海明威对待命运的矛盾态度在其作品中的体现
HEMINGWAY’S CONTRADICTORY ATTITUDES
TOWARDS FATE MIRRORED IN HIS WORKS
by
Wu Zhihao
April, 2007
Xiaogan University
Abstract
The thesis shows Hemingway’s contradictory attitudes towards fate on the basis
of an analysis of the main characters in his three well-known novels. In The Sun Also
Rises, the protagonist Jake is unfortunate. His wound symbolizes the cruel fate as well
as Hemingway’s pessimistic attitude towards life. But Jake has changed from a
depressive to a person who has found the hope for life. His change reflects
Hemingway’s optimistic attitude: remaining a gleam of hope in despair. In A Farewell
to Arms, the death of Catherine, meaning the loss of love too cruel a fate for the
protagonist Henry to stand, reflects Hemingway’s pessimistic view of life and his disappointment at reality. But Henry has changed from a man treating life as a game
to a tough guy of duty who can face his heartbreak alone, which shows Hemingway’s
positive view of life. In The Old Man and the Sea, Hemingway reveals his positive
attitude towards fate through the protagonist Santiago’s unusual courage and optimism and reveals his pessimistic view of life through Santiago’s failure and
loneliness. But Hemingway also leaves a gleam of hope—Manolin. The boy will be the next champion not to be defeated.
Hemingway’s contradictory attitudes towards fate are fully demonstrated in the
protagonists’ fates in his works. The attitudes stemmed from his family background,
his complicated life experiences and the social reality in America at that time.
So we cannot simply see Hemingway’s attitudes towards life and fate as either optimistic or pessimistic. His attitudes are paradoxical. On the one hand, he admires
unyielding efforts and believes in the strength of human beings; on the other hand, he
reveals pessimistic attitude towards life that no matter how hard one tries, his efforts
are all for naught.
Key words: Hemingway; Contradictory attitudes; Towards; Fate
通过对海明威著名的三部小说中主要人物进行
可以看出海明威对待命
运的矛盾态度。《太阳照样升起》中的主人公杰克是不幸的,他的伤象征着残酷
的命运以及海明威对待生活的悲观态度。但是杰克改变了,从一个忧郁悲伤的人
转变成为一个找到了生活的希望的人。杰克的转变反映出海明威在绝望中保留一
丝希望的乐观态度。在《永别了,武器》中,凯瑟琳之死意味着爱情的失去,是
主人公亨利难以承受的残酷命运。它反映出海明威悲观的人生态度以及对现实的
失望之情。但是亨利从一个游戏人生的人转变为一个有责任感并独自承受巨大悲
伤的硬汉。亨利的转变显示出海明威积极的人生态度。《老人与海》中主人公圣
地亚哥非凡的勇气和乐观精神显示出海明威积极的人生态度,而圣地亚哥的失败
和孤独则显示出海明威悲观的人生态度。但海明威还是留下了一线希望—马洛
林。这个男孩将成为下一个不会被打败的胜利者。
海明威对待生活和命运的矛盾态度通过其作品中主人公的命运得到充分展
现。他的这一态度源于他的家庭背景, 他复杂的人生经历和当时美国的社会现实。
所以,不能简单地认为海明威对待命运的态度是乐观的或者是悲观的。他的
态度是矛盾的。一方面,海明威赞扬不屈不挠的努力,相信人类的奋斗精神;另
一方面,他显露出悲观的人生态度,即无论怎样努力,一切都是徒劳。
: 海明威; 对待; 命运;矛盾态度;
Contents
1. Introduction…………………………………………………………………….….1 1.1 About Hemingway’s three novels……………………………………………….1 1.2 The protagonists’ fates in the three novels……………………………………...1 2. An analysis of Hemingway’s attitudes towards fate …………………………….2 2.1 Attitudes towards fate in The Sun Also Rises…………………………………..2 2.2 Attitudes towards fate in A farewell to Arms…………………………………...4 2.3 Attitudes towards fate in The Old Man and the Sea……………………………6 2.4 The causes of Hemingway’s contradictory attitudes……………………………8 3. Conclusion………………………………………………………………………...10 Notes…………………………………………………………………………………10 Bibliography…………………………………………………………………………11
Hemingway’s Contradictory Attitudes Towards Fate
Mirrored in His Works
1. Introduction
1.1 About Hemingway’s three novels
Earnest Hemingway, an American novelist and short story writer, was awarded
the Nobel Prize for literature in 1954. He is one of the great American writers of the
th20 century. Lots of his works involve his own complicated life experiences,
including his participation of the two world wars and his enthusiasm for fishing,
hunting, bullfighting, etc. They are his autobiography to a large degree. Hemingway
reveals his own innermost feelings, including his contradictory attitudes towards life
and fate through the characters’ fates in his works.
With the publication of his first true novel The Sun Also Rises in 1926,
Hemingway was recognized as the spokesman of the Lost Generation and became an
international celebrity. The novel, sold more than one million copies during his
lifetime, is about some expatriates living in postwar Paris, who try to seek psychic
solace by eating, drinking, traveling, and lovemaking. In 1929 Hemingway published
A Farewell to Arms, another novel with World War?as its background. It tells of a
tragic wartime love affair between an ambulance driver and an English nurse. Both
the two books reflect an entire generation, including Hemingway himself, ruined by
the war physically and mentally. His last masterpiece, The Old Man and the Sea
printed in 1952, earned him the Pulitzer Prize in fiction for 1952, and was
instrumental in winning him the Nobel Prize two years later. It is a story of an old
Cuban fisherman, down on his luck, and his supreme ordeal—an agonizing battle with
a giant marlin on the sea. The three novels, together with For Whom the Bell Tolls,
are his main masterpieces, representing his great achievements in literature.
Most protagonists in Hemingway’s works have distinctive characteristics, such
as bravery, strong will and remaining graceful under pressure. They are well-known as
Hemingway Hero. Hemingway’s works usually share an exciting topic that how a tough guy braves and experiences hardships calmly and gracefully. But those
protagonists also reveal a pessimistic view of life from time to time. From those vivid
images’ determination as well as pessimism, Hemingway unfolds people’s great
physical and mental suffering in a certain times and reveals his contradictory attitudes
towards life and fate.
1.2 The protagonists’ fates in the three novels
The protagonist Jake in The Sun Also Rises is a symbol of despair, loneliness,
and melancholy. He is a typical image representing an entire generation who have torn
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by World War?and are grieving for the loss of their romantic idealism. Jake is injured during the summer of 1925 in Italy, which leads to his sexual dysfunction.
Later, he falls in love with Brett who loves him, too. But both of them are aware of
the impossibility of their having a life together. Jake suffers more than any other
person in this book physically as well as mentally, but finally he manages to seek
solace from fishing, swimming, tennis, and, especially, bullfighting. He finds the ring
of bullfighting is a new world on which he can concentrate his thoughts and feelings.
The bullfighters, together with the rising sun bringing warmth and brightness to the
world, symbolize his hope for life.
The protagonist Henry in A Farewell to Arms also represents the entire
generation ruined by World War?. He has been changed greatly by his violent
wounding, from a man treating life and love as a game to a tough guy of duty who can
face his heartbreak alone and continue his life bravely. He escapes from the battlefield
during the retreat and manages to arrive in Switzerland with Catherine. He begins to
understand the value of love and enjoy the true love. But before long he loses all of
that when Catherine dies of a difficult labor.
The protagonist Santiago in The Old Man and the Sea is a classic image of tough
guy in Hemingway’s works. Santiago, an old lonely Cuban fisherman with unusual courage and optimism, hooks and finally kills a giant marlin through days of
painstaking efforts far out in the Gulf Stream. But his capture is almost eaten up by
the sharks during the long voyage home.
2. An analysis of Hemingway’s attitudes towards fate
2.1 Attitudes towards fate in The Sun Also Rises
The Sun Also Rises is the first published long piece of fiction written by
Hemingway. The whole story is dominated by a tragic and depressing atmosphere.
The protagonist Jake represents an entire generation ruined by World War?. He loses
more than he deserves in the war, and even worse, he is disillusioned with traditional
American values of hard work. He meets Brett who is a nurse’s aid when he is injured
and sent to a hospital in Milan. They fall in love. But when Jake learns that he is
impotent, they decide to go their separate ways. They love one another, but they feel
there is nothing they can do about the cruel reality. It is painful and destructive for
them to be together. When they meet in England again, they discover that they are still
in love. However, their love ends in misery.
Jake’s wound is not life-threatening, but it is too cruel for anyone to bear. It
deprives Jake of the right of being a normal man. Except grieving for his misfortune
and his lost love alone, he can do nothing about his wound, which actually symbolizes
the unchangeable and terrible fate. He loses much more during the celebration in
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Spain, for his love and respect for Brett have been tarnished. What sustained him is
gone. Undoubtedly, he is one of the most lonely and tragic characters in Hemingway’s
works.
By describing Jake’s suffering and despair, Hemingway reveals his own pains and sorrows when his idealism has been ruined by World War?. After the war,
people’s interest on Hemingway’s bravery on the battlefield gradually cooled, and Hemingway, suffering from the wound and the terrible recollection of the war, led a
humble life. He even could not have enough money for food. His passion and
idealism before he participated the war had turned into deep disappointment, or even,
hatred towards the reality and society. He felt that he had been cheated and everything
was a lie and life, dominated by fate, was painful and aimless. People could not
change their unfortunate fates no matter how hard they tried. The only thing they
could do was suffering the endless misery silently like Jake.
But it is an oversimplification to regard Hemingway as a pessimist just according
to the description of Jake’s misfortune. Jake finally manages to learn how to make a life for himself, seeking solace from his work, sports, swimming, bicycle racing,
observing box, fishing, and especially, bullfighting. His wound has nothing to do with
his relationships with man, and he makes a lot of male friends. He is satisfied with his
life in a man’s world and he has become a tough guy who can brave and shoulder
pains and sorrows alone. He gets solace from the ring of bullfighting and those
masculine bullfighters belonging to the man’s world. The ring of bullfighting serves
as a psychic refuge for him. The sun, rising every day in the east, brings warmth and
bright to the world and implies that life will continue its process no matter how hard it
is and that people should not lose heart but should remain a ray of hope in despair and
continue their lives bravely. The mortals’ vexations are so negligible in comparison with the eternal sun. Jake’s change and his strong in mind reflect that Hemingway does not lose all his hope for life,
Hemingway is by no means a pessimist denying everything in the world. Instead,
he believes there are a lot of beautiful things and hopes, such as the rising sun and the
ring of bullfighting, in life. One may fail in one field as Jake loses his love and the
right of being a normal man, but one can be successful in other fields as Jake gets rid
of his decadent attitude towards life and finds something sustaining him to continue
his life. In spite of Hemingway’s disappointment at reality, he did not completely lose his hope for life. His personality prevented him from taking a decadent attitude
towards life. Actually, when he led a humble life in Paris in the expectation of
achieving his objective of being a successfully professional writer, he never had an
idea of giving up even during the hardest times when he hardly had anything to eat.
The change of Jake embodies Hemingway’s strong will and the optimistic attitude
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towards life. So The Sun Also Rises is a tragicomedy rather than an absolute tragedy.
In this novel, Hemingway reveals his contradictory attitudes towards fate mixed by
disappointment and hopefulness for life.
2.2 Attitudes towards fate in A Farewell to Arms
Hemingway’s contradictory attitudes towards fate are also mirrored in A
Farewell to Arms. During World War?, Hemingway served a few weeks as a Red
Cross ambulance driver on the Italian front in 1918 before being injured by an
Austrian mortar burst. In the Milan hospital, he fell in love with an American nurse
who was eight years older than he was and who eventually refused to marry him. His
wound and the failure of his first true love are a heavy blow to him. A Farewell to
Arms is Hemingway’s autobiography to a large extent. One of the main differences
between the protagonist Henry and Hemingway is that Henry understands the war in a
way that Hemingway never did in Italy at the age of nineteen. That is the reason why
Henry holds a decadent attitude towards the war and life and treats life and love as a
game.
There is a sharp contrast between Henry’s decadence and Hemingway’ zest
during the war. At first, Henry treats his relationship with Catherine as a game. When
Henry kissed Catherine, “Oh, darling,” she said, “You will be good to me, won’t
you?” “What the hell, I thought. I stroke her hair and patted her shoulder. She was
crying.”
[1] A piece of his monologue reveals his view of love and life at that time. “I
knew I did not love Catherine Barkley nor had any idea of loving her. This was a
game, like bridge, in which you said things instead of playing cards. Like bridge you
[2]had to pretend you were playing for money or playing for some stakes.” Henry’s
decadence actually reflects Hemingway’s disappointment and pessimism towards life
and the social reality when Hemingway understood the truth about the war a few
years later on. Hemingway, tortured by his wound and the terrible recollection of the
war, was depressed and suffered from insomnia. He began to view the war in a new
way, understanding the so-called glory and the salvation of democracy in the world
were nothing but nonsense and he was cheated by the political propaganda. .
But Henry has been changed greatly by his violent wounding. He begins to
understand the vulnerability of life and the value of true love and his feelings, habits,
and character alter. His escape during the retreat is by no means cowardliness but a
farewell to arms and the pursuit of life, peace and love. The most exciting and
beautiful scene in the story is when Henry and Catherine meet again. “That night at
the hotel, …outside the windows the rain falling and in the room light and pleasant
and cheerful, …feeling that we had come home, feeling no longer alone waking in the
night to find the other one there, and not gone away…”
[3] As for Henry, it is a farewell
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not only to arms, but also to the decadent self and those abstract notions such as faith,
honor, and patriotism and it is a beginning of being a man of duty who has understood
the significant meanings of life and love.
Finally Henry and Catherine successfully arrive in Switzerland, where they enjoy
the happiest days in their lives. In the novel, the rural scenery in the neutral country is
described like a fairyland. “ In front of the house where we lived the mountain went
down steeply to the little plain along the lake …There was an island with two trees on the lake and the trees looked like the double sails of a fishing-boat. The mountains
were sharp and steep on the other side of the lake…”[4] At there, Henry and Catherine
enjoy the happy life to their heart’s content.
By describing the change of Henry and the true love between him and Catherine,
Hemingway is in praise of the beauty in life and demonstrates his positive view of life.
Henry and Catherine’s happy life in Switzerland symbolizes beauty and hope, serving
as a solace to people who are suffering the cruelty of war and life. The picturesque
and serene land is an idealistic shelter from the disappointing reality. Hemingway
thinks that one should grasp opportunity and take action without any hesitation to
change his life and fate like Henry’s resolute farewell to arms and one should not
succumb to misery but should try to break away from it to create a promising future. It
is an optimistic and positive attitude towards life.
However, as the story goes on, the couple are confronted with tragic fate again.
Catherine delivers a stillborn baby boy and, later that night, dies of a hemorrhage.
Catherine is a perfect character in the story, representing kindness, gentleness, honesty
and strong mind. She is the incarnation of Hemingway’s first love. Catherine’s death
symbolizes the uncontrollable and terrible fate and human beings’ doom. Much as
Henry loves Catherine, he can do nothing about her difficult labor; skillful as the
surgeon, he can only postpone death for a little while instead of saving Catherine or
her baby. It is a world where people are all permanently at risk and have little control.
Hemingway cannot offer a satisfactory explanation to the destroy of beauty in
life. It is the world, he thinks, that “kills the very good and the very gentle and the
very brave impartially”, and “If people bring so much courage to this world the world
has to kill them to break them, so of course it kills them.”
[5] Like the ants on a log in
the fire, it is impossible for people to escape from inevitable misery and defeat no
matter how hard they try. Hemingway, seized by pessimism again, sees life as an
agonizing and helpless process in which man is negligible, fragile and is predestined
to be defeated.
At the end of the story, Henry, a changed man, bears his heartbreak with an
astonishing endurance. By writing short and concrete words and dialogues,
Hemingway impresses the readers with Henry’s great pain and, more important, his
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strong will. “You can’t come in now,” one of the nurses said. “Yes, I can.” I said.
[6]“You can’t come in yet.” “You get out,” I said. “The other one too.” Behind the seemingly plain words are Henry’s heartbreak and endurance. Then Henry “went out
[7]and left the hospital and walked back to the hotel in the rain.” He has become a genuinely tough guy who can endure agony on his own calmly. Undoubtedly, Henry
will continue his life firmly and live his life according to his principles instead of
slipping back into his old decadent lifestyle. In the dominant tragic atmosphere,
Hemingway leaves a gleam of hope to the readers, encouraging them to face
hardships bravely and remain a gleam of hope in despair, which is a positive view of
life.
In this novel, Hemingway’s attitudes towards life and fate are contradictory. On
the one hand, he thinks life is hopeless and is predestined to end in misery; on the
other hand, he refuses to reconcile himself to the dominance of fate, considering the
future still hopeful.
2.3 Attitudes towards fate in The Old Man and the Sea
Hemingway’s contradictory attitudes towards fate are also mirrored in The Old
Man and the Sea. This novel is Hemingway’s last masterpiece and one of his most
enduring works. Written in 1952, this hugely successfully novel confirmed his power
and presence in the literary world and played a huge part in his winning the 1954
Nobel Prize for literature.
The protagonist Santiago is a typical Hemingway Hero with unusually optimism
and endurance. Living in a shack and hardly having anything to eat, he still talks
about baseball match enthusiastically with the boy who is his former apprentice. He
does not take a fish for 84 days and his beloved apprentice has forced to leave to him.
In that condition, his eyes “were the same color as the sea and were cheerful and
undefeated.”
[8][9] He says to the boy, “I feel confident today.”And, “Eighty-five is a lucky number,” the old man said. “How would you like to see me bring one in that
[10]dressed out over a thousand pounds?” When the boy wonders why the old man’s eyes are still good after years of turtle-ing that is very harmful to the eyes, the old man
[11]says, “I am a strange old man.” For Hemingway, the word “strange” not only means unusual courage and optimism, but also symbolizes human beings’ strength and resolution to brave hardships and to challenge life and fate, which is what
Hemingway most admires. In the skiff, before the giant fish has been hooked,
Santiago says, “My big fish must be somewhere.”[12] During the days of agonizing
battle with the fish, he says, “I am glad we do not have to try to kill the stars.” “But
[13]imagine if a man each day should have to try to kill the sun? We were born lucky.” Finally Santiago succeeds to kill the fish. But during the long voyage home, he is
6
confronted with more powerful enemy—the sharks. Although he is exhausted and
knows in his heart that his chance of winning is slim, he tries his best to fight against
[14]them. He thinks, “It is silly not to hope.” “Fight them,” he said. “I’ll fight them
[15] until I die.”
The sea is a stage where Santiago fully demonstrates his courage, confidence,
and optimism, which represent human beings’ resolution and dignity under pressure.
The intense fight between Santiago who symbolizes the champion in society and the
giant marlin that symbolizes the champion in nature ends in Santiago’s success. By creating the image of Santiago, Hemingway reveals his admiration for the immortal
spirit of not giving way to pressure and his optimistic view of life. Santiago, an old
man in a shabby skiff, finally killed the champion in nature. It illustrates that man can
achieve his objective through unyielding efforts and the key to winning is not giving
up even in the severest conditions. Optimism is the reflection of this spirit, for it
means remaining a gleam of hope in face of difficulty and believing in the brilliance
of the future. As Santiago says to the boy, “Tomorrow is going to be a good day,”[16]
he does not get discouraged about his bad luck, instead, he believes that things will be
better. It is optimism that supports him to fight unyieldingly. Through Santiago’s
unusual courage and optimism, Hemingway reveals his positive and optimistic
attitude towards life and fate.
But veiled by the seeming optimism and confidence, the whole story is pervaded
by an atmosphere of depression and despair. From the beginning of the story, Santiago
is in a mood mixed by cheerfulness and gloom. The readers can perceive his deep
loneliness. Except the boy, Santiago hardly has any friend. In his shack, there is only
“a bed, a table, one chair, and a place on the dirt floor to cook with charcoal.”[17] He
has taken his wife’s photograph down from the wall “because it made him too lonely
[18] [19]to see it…”When he is asleep, “there was no life in his face.” A fisherman’s life
[20]is lonely. “Most of the boats were silent except for the dip of the oars.” “No one
[21]should be alone in their old age, he thought. But it is unavoidable.” Behind his
loneliness is his deep disappointment about life and society. The sea, however, is like
a kind, beautiful, but very cruel woman and the porpoises and the flying fish are his
brothers. He even loves and respects the hooked giant marlin and he also sees it as his
brother. The sea, including all the living things in it, is another world in Santiago’s life.
In that world, he can pour out his innermost feelings, including the occasional
diffidence and pessimism that he never reveals in the land world. Although he does
not believe in religion, he prays God many times for help on the sea. During his
agonizing battle with the giant marlin, he says aloud that he wishes he had the boy for
nine times. He even says, “Perhaps I should not have been a fisherman…”[22] The sea
provides him with a temporary shelter from the loneliness and misfortune in the land
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world. The loneliness and melancholy of Santiago reflects Hemingway’s pessimistic
attitude towards life and his passive thoughts of turning a blind eye to reality.
Hemingway’s pessimism is especially reflected in the failure of Santiago. The
sharks symbolize the abominable fate too hard for people to overcome. The first
appearance of the sharks has announced Santiago’s failure. Much as he tries, he can
do little about his capture’s being robbed by the terrible animals. Santiago “knew he
was beaten now finally and without remedy…”[23] The world is full of misery and
disappointment and the so-called tough guy as well as spiritual success is just a
consolation for people. No matter how hard man tries, his effort, like the marlin’s
[24]skeleton, is for naught. “A man can be destroyed but not defeated.” Behind the seemingly exciting words are Hemingway’s innermost feelings of despair and
helplessness. The striking contrast between Santiago’s spiritual success and his material failure, between his days of painstaking efforts and the giant skeleton,
embodies the embarrassment Hemingway was suffering both in his life and in his
writing career. He hoped to be the best all the time, but he was at his wits’ end in his later years.
Like the ring of bullfighting and the rising sun in The Sun Also Rises and Henry’s
endurance in A Farewell to Arms, Hemingway also leaves a gleam of hope—Manolin. The boy is faithful, kindhearted and strong-minded, representing the advanced
productive force and human beings’ hope. He will be the next champion not to be
destroyed. It is admirable of Hemingway to keep a slight hope in despair. When he
wrote The Old Man and the Sea, his physical and mental state began to deteriorate. He
reveals his contradictory attitudes towards fate through Santiago’s characteristics and fate.
2.4 The causes of Hemingway’s contradictory attitudes
Hemingway’s contradictory attitudes towards fate stemmed from his family
background, his complicated life experiences and the social reality in America at that
time.
Hemingway was born in a comfortable middle-class family in Oak Park, Illinois,
on July 21, 1899. His father was a physician with a passion for hunting and fishing.
His mother, on the contrary, was interested in culture and arts. His parents, completely
different in characters and interests, were both stubborn and self-opinionated.
Although they were not in harmony with each other, they both cared about
Hemingway and hoped to influence and cultivate their son according to their own
interests and characters. Therefore, Hemingway formed a character mixed by bravery
and an artistic temperament. Behind the seeming blessing was a curse for Hemingway.
The contradictory educational styles actually had a negative effect on immature
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Hemingway’s mind. His passion for the outdoors helped him to form a distinctive
personality that he could be the best in whatever he did while his artistic temperament
contributed to his sensitivity and melancholy. Hemingway was outwardly strong, but
inwardly fragile. His contradictory attitudes towards life and fate were a reflection of
the conflict of the educational styles in his family.
When Hemingway was a high school student, his attitudes towards life were
mainly positive. He believed that one could succeed as long as one made great efforts.
Ideal, energy, plus the political propaganda, made the young generation, including
Hemingway himself, seething with righteousness. He and a lot of ardent youngsters
enlisted and went to the battlefield in Europe, harboring an ideal of the salvation of
democracy. But World War?changed them greatly.
Hemingway was seriously injured during the war. His wound and the cruelty of
the war tortured him for the rest of his life. In addition, the failure of his first real
romance saddened him for a long time, making him develop a feeling of distrust or,
more exactly, hatred about woman. It is one of the reasons why most Hemingway’s
works belong to man’s world. The years after the war witnessed the doubt about conventional morality and the emergence of new trends of thoughts in America. The
American society of the 1920s was an aureate symphony with the taste of money and
desire. The American Dream, based on dollars, had become the dominant ideal and
doctrine in spirit with corruption beneath prosperity. Torn by the war physically and
mentally and bewildered by the change in society, Hemingway began to doubt what
he had firmly believed and began to develop a pessimistic view of life. But he was
reluctant to give up his belief in the strength of human beings and the positive attitude
towards life. This dilemma is first reflected in The Sun Also Rises, making him the
leader of the Lost Generation. During his writing of the book, his father committed
suicide. This event depressed Hemingway deeply and impressed him the vulnerability
of life. He began to consider society an absurd, brutal, and irrational existence full of
violence and evil.
Hemingway also suffered from loneliness. As a professional writer, he had to
endure loneliness. He reveals his fear and hatred of loneliness through Santiago’s
lonely life. In The Old Man and the Sea, Santiago also suffers from loneliness. He
talks with a bird perching on his boat and sees the porpoises and the flying fish as his
brother. Hemingway’s loneliness is also reflected in the similar topic of many his works that how a strong-minded man braves hardships on his own. His loneliness is
one of the reasons why he developed a pessimistic view of life.
During the 1950’s, Hemingway’s conditions were from bad to worse. In January
1954, Hemingway and his wife survived two plane crashes in two days. In addition to
a “full-scale concussion, his injuries included a ruptured liver, spleen, and kidney,
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temporary loss of vision in the left eye, loss of hearing in the left ear, a crushed
vertebra, a sprained right arm and shoulder, a sprained left leg, paralysis of the
[25]sphincter, and first degree burns on his face, arms, and head.” As winner of the
1954 Nobel Prize for literature, he was even unable to attend the ceremony owing to
his poor health. In his later years, he began to suffer from diabetes, high blood
pressure, and cirrhosis of the liver. In order to combat the pain, he drank more heavily,
which made his conditions even worse. His mental state began to deteriorate as well,
and he experienced bouts of extreme paranoia. The electroshock treatments destroyed
much of his short-term memory. In that condition, Hemingway still kept a gleam of
hope. He tried to write, but the books written during that period were not satisfactory.
The exhaustion of his literary talent broke his last hope for life, but his ideal and
personality forbade him to reconcile. He hoped to face his failure calmly as Santiago
did, but he could not make it. In despair, he committed suicide. He refused to submit
to the dominance of fate by killing himself.
3. Conclusion
So we cannot simply see Hemingway’s attitudes towards life and fate as either optimistic or pessimistic. The tragic topic and the characters’ misery in Hemingway’s
works cannot justify a conclusion that he is a fatalist. Likewise, the characters’
unusual courage and optimism in his works are insufficient to support an opinion that
he is a positive who firmly believes in the strength of human beings. Hemingway’s
attitudes towards life and fate are paradoxical. On the one hand, he admires
unyielding effort and believes that one can succeed through painstaking efforts; on the
other hand, he reveals the pessimistic thoughts that no matter how hard one tries, his
efforts are all for naught.
The readers, however, might not develop a negative attitude towards life or even
to the extent of committing suicide. On the contrary, they could learn a lot about how
to brave hardships and about keeping a glimmer of hope in despair, in which the
perpetual charm of Hemingway’s works lies.
NOTES
[1], [2], [3], [4], [5], [6], [7] Ernest Hemingway, A Farewell to Arms (Xi’an: World
Publishing Company, 2004), p.16, 18, 164, 189, 164, 218, 218.
[8], [9], [10], [11], [12], [13], [14], [15], [16], [17], [18], [19], [20], [21], [22], [23], [24]
Ernest Hemingway, The Old Man and the Sea (Nanjing: Yilin Press, 2001), p.2, 19, 9, 7, 28, 70,
101, 112, 6, 8, 8, 11, 21, 41, 44, 116, 99.
[25] Carlos Baker, Ernest Hemingway: A Life Story (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons,
1969), p.522.
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