in Cuba and then he went to London as a Journalist. He flew on several missions with the Royal Air Force, into the heart of the battle. He crossed the English Channel with the American forces to report on the invasion of France, and he was present at the liberation of Paris. After the war, he returned to Cuba, divorced his third wife, and married a journalist whom he had met in London. She stayed with him for the rest of his life. In 1952, Hemingway published his last successful novel, The Old Man And The Sea. This novel is a Parable of inner strength and courage about a Cuban Fisherman’s struggle to bring home a great marlin he has caught. It highlights the theme that a man can be destroyed but not defeated. In 1954, he was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature.
      After the Cuban Revolution, Hemingway had to leave Cuba. He settled down in Idaho, a wild part of the U.S.A. in the Rocky Mountains. But he became deeply depressed and so tormented by failing artistic and physical power that he had to receive electric shock treatment. That treatment, in fact, did not work. Two days after returning to Idaho, he committed suicide by shooting himself with his hunting gun.
2.His Point of View
      Hemingway’s point of view was shaped by his experience as a young man in the First World War, and his near death on the battlefield. Many of his stories dealt with war or injury and nearly all of them examined the nature of courage. By living through the impersonal violence of the war, by suffering the violent accident of his wound, he felt that he had been cut off from the security of his own past life, and from all his old beliefs and assumptions about life. In a parallel way, he felt that the First World War had broken America’s culture and traditions, and separated them from their roots. He wrote about men and women who were isolated from tradition, frightened, sometimes ridiculous, trying to find their own way. He gave no literary explanations, and no conventional “happy endings ” to his stories.
      In trying to understand the nature of injury and violent death and the courage needed to face them, Hemingway became a knowledgeable spectator of Spanish bull fighting. Many of his stories contained episodes in the bullring. Risk, danger, grace, skill and death were always present in this traditional ritualistic sport of Spain. His own love of big game hunting undoubtedly stemmed from his curiosity about these things. In the African jungles, he could test his own courage and skill against an impersonal, violent enemy, the wild beast, while avoiding the random devastation of modern war.
He also wrote about courage with which people face the tragedies in life. To him, man’s greatest achievement is to show “grace under pressure” Here, “grace” refers to the behavior of the heroes under Hemingway’s situation; “pressure” refers to Hemingway’s situation. Hemingway’s situation is usually characterized by all kinds of unpleasant things, such as crime, death, chaos and violence.
     One of the important things that make Hemingway popular is that in a time of general despair and pessimism he wrote stories with heroes that the readers could admire. This is one of the reasons that his stories sold very well. Hemingway’s hero is usually isolated, and fights a good fight. There is a particular term, “the code hero,” for his character. The code hero with stoic courage lives by a pattern which gives life meaning and value. Usually, the code hero should be a master of many skills, demonstrate in resolution and endurance and exhibit pride and humiliation combined.
     In his fiction the nihilistic vision of sterility, failure and death is modified by his affirmative assertion of the possibility of living with style and courage. Therefore, he often dealt with war and its effects on people, with contests such as hunting and bullfighting which demand strength and courage and with the question of how to live with pain. Nihilism is Hemingway’s attitude toward the world.
3. His Literary Style
     Hemingway’s iceberg theory of writing is famous. Think of an iceberg: one eighth of an iceberg is above the water. All of the rest is underneath the water. The rest is implied. One must go very deep beneath the surface to understand the full meaning of his writing. Hemingway’s vocabulary is easy and his sentence patterns are easy, but they are extremely difficult to be fully understood. His lean, economical style of writing is striking: sentence short, uncomplicated, but active; words simple but filled with emotion; few adjectives, and great control of pause with action of the story continuing during the silences. There are times when the most powerful effect comes from restraint and understatement for he believed the strongest effect comes with an economy of means.
      In his novels, Hemingway’s dialogue can introduce setting; can help development of plot; can be used to portray a character and can be used to show the theme.
Hemingway is often called a lyric writer for he was interested in conveying a deep emotional feeling. He did have some realistic techniques, but on the whole he was not like the realist writers because he was more interested in conveying his personal emotions.
4. His Major Works
      Hemingway’s fourth book, The Sun Also Rises, appeared in 1926 and it was an immediate success. He described the life of aimless expatriates, in Europe as seen through the eyes of a young man who must face the bitter fact that a war wound left him unable to have children. In this story, Hemingway used a bullfight in Spain symbolically, as a criticism of the feckless atmosphere of postwar life. This novel paints a picture of the whole Lost Generation.
     His second big success was A Farewell To Arms (1929). This novel describes an American lieutenant fighting in Italy in the First World War, just as Hemingway himself did. The hero suffers from three shocking events. First, he receives a serious wound in battle. Second, he takes part in a retreat which turns into undisciplined chaos and destruction. The hero loses all sense of responsibility to the army and escapes to Switzerland with the nurse whom he loves. He is determined to build a decent life, have a family, and contribute a grain of sanity to the madness of the world. When his baby is stillborn and his wife dies in childbirth, he has nothing left but his own courage to rely on.
      In the next ten years, Hemingway wrote a short novel about bullfighting entitled Death In The Afternoon (1932), and one about big game bunting called Green Hills of Africa (1936). He also wrote many short stories. But his next important work was his novel about the Spanish Civil War, For Whom The Bell Tolls (1940). This novel concerns a volunteer American guerrilla in Spain, who blows up a strategic bridge as part of an attack which he knows is doomed to failure. In the end, he is left to die, yet he does his best for his comrades-in-arms and for the cause which he believes in.
      In 1952, he wrote another masterpiece, The Old Man And The Sea. This short novel is a simple story, containing some of Hemingway’s best writing. It tells about a Cuban fisherman who catches a giant marlin, only to see it devoured by sharks. This book capped his career, and led to his receipt of the Nobel Prize two years later.
Throughout his life, Hemingway wrote short stories, some of which are as famous as his novels,  “The Snows of Kilimanjaro” and “The Killers” are probably among the best known.

III. Selected Reading  A Farewell to Arms
1.Plot Overview
      During the First World War lieutenant Frederick Henry is a young American serving in an Italian ambulance unit on the Italian front. When Henry returns from his leave, Henry’s friend Rinaldi, an outgoing Italian surgeon, takes him to see Catherine Barkley, one of the nurses that have just arrived in the British hospital unit. Miss Barkley is a tall blonde with gray eyes and long hair. Speaking of her fiancé who died earlier on the French front. She finds it puzzling that an American should be on the Italian front. Henry finds her pretty and visits her between ambulance trips to evacuation posts. His pursuit of her is nothing more than a “chess game,” in which he pretends to be in love with her, although what he is really thinking is that she is a little neurotic. At the front, Henry notices that the soldiers are sweaty, dusty and tired. Most of the participants have little enthusiasm for the war. When he returns to the villa and reflects on the war: “it had nothing to do with me” and he wishes that it would soon be over. Then he starts for Catherine’s hospital. Catherine is on duty. Henry feels lonely and hollow when he is unable to see her. Just before the assault, a big trench-mortar shell explodes over them. Henry is terribly injured both in the head and the legs. He is taken to the field hospital after an emergency operation.
      There Henry receives two visitors, Rinaldi and the priest. Rinaldi is cheerful, emotional and fiery as ever. He brings with him a smell of the brothels and the officer’s mess hall. War to him is a chance to improve his skill as a doctor though he is kind-hearted in nature. The priest is different. During the priest’s visit, Henry manifests his admiration for the man. His concept of values and ideal appeals to Henry. When discussing love, the priest says something significant: the affairs in the houses of prostitution are not love; that is only passion and lust. He goes on to maintain that when a man loves someone, he will want to sacrifice for her. At this point Henry admits that he doesn’t love: he does not believe in any religion and has not started to love seriously yet.
      Henry now has been transferred to Milan where an American hospital has just been installed to take charge of Americans on service in Italy and where Catherine has also been posted. Seeing her for the first time after such an eventful period, Henry suddenly comes to the realization that he is in love with her.
      Henry’s romance with Catherine develops at a fast pace. Catherine has her schedule changed to the night shift so that they can spend the night in his ward secretly. This is not just convenient for their love affair; it is equally important for a person like Henry, who can never sleep well until it is daylight.
      Away from the storm and stress of war, Henry and Catherine spend an idyllic summer together. That summer is hot and the newspapers are loaded with reportings of victories. Henry is gaining a swift recovery. He is first on crutches and then walks with a cane. The lovers enjoy their spare time by attending social gatherings and horse races. It is the first time that Henry learns that Catherine is afraid of rain, a symbol of death for her.
      Happiness and peace are gone when fall arrives. The situation of fighting at the front deteriorates steadily. Henry has a three weeks’ convalescent leave before he has to return to the front. Catherine breaks the news of her pregnancy to him and both are overjoyed. But parting is around the corner. The night before Henry’s leave ends, rain comes down again. And the night he leaves for the front he does so in a deluge of rain. The parting is simple and pathetic as it might well be the final one-one going off to war and the other pregnant with an illegitimate child. In the rain at the station there is no crying when they wave each other good-bye.
      Henry arrives back at the front to find that little has changed, except that the combatants have grown more cynical than ever. All the energy has been squeezed out of them. The major is “older and drier,” Rinaldi “looked tired” and the priest, while outwardly the same, comments that “it has been a terrible summer.”After the meal, the priest tells Henry how desperately he hopes that the war will end soon.
      The Austrians attack and, after several days’ hesitant bombardment and skirmishing, the Italian Army retreats. To Henry, battlefield is identical with the slaughterhouse in Chicago. At the beginning, everything is orderly, but gradually chaos takes the upper hand, turning the picturesque front in the early chapters into scenes of anarchy and confusion. One reason is that for the first time the Germans have entered the war on the Italian front and the development has aroused general fear.
      Henry and his men join the mainstream of retreating vehicles. At first they move slowly but steadily in the rain in one wide column consisting of the troops, the motor trucks, the horse-drawn carts and the guns. Henry fears that they might soon be trapped in air raids, so he leads his vehicles away from the procession and up a series of rural side roads. They manage to get some food to eat from a local farmhouse. When they are on the road again, one of the cars sticks in the mud and two of the soldiers try to desert. Henry shoots one, and Bonello, one of Henry’s drivers, finishes the job of killing him while the other succeeds in the escape.
      They have to march on foot, everywhere seeing scattered all kinds of abandoned weapons and trucks. More disasters await them ahead. Now the scenes on the retreat from Gaporetto have built up to a climax: there is almost complete confusion, the soldiers cursing all the officers, the discarding of arms, and the dominant longing for home. Henry now comes face to face with the military police. The battle police are scrutinizing everyone in the retreating column, picking out officers, accusing them of desertion; many are shot after senseless questioning or, if you resist, they grab you. When he is stopped, Henry is scared that he will be shot as a spy because of his foreign accent. He runs away by darting into the river and floating away under the cover of a log. After an arduous and exhausting walk, he is able to board a freight train which takes him to Milan. Before the train trip Henry is too occupied with keeping alive to do much thinking. Now he has time to ponder over the disasters that have happened.
     Since the beginning of the war, Henry has been bound to the small ambulance group and felt loyalty only to it. Now that the small unit does not exist, the sense of loyalty in Henry has also disappeared. He yearns for food and Catherine’s company. Henry is making his farewell to arms and is going to reunite with Catherine in Milan. When Henry reaches the hospital in Milan, he learns that Catherine and Miss Ferguson have been moved to Stresa. Borrowing some civilian clothes from an American friend, Henry follows Catherine to Stresa. Catherine is overjoyed to see him safely back but Miss Ferguson denounces him as an immoral seducer.
At last, Henry can relax. He is quietly happy with Catherine and goes fishing on the lake by the hotel. Henry’s reason tells him that he has not escaped; that he is only playing truant.
     One night the bartender wakes Henry to warn that the military police are on their way to arrest him for desertion. He and Catherine sneak out of the hotel and row across the lake to Switzerland in the bartender’s boat.
     Now that the war phase of their life is over, Henry and Catherine are settling down to a happy life together, awaiting the birth of their child in peace. When Catherine’s labor pains start, the whole happy mood that has been built up in Switzerland abruptly comes to an end. Henry rushes her to the hospital. She suffers horribly and bravely. More than twelve hours pass; she does not give birth. Rain starts as the medical staff wheel Catherine into the operating theatre for a Caesarean operation, finding the baby stillborn. Catherine begins to haemorrhage. She dies.
After her death Henry comes in to see her. He cannot yet cope with the idea that death is the end of all things, which is Catherine’s philosophy. Yet when he looks at her and “it was like saying good-bye to a statue,” Henry finally comes to full awareness of the truth about death. He walks back to his hotel in the rain, alone.

2. Brief Comment
2.1. Importance of the Novel
  A Farewell to Arms is one of the best novels about the World War I.
It established Hemingway’s position in American literature and painted a complete picture of the Lost Generation. It is one of the works which completely demonstrate his style.
2.2 Hemingway Style
     Hemingway was influenced by Mark Twain, Sherwood Anderson and Gertrude Stein. He used colloquialism; his language was plain and simple. He learned simplicity and economy of expression as a way to reach his goal. His use of short, uncomplicated active sentences with fundamental words such as n., v. and very few adjectives and connectives such as and, but, so, then etc. became his recognizable style.
     His dialogue can introduce setting, can help development of plot, can be used to portray a character and can be used to show the theme. For his Iceberg Principle, Hemingway thinks, a writer should write little…He should write in this way that readers can understand much more. So his sentences are seemingly simple, but deeper in meaning if read carefully.
He also used some modern writing techniques such as symbolism, stream of consciousness etc..
3. The following is an excerpt from A Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway.
A Farewell to Arms   
BOOK I
1
     In the late summer of that year we lived in a house in a village that looked across the river and the plain to the mountains. In the bed of the river there were pebbles and boulders, dry and white in the sun, and the water was clear and swiftly moving and blue in the channels. Troops went by the house and down the road and the dust they raised powdered the leaves of the trees. The trunks of the trees too were dusty and the leaves fell early that year and we saw the troops marching along the road and the dust rising and leaves, stirred by the breeze, falling and the soldiers marching and afterward the road bare and white except for the leaves.
     The plain was rich with crops; there were many orchards of fruit trees and beyond the plain the mountains were brown and bare. There was fighting in the mountains and at night we could see the flashes from the artillery. In the dark it was like summer lightning, but the nights were cool and there was not the feeling of a storm coming.
     Sometimes in the dark we heard the troops marching under the window and guns going past pulled by motor-tractors. There was much traffic at night and many mules on the roads with boxes of ammunition on each side of their pack-saddles and gray motor trucks that carried men,  and other trucks with loads covered with canvas that moved slower in the traffic. There were big guns too that passed in the day drawn by tractors, the long barrels of the guns covered with green branches and green leafy branches and vines laid over the tractors. To the north we could look across a valley and see a forest of chestnut trees and behind it another mountain on this side of the river. There was fighting for that mountain too, but it was not successful, and in the fall when the rains came the leaves all fell from the chestnut trees and the branches were bare and the trunks black with rain. The vineyards were thin and bare-branched too and all the country wet and brown and dead with the autumn. There were mists over the river and clouds on the mountain and the trucks splashed mud on the road and the troops were muddy and wet in their capes; their rifles were wet and under their capes the two leather cartridge-boxes on the front of the belts, gray leather boxes heavy with the packs of clips of thin, long 6. 5mm. cartridges, bulged forward under the capes so that the men, passing on the road, marched as though they were six months gone with child.
     There were small gray motor cars that passed going very fast; usually there was an officer on the seat with the driver and more officers in the back seat. They splashed more mud than the camions even and if one of the officers in the back was very small and sitting between two generals, he himself so small that you could not see his face but only the top of his cap and his narrow back, and if the car went especially fast it was probably the King. He lived in Udine and came out in this way nearly every day to see how things were going, and things went very badly.
     At the start of the winter came the permanent rain and with the
rain came the cholera. But it was checked and in the end only seven thousand died of it in the army.

4.Questions for discussion

(1). What techniques did the author use to set the tone?
(2). It is the very beginning of the whole novel. Can you learn in which year the story took place here? Can you know the name of the village, the name of the river and even the name of the country? Why or why not? What kind of attitude of the author can you learn toward the war from this?