If you want to get any sense of how Ernest Hemingway became a Nobel laureate and progenitor of a stylistic school in literature, don't read this book. Read one of his novels instead. This book focuses on the women he married to the extent that he might as well have been a car salesman as a writer.
The author Ernest Hemingway overlapped his wives: the next wife was his mistress towards the end of the tenure of the current wife. Thus first wife Hadley was replaced by her best friend Fife. Ernest was still married to Fife while carrying on an affair with journalist and author Martha Gellhorn who became Mrs H#3. Mary, the fourth wife, started sleeping with Ernest while he was married to Martha. Mary was, perhaps, lucky that Ernest shot himself (accident or suicide) before moving on from her.
This novel focuses on the overlaps. Which was a bit repetitive.
The narrative was from the perspective of the current wife, in the third person. The current time was written in the present tense; the flashbacks were narrated in the past tense.
The problem was that I wasn't particularly interested in the women. Apart from Martha, the other wives didn't really do anything exciting enough to warrant a biography (except marry Ernest). Perhaps this is why they only got a quarter of a biography each. But this compounded the problem. We never really grappled with any of them in depth.
Basically I was bored. I perked up a bit when we reached Martha. Martha Gellhorn was a journalist who became a great war correspondent, reminding me of photojournalist Lee Miller whom I learned about in the book The Age of Light and the film Lee. This book mentions her journalism and the novels she has written but, again, it doesn't really get into her as a writer. Focussing on her as a wife does her a disservice. It is said that she didn't want to become "a footnote in someone else's life" but this is exactly what she has become in this book.
On the plus side, I realised that I haven't read any Hemingway for a long, long time and I ought to go back to him.
Selected quotes:
- “The trees’ shadows pour onto the water like vinegar into oil.” (Ch 5)
- “The hangover: such a cure, she thinks, for overthinking.” (Ch 22) I'm not sure whether I like or dislike the double use of think in this sentence.
- “I put the needle on the same place in the same track and I expect a different tune.” (Ch 34)
- “His eyes are like the twin holes of a rifle.” (Ch 37) But does a rifle have two holes?
This was a book about the domestic circumstances of one of the major forces of twentieth century. It's a bit like writing a novel about the catering arrangements during the Olympic Games; I'd rather find out about the gold medallists.
September 2024; 317 pages
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