Transcript
51HEMINGWAY AS A NOVELIST
Ernest Hemingway is one of those authors whose life and works are interdependent. His style of writing was
greatly influenced by his personal experiences. Therefore a
study of Hemingway's style would be incomplete without an
understanding of his life, which has a lasting effect on his
works.
Hemingway has been a multi-dimensional personality
all through his life ; an ambulance driver in the first world war, a deep sea fisherman, a boxer of a relatively good
stature, an excellent hunter, a Nobel Prize winner for
literature, a popularly known 'Papa5 and a successful jour
nalist and besides all these multifarious activities, he was
a great literary legend.
Hemingway, the son of Dr. Clarence Hall and Grace
Hall Hemingway, was born in Oak Park Illinois, a suburb of Chicago in 1899. Young Hemingway was very much influenced by
his father who embodied a conflict between the independent
masculine world of the outdoors of hunting, fishing and physical endurance as contrasted with the over domesticated town life. Inspite of his mothS'rs^endeavours to give him
genteel education like music, Hemingway was much fascinatedby the instruments like fishing rods and guns.
52
But his literary qualities were developed in his
school in Oak Park, where he worked as the editor of his
school paper and thus demonstrated his ability of writing
well for the first time in his life. After graduation from
high school in 1917, he worked briefly as a reporter for the
"Kansas City Star'11. He enjoyed a rather sensational career as
a journalist by the age of twenty five, as he covered the
Greek-Turkish war and interviewed the world famous figures
such as Lloyd George, Clemenceau, and Mussolini. He worked as
reporter for the "Toronto Star" and "Star Weekly" and inter
viewed literary people like Sherwood Anderson, Gertrude Stein
and Ezra Pound. Encounters with these great writers encour
aged him to concentrate on writing.
Hemingway's literary career began with his stories^
appeared in avant-garde and popular magazines. He published
Three Stories and Ten Poems in 1923 and a series of 32 frag
ments In Our Time in 1924 and The Torrents of Spring in 1926.
Hemingway *s literary reputation rested on his works between
1924 and 1933. His first major work The Son Also Rises (1926)
postulated him as a spokesman of war generation. A Farewell
to Arms (1929) was the second major work gf Hemingway which
was an immediate financial and critical success. His next
works Death in the Afternoon appeared in 1932 and Winter Take
Nothing in 1933. Meanwhile he travelled extensively in
53
Africa and wrote The. Green Hills of Africa in 1935. Then he
wrote three related stories (two of which had been published
se^er^ately) under the title Jo Have and Have Not. His another
work in 1940, For Whom The Bell Tolls aroused a storm of
controversy in political spheres. It was equally criticized
by left-wing , right wing and liberal critics. His next major
work Across the Rj_ygr and into the Trees (1950) was hailed as
a milestone in his career, which was again based on the
political theme of “war against fascism.* It is due to this
novel that Hemingway had to meet with much critical disap
proval. Almost all the critics called it a novel below the
expectations of a novelist who wrote The Sun Also Rises and A
.F^.r.ewel.1. to. Arms. Hemingway took this review to his heart and
in two years retrieved his position as a great writer by his
masterpiece The Old Han and The Sea (1952.) .'^fhe Old. Han and
Sea has been described as *a poem in prose*. The source of
this small novel of 127 pages seems to be a two hundred word
article entitled On the Blue Water about fishing in the Gulf
Stream in * Esquire* on April 1936.)
The Old Han and Sea was hailed all over the world
as '■‘a mini-epic perfect in design and execution*. Hemingway,
thus regained his lost position by winning the Nobel Prize
for The Old Han and the Sea. On Oct 28, 1954, the Swedish
Academy announced the Nobel Prize for literature and cited
54that he was awarded the Nobel Prize for 'powerful style
forming mastery of the art of modern narration as most re-Qcently evinced in The Old Man and the Sea . Besides large
critical approval over Hemingway's artistic excellence, there
aroused much controversy over the Nobel Prize. The hostile
critics claimed that Hemingway's writings didnot fulfil the
basic conditions of Alfred Nobel's will. The will enjoined
that the award has produced the most outstanding work of anxideal tendency. It was pointed out that idealism was not the
most prominent characterstic of Hemingway, who was preoccu
pied with themes of violence, brutality, cynicism sex and
death. Critics like Maxwell Greismar objected that Hemingway
received Nobel Prize for the wrong book and for the wrongperiod of his worl^Oespite this dissenting criticism, The Old.
Man and thp Sea won an impressive list of awards including
the Pulitzer Prize for fiction in May 4, 1953. It also re
ceived 'the Award for Merit Medal' for the Novel given by the
American Academy of Arts and Letters and also “ the Order of
Carlos Manuel de Lespedos’
Hemingway narrowly escaped death in an airplane
clash in the same year he received the Nobel Prize. He then
suffered a long period of illness but met his death by a
'self-inflicted' gunshot wound in 1961, at Ketchum, Idaho.
55n
It is said that every writer is the product of the
age in which he lives. Hemingway is no exception to it. He is regarded as one of the special products of the age of freedom
in America. Due to the emphasis on realism in the Nineteenth
Century American Fiction, there was a need of revitalization in literature. It was Hemingway who revived the dying art of
novel and gave it a new life. Despite leading a busy life of shooting, big game hunting, fishing, fighting, travelling
etc., Hemingway had a remarkable literary output. He wrote of
what he experienced and that too as honestly, clearly and
directly as he could. Regarding the themes of his novels, it
is found that his range of subject matter is not wide and
therefore he returns again and again to the same kind of
material.
His themes are related to the central experiences
of war, violence and death. As a representative of war gener
ation, Hemingway seems to be interested in violence and
painful behind not
only physical scars, but also the psychological ones. In
almost all of his novels, the hero or the protagonist faces a
close touch of death or actually dies. Naturally “dignity in confronting death' is one of the leading themes in his novels. He also emphasizes the “view of Nihilism' that American
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adolescents face. This nihilistic view instills a feeling of
futility and makes man feel impossible to lead a decent self-respecting, dignified and satisfying life. Hemingway's
faith in the valuable qualities of courage, forbearance,
tolerance, and simple affection has found its reflection in
the themes of his novels. The search for peace in society andomorever an inner spiritual peace is one of the recurrent A
themes in Hemingway's novels.
The idea of 'Separate Peace' arises out of the
awareness of the absence of peace in the post-war situation. But it undoubtedly symbolizes man's alienation from society,
growing loneliness and his innate need for peace. It is
obvious that Hemingway's themes reflect growing awareness of
the common man's problems in America. But again he seems to
have realised that solution to human
problems. Therefore some of his novels hold a theme that
reveals Hemingway's incapacity to deal with complex social
and political problems and ultimately he reverts back to man's isolation, endurance, courage and a life by senses.
Dignity is also one of the important themes of Hemingway. His
characters refuse to yield to the powerful forces of nature but retain their dignity. For example in Thg, Old Man and The
Sea. Hemingway portrays the character of Santiago as a sincere old man struggling alone with the marlin and the sharks.
He is left alone but refuses to yield to the powerful natural
57
forces with all his dignity. Hemingway seems to be aware of
the importance of solidarity and inter-dependence. The rela
tionship between individualism and inter-dependence has beenB>
one of the important concern^of Hemingway.
Ill
Hemingway has created some of the most memorable
characters of his time. By portraying characters like Santia
go, Hemingway has been successful in presenting his charac
ters both as an individual and as a representative of a whole
generation at the same time. Even his minor characters have
left a deep impact upon the readers due to their individuali
ty. They also exemplify Hemingway’s code to some extent. His
technique of characterisation is different from others as he
doesn’t directly make any authorial comments on the charac
ters^ so as to throw light on their nature and personality.
It is often left to the readers to form their own impression
about each character.
Some of his characters possess symbolic signifi
cance. They symbolize religious as well as some social moral
tendencies. Not only the positive aspects of human nature
like fortitude, patience, tolerance, strength but also some
negative characterstics like disillusionment and pained
sensibility are symbolized through his characters.
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His characters become more lively because of his
art of conversation. Dialogue plays a very important role in
throwing light on his characters. The only drawback that.
Hemingway>s art of character portrayal suffers is the absense
of concrete realisation of the characters. Sometimes the
physical features of some of his characters are abruptly
described, therefore the readers cannot have a clear mental
image of the characters.
Hemingway is wellknown for his portrayal of a
character of protagonist who was then popularly known as
'Hemingway hero or Code hero'. This ’Code hero' represents
all the moral qualities cherished by Hemingway such as courage, dignity, sense of honour, integrity, dedication to
vocation, endurance etc. In the post world war world, where
values were getting eroded day by day, the new generation
tried to base their values ( in arts, politics and literature
etc.) only on truth. The youth of new generation expected the world to endure the harsh reality of life by inculcating
pride, courage and silence. Hemingway was widely called as a representative of the lost generation (i.e. post-war genera-
tion). The, tried to impose a ’Code' of action not only in
work but in talk and in play. Such a Hemingway code was a
major element in all his books. This code expects that while
59facing futility one would try to create his own reality by
imposing form upon chaos. There would be a code for men and
women in the way they hunt, drink wine, make love or suffer
pain. And thus by acting well an individual can overcome
futility itself. Hemingway's some novels depicted a kind of a
’Hemingway hero’, which later on developed into the ’Code
hero’.
IV
Hemingway’s novels are appreciated by tbe critics
as the well made ones. He is remarkable not only for an
excellent plot but also for its austerity and integrity. The
plot of his novel is always so very integrated that it is
difficult to isolate any single event or incident from the
whole. But the first thing that strikes in all his works is
the extreme simplicity of his plots. His plots usually re
volve around one or two major characters, their struggle,
their achievements, their frustrations, etc. Some critics
found Hemingway’s plots cyclic. Because they almost invar
iably end there, where they begin with. But in£adt the proc
ess of growth gives a deeper insight to the characters into
himself. There are also limited number of events that occur ?
in the novels of Hemingway. There is no suspense nor any
breathless anxiety in any of his plots. But it is due to its ?
skillful interweaving of the incidents in the plot that the
critics find him a superb craftsman.
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Hemingway's narrative structure is simple but at
the same time it is never common place or tedious. It has a
distinct rhythm of its own. All the events occur in slow
motion so that the reader can follow each stage of the narra
tive in detail. Ha tries to give all the facts in his narra
tive with great exactitude. He wants to make his readers feel
the emotion directly not as if they were being told about an
event but as if they were taking part in it. Because of his
detached and carefully accurate use of language, critics
compare it with camera and call his works 3 cinematic
prose'. In his cinematic prose, he would manipulate language
itself as a kind of camera to record precise observation of
physical surfaces. This proved more effective in his short
narratives. He prefers the third person or omniscient author
technique of narration as this helps the author to present
his own vision of reality. He usually presents the reality
through a sequence of different expressions that are com
pletely free from value judgement. He gives very little
authorial comment on any of the events described by the
narrator. All these qualities of Hemingway's narrative make
The Old Man and the Sea a fine example of narrative prose.
A piece is cited from The Old Man and the Sea to
exemplify Hemingway's narrative art :
The Old man dropped the line and put his foot on
it and lifted the harpoon as high as he could and
drove it down with all his strength, and more strength he had just summoned, into the fish's
side just behind the great chest fin that rose
high in the air to the altitude of the man's chest. (P.80)4
This piece from the text shows Hemingway's effectiveness in
communicating the action directly and also holding the atten
tion of the reader through different images. His style seems
to be a concrete one as it shuns off all that is abstract.
Thus the object of his narrative is always to give the reader
an accurate and realistic description of any object or action
that takes place.
VI
Naturalism, as a literary genre, presents a pic
ture of life more real than the one found in realistic writing. Hemingway's novels have an evidence of naturalism every
where. It is seen in his character portrayal and nature description. He, as a naturalist, firmly believes that man is
no more than the highest order of animals and that he is simply at the mercy of natural forces which make^ him a pawn in the hands of these forces, e.g. in The Old Man and the
62Sea, the character of Santiago is portrayed in this manner.
Santiago^ despite being^brave, experienced old fisherman^, is
defeated by the Sharks. The natural forces attack him and he
fails in defending himself. This reduces him merely to the
pawn in the hands of the most powerful natural forces.
Hemingway expects his heroes to be strong and<ibrave men of action, no matter to which class they belong
t<D, Even his minor characters are uncorrupted, earthy people.
For example, in The Old Han and the Sea, the character of
Manolin, though a simple, down to earth one, plays a very
soothing role in Santiago’s life. But as found in a natural
istic novel, many a tim^s)it ends in tragedy and so is the
end of The Old Han and the Sea.Despite Santiago’s consistent
efforts to get the fish home, he meets a failure and the
story ends in his tragedy.
Hemingway not only portrays the characters in
their most natural forms but also the nature in its joyous
but mystic form. He thus presents a real picture of life in
his novels. Once he said in his interview published in Time,
Dec 13. 1954. ,1ml6
'I tried to make a real old man, a real boy, a
real sea, and a real fish and real sharks. But if
I made them good and true enough they would mean
many things. 5 , lm5
63After considering all these aspects, it would not
be wrong to place Hemingway in the tradition of literary
naturalism and realism.
VII
Hemingway constantly uses symbols in his writings.
The subjective conditions of his characters is expressed by
invariably following the symbolist technique. He uses ’Mou^_
tains’ as a symbol of ’peace, security and health’, and
’Plains’ as a symbol of ’fatigue, war and death', and ’snow’
as a symbol of ’death'. This clearly makes his style look
more as a combination of association and connotation than
merely as a denotation. In The Old Man and the Sea, the sea
stands for life. It also symbolizes vastness, as it is full
of many unexplored things in it. After the publication of Tb©
Old Man and the Sea, critics saw the novel as a personal
parable in which Santiago represents Hemingway himself. The
marlin stands for the novel and the sharks symbolize the
critics who attacked the novel and tried to tear the literary
reputation of Hemingway.
VIII
Hemingway’s craft and style were clearly influ
enced by different cultural, literary and familial forces in
his life. Initially it was the influence of his family (i.e.
his mother and father) that has left a deep mark on his
64writings. The roboust personality of his father is clearly
seen in the portrayal of Hemingway heroesy who love hunting,
shooting and fishing and all other outdoor life.As he grew up, he developed a great fascination
for war and adventure and always waited for some chance of
adventure that would combine glory with danger. It inculcated
in him a strong dislike for passivity. He tasted bitter glory
of war as he was blown up unfortunately by a strayshell and
wounded seriously when engaged in a rather ludicrous activity
of handing out chocolates to Italian soldiers. This experi
ence left its scars forever on Hemingway's spirit. He was so
deeply attached to the war spirit and its consequences that
Gertrude Stein remarked calling him “the spokesman of lost generation.' The phrase j/^ost generation' is originally usedv^
to define the disillusioned young people who had seen an
entire world of ethical, moral and political values shattered
in the chaotic butchery of the world war. However, it is a
misleading label for the young writers and critics after the World War. Infact, young writers like Hemingway developed a
fresh sense of truth through his writings.
His greater zest for life, a greater urge for
action and travelling made him travel extensively, hunting in Africa and the Far East, fishing in numerous oceans andseas. All this made a lasting impact on Hemingway's writings.
65
His literary style was also evolved out of painting and
music. He learned something from the painting of Cezanne that
made his writing simple and true.
Hemingway also had an impact of his journalistic
career on his style. He began his literary career with his
journastic writing. Journalism contributed in two significant
ways to the evolution of his style. It taught Hemingway to
present the thing "the way it was" and to focus all his
attention on the fact to be observed. His seven months expe
rience in the ’Kansas City Star’ formed his vigourously
masculine and objective style . It taught him the technique
of disciplined prose and objectivity. The famous ’Star’ style
sheet influenced him in using vigorous English devoid of lengthy sentences and cumbersome diction. It inculcated in
him a habit to write in a simple lean style with sparing use
of adjectives and adverbs and completely objective but power
ful expression. C. G. willington (Assistant Editor of the ’Star’) trained Hemingway to write graphic prose.
Many literary influences directly or indirectly shaped Hemingway’s style. Ring Lardner, a popular writer of
the time when Hemingway was in school, was also imitated by Hemingway in his earlier attempts. Later on Hemingway himself acknowledged the direct influence of Mark Twains The Adven-
66tures of Huckleburrv Finn (1884) on his writings. Hemingway
learnt the art of terse prose and lively dialogue. He also
mentioned the debt of Stephen Crane which made him acquire the intensity, terseness, natural tone, unartificial dialogue. Inspite of the American literary influence, Hemingway
also came in contact with Gertrude Stein, Ezra Pound, 0. H.
Lawrence, James Joyce and even T.S. Eliot. Ezra Pound was the
first to recognize Hemingway's budding talent. He learnt from
Ezra Pound the essential difference between reporting and
literature. Pound encouraged Hemingway by correcting his
early writings.
Gertrude Stein introduced Hemingway to the art of
writing with precision and elimination of superfluous adjec
tives. All the important literary figures helped him to free
his style from outworn cliches, decorative metaphors and to
develop the style of using the simplest possible words.
Joseph Conrad also made a remarkable impact on Hemingway's
style.
When Hemingway visited Paris, he came in touch
with a celebrated writer like Scott Fitzgerald, and then he had some direct references to these celebraties. He learnt
his craft from Russian Writers like Tolstoy, Chekor, Dostoevsky and European Prose masters like Maupassant, Flaubert,
Alexander Dumas, Balzac, Baudelaire etc. Thus it becomes
67
evident that Hemingway's style is mixed with varied
types of influences. Therefore Gertrude Stein aptly describes
Hemingway as 'a man of museums'. Even though he was influ
enced by many great literary writers, he forged his own
style. His style is uniquely his own and very few writers
after him have succeeded in imitating such a simplicity and
precise terseness in prose.
IX
Hemingway was universally acclaimed by the contem
porary writers and critics for the unique style he innovated.no
His style bore imprints of several influences to which he was
exposed from his highschool days at Oak Park. In his forma
tive years, he imitated many writers and what he learnt from
others was soon assimilated into a pattern of his own. Phil
lip Young says, 'He is not a reproduction and if he has the
look of a genuine original, who has fashioned what is unques
tionably the most famous and influential prose style of our
time, it is because many ingredients have been thoroughly
assimilated and revitalized by the force of all integrated
and talented personalities.
He evolved his style by long years of apprentice
ship which served as an original model to the jfatte)- writers.
He borrowed from his famous predecessors and transformed
68whatever he borrowed into something new. His new style influ
enced many writers like Norman Mailer, Joseph Heller, Saul
Bellow, etc.
Infact, according to some critics Hemingway com
mands more repect as a stylist. His prose is easily recog
nised as it is characterised chiefly by colloquial language
simplicity of diction and sentence structure and precision.
He showed strict aversion for verbiage and embellishment. His
words are normally short, simple and common ones. He shunned
gaudy, inane and abstract phraseology. He always felt that
phrase-mongering was the occupation of the politician or
professional patriot and it was not the instrument of the
writer. Therefore he insisted on not using words that obscure
the reality of experience. He used concrete words that repre-
sent concrete action and avoided abstraction of any sort.
Gertrude Stein and Ezra Pound advised Hemingway to
prune his phrases of chiches, unnecessary adjectives and
adverbs. Therefore he developed his style by making limited
use of adjectives and adverbs and avoiding cliches. He, thus,
used adjectives and other embellishments sparingly and only
when absolutely necessary e.g. He describes plainly the
action of the fish which woke Santiago by pulling the line
through his hand. To quote from the OMATS.
69’He woke with the jerk of his right fist coming up
against his face and the line burning out through
his right hand.... (pp-69, 76).7
Here the jerk that wakes up Santiago must be Violent but
Hemingway avoids using the word ’Violent' here.
Hemingway was later compared with Swift who made a
sparse use of adjectives and slashed off all^merely decora
tive. Therefore in Hemingway’s writings greatest burden is
carried forward by concrete nouns and the simplest verbs such
as drop, put, think etc. He harnessed all nouns to their
utmost capacity because they are the most appropriate medium
for representing concrete objects and abstract ideas.
Thus, he stripped off all stylistic adornments,
smart phraseology and big empty words and made use of small
but full words. In fact, he used a very limited vocabulary.
Because his range of vocabulary is limited. For example, for
him the words 'good' and 'nice* stand for all the pleasant
emcotions. He always preferred to use the words 'big' or
'very big' rather than 'huge' 'enormous* 'gigantic' etc. He
doesn’t have a range of vocabulary like Faulkner and thus
disappointed Faulkner who noted that Hemingway didnot use
words that would send the reader to the dictionary. While
reacting to this Hemingway pitied Faulkner and said "Poor
70Faulkner! Does he really think big emotions come from big
words. He thinks I don’t know the ten dollar words. I know
them alright. But there are older and simpler and better
words and those are the ones I use". It shows that Heming
way had a clear distrust for the “ten dollar words’ or ’high
falutin words’ that he referred here. He strongly believed
that the dramatic situations, the scenes of emotional and
physical violence could best be described in short, terse and
colloquial language. His prose style is known for its sim
plicity and shortness of sentences. It becomes more simple
because of the use of translated phrases or sentences from
foreign languages to English,
He normally uses flat, clipped and clear sen
tences, He- prefers simple declarative sentences as clauses
.joined together with conductions. It was Gertrude Stein who
taught him the art of using conjunctions repeatedly to pro
duce a particular effectiveness. Use of conjunctions like
’and’, ’but’ thrice or more than that in a single sentence
adds to the simplicity of his style. His each sentence con
sists of only a few words and even these are simplest. He
does use complex and compound sentences also but these are
structured additively that is, one clause follows another in
a simple sequence. He avoided sentences with embedded
clauses. He maintained purity of his sentences by avoiding
71digressions and structural complications.
XI
Hemingway’s most significant contribution to style
is his effective use of dialogue in his novels. He wrote
simple, laconic, terse and clipped dialogue. He even slashed
off all redundancies, circumlocutions, cliches etc. P. G.
Rama Rao says,
’The principal of economy and understatement and
the use of colloquial speech rhythms control
Hemingway’s dialogue. The old habit of underlining
the intent or emotion or intonation of the speaker
began to be discarded by Mark Twain and Henry
James. Hemingway carries this process to the
logical conclusion making the dialogue completely
dramatic with no commentory from the author exceptQwhere it is absolutely needed.
Hemingway’s writings show his knack for dramatizing his
dialogue. As he was insistent on simplicity, he even avoided
using emotionally heightened language, Despite simplicity,
his dialogues were closely adhered to the accents and manner
isms of human speech. Instead he reproduces speech that
identifies the speaker and brings the character to life.
72
Hemingway is acclaimed as a creater of fresh and
sparse style for his age. He developed and perfected a new
prose style, a style based on short unadorned statements
which adequately expressed the disillusioned and cynical mood
of the war ridden society. Phillip Young says about Heming
way's style,
’it was mainly forged and evolved during the same
period, when Hemingway was making an effort to
reorganise his personality after his disillusion
ment in the first World War>.i^
Critics found Hemingway’s style largely impressed by the
World War situation. J.8. Priestley praised Hemingway's
style by saying that,
’The style of Hemingway for which he deserves the
highest praise not only made him as a man from the
results of some trauma some open war wound in his
inner life’.
Even after a critical disagreement on the point of
impact of war on Hemingway’s style, there was a unanimous
agreement on some other aspects of his style. Tpe critics
clearly seem to agree on the fact that Hemingway’s was en
tirely an original, new and unique style and he, like many
73other modern novelists, fashioned his style by reacting
against the notion of literary style.
He never wrapped his meaning in mystery as was the
case with others. His chief aim was to tell his story as
simply and cleanly as possible. This led him not to add to the language but to cut out or avoid all redundant literary
words and get back to simple but distinct style, Edward Wagenknecht says, "His writings is characteristically simple
to the point of brutality, concrete, emphatic as the rain of
bullets, largely monosyllabic and innocent of subordination" .i2
As learnt in Journalism, Hemingway was particular
in making precise and economical use of words. Therefore he
insisted on using not more but fewer words whose meaning
would be clear and unmistakable. According to him, the real
style was the plainest. He valued purity and honesty more
than ornamentation in getting the right vision on the paper.
He, as a writer, never communicated his emotions directly to the readers. He was of the view that a writer
cannot transfer his emotion or idea from his own mind direct
ly to his readers. It needs some kind of mediation of a set of objects, a situation or some events. Though he preferredsome kind of mediation, he always avoided irrelevant and
74unnecessary feelings and tried to present the right feelings
and the right emotions. His method was to describe emotions 7—----------- - (
as it was felt by him or his characters.
Even while expressing the emotion of the charac
ters in the most realistic manner Hemingway assumes that what
is visible on the surface is only about one eighth of the
totality of the experience that is being represented. This he
calls his Iceberg Theory in which he states that, 'Good
prose is like an iceberg with only a small part showing on 1the surface.9
He was keen about the fact that the author must
know what he is writing about. He should delete everything
that can be deleted in order to make his writings less chaot
ic. His technique of deleting or leaving half said and more
unsaid came to be known as the ’irony of the unsaid' e.g. In
some of his short stories, he makes use of understatement and
avoids using certain words. For example in his story of Hills
Like White Elephant the problem in the story is that of
abortion but nowhere in the story the word ’abortion* is
spoken. He was thus the master of the ’idiom of understate
ment. 9 He was of the view that a particular method of de
scribing an experience is that nothing should be said explic
itly about it. He expects the readers to grasp the situation
on their own. Thus by emphasizing the technique of under-
75statement Hemingway is found keeping with his own "Theory of
Iceberg".
Another interesting facet of Hemingway’s uniquestyle is his ’idea of fifth dimension prose." The idea came
to Hemingway as he wanted to write a new prose more precise
than the conventional prose. Infact this idea of fifth di~15menssional prose was originally used by P.D. Oupensky.
Malcolm Cowley dismissed this idea of fifth dimension as a
mystical or meaningless figure of speech. Whereas Hemingway
says that, "It is much more difficult than poetry. It is a
prose that has never been written. But it can be written16without tricks and without cheating.
The phrase "a fourth and fifth dimension* is
rather too vague. According to some critics, "the fourth
dimension* perhaps has something to do with the concept of
time and with fictional technique of describing it. They
think that "the fourth dimension* may be related to an
"aesthetic factor’ while ’the fifth dimension’ may be "an
ethical factor’. Though it is called as a mystical and mean
ingless figure of speech as F.I. Carpenter says, *It became a reality in Hemingway’s best fiction especially in The Old Man
and the Sea *. It is true when we find Hemingway’s narrative very simple, laconic and as said by Hemingway himself it iswithout tricks and without cheating.
76
Much has been written about Hemingway and his
style. Despite creating a unique style with all these features many critics attached his style by calling it remarka
bly unintelletual. In his fiction, Hemingway diapproved the
importance of mind and chiefly highlighted the physical
activities like hunting, fishing, eating, drinking all these
things show his escape from thought or mind.
Phillip Young supports this criticism and says,
"It is a remarkably unintellectual style. Events are de
scribed strictly in the sequence in which they occured, no
mind reorders or analyses them and perceptions come to the
reader unmixed with comment from the author. The impression,
therefore is of intense objectivity the writer providesIQnothing but stimuli...
It shows that Hemingway's habit of going away fromemotions and mind made many critics react in a rather
negative way. Critics like Leon Edel objected the very ideathat Hemingway has created a style by saying that, *1 wouldargue that Hemingway has not created a style. He has rather
created the artful illusion of a style for he is a clever
artist and there is a great deal of cleverness in all that he
has done. He has conjured up an effect of style by a process
of evasion, very much as he sets up an aura of emotion by1 <2making directly away from emotion.
77
©However^ Phillip Young challenged Leon Edel by
saying that ’For me Hemingway is next to Thoreau, the great"
est prose stylist in our literature. That is at the most. At
the very least, he is the writer of some of the cleanest,
freshest, subtlest, most brilliant and most moving prose of 20our times.
After a brief account of Hemingway as a novelist
and his prose style in general/ in the next chapter his style
in The Old Man and the Sea in particular is analysed thor- oughly.
78
REFERENCES :
1. Dr. Mundra ; Ernest Hemingway : The Impact of War on
his life and Works (Bareilly : Prakash Book Depot, 1988).
P. 84.
2. Ibid, P 180
3. Ibid, P. 180
4. Ernest Hemingway : The Old Han and the Sea (New Delhi :
INDUS, An Inprint of Harper Collins Publishers India Pvt,
Ltd, 1991). P. 80.
5. Dr. Mundra : Ernest Himingway : The impact of War on
his life and Works (Bareilly : Prakash Book Depot, 1988),
PP. 84,85
6. Philip Young : Ernest Hemingway ( London : G. Bell and
Sons Ltd. 1952). P. 144.
7. Ernest Hemingway : The Old Man and The Sea (New Delhi:
INDUS An Inprint of Harper Collin Publication India Pvt.
Ltd., 1991) PP. 69, 70.
8- A.F. Hotchner : Papa Hemingway A Personal Memoir (New
York : A Banton Book, A National Co., 1970) P. 75.
79
9. P.G. Rama Rao : Ernest Hemingway : A study in. Narrative
Technique. (New Oelhi : S. Chand & Co. Ltd., 1980), P. 101.
10. Dr. Mundra : Ernest Hemingway : The Impact of War on
his Life and Works (Bareilly:Prakash Book Depot,1988). P.159.
11. Ibid, P. 159
12. Edward Wagenknecht : Cavalcade of the American Novel,
(Delhi ; Oxford and IBH publishing Co., 1969). P. 372.
13. Dr. Mundra : Ernest Hemingway : The Impact of War on
his Life and Works. (Bareilly : Prakash Book Depot, 1988),
P.168.
14. Ibid, P. 168
15. Ibid, P. 174
16. Ibid, P. 174
17. Ibid, P. 174.
18. Ibid, P. 178.
19. Edel Leon : The Art of Evasion printed in Robert. P.Weeks (ed. ) Hemingway : A Collection of Critical Essays
(Englewood Cliffs, N.J. Prentice- Hall, Inc, 1962) . P.169-70.
20. Phillip Young : A Defense printed in Robert P. Weeks(ed.) Heminiqwa:v : A Collection of Critical Essavs (EnglewoodCliffs, J.N. Prentice - Hall, Inc, 1962). P.173.
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