# Hemingway's writing style. Am I being whooshed? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [April 25, 2012, 1:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hemingways-writing-style-am-i-being-whooshed/619902 "2012-04-25T13:43:03Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Maggie\_the\_Ocelot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/df705f/32.png) [@Maggie\_the\_Ocelot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maggie_the_Ocelot)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2012, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hemingways-writing-style-am-i-being-whooshed/619902/21 "2012-04-25T20:19:48Z")
Meh. I like a beautifully turned phrase better than a terse one. > [@](#): > > Originally posted by **Ray Bradbury** > > THE OCTOBER COUNTRY … that country where it is always turning late in the year. That country where the hills are fog and the rivers are mist; where noons go quickly, dusks and twilights linger, and midnights stay. That country composed in the main of cellars, sub-cellars, coalbins, closets, attics, and pantries faced away from the sun. That country whose people are autumn people, thinking only autumn thoughts. Whose people passing at night on the empty walks sound like rain… ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2012, 8:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hemingways-writing-style-am-i-being-whooshed/619902/22 "2012-04-25T20:23:22Z")
Hemingway managed, with very few pages, to say what could be said in no pages at all. ---
**Author:** ![Imago](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/85e7bf/32.png) [@Imago](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Imago)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2012, 10:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hemingways-writing-style-am-i-being-whooshed/619902/23 "2012-04-25T22:13:47Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > It is not surprising that those raised on nearly 100 years of tough, terse, post-Hemingway writing don’t see what’s so new. Seeing, hearing words like “tough” and “terse” makes me very badly want to read a thing- perhaps I’d like Hemingway’s literary successors more than himself. Drop me a few names, and I’ll check them out if I haven’t already read them. > [@Wakinyan](#): > > It is not “macho”, quite the opposite, it is suppressed _feeling_. He is simply one hell of a writer – fascinating stuff. Hmm. You know, maybe part of my problem is also that I totally expected an awful lot of something or other that could be construed as macho- the closest word I can pull out my backside right now is “unflinching”. And maybe a shitload of people before me read it, missed the bits where he (expertly, and no doubt intentionally) flinches, liked it, recommended it and that’s why I keep feeling like there’s a gulf between Hemingway’s rep and his actual body of work. Maybe I’ll never know exactly why I’m not drawn to Hemingway. In which case I’m probably doomed to keep picking him up every once in a while and scratching my head. ---
**Author:** ![NAF1138](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/naf1138/32/3245_2.png) [@NAF1138](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NAF1138)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2012, 11:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hemingways-writing-style-am-i-being-whooshed/619902/24 "2012-04-25T23:21:35Z")
> [@Imago](#): > > Seeing, hearing words like “tough” and “terse” makes me very badly want to read a thing- perhaps I’d like Hemingway’s literary successors more than himself. Drop me a few names, and I’ll check them out if I haven’t already read them. Sure. Everyone writing after about 1940 in any vaguely literary way who isn’t consciously trying to ape James Joyce instead. 😉 Ok, that is a bit of an exaggeration, but only a bit of one. Maggie the Ocelot quoted Bradbury as a contradiction to the style of Hemingway, but I think it serves better as an example of his influence. Contrast that quote with, > [@Lord Dunsanay](#): > > And at that moment a wind came out of the northwest, and entered the woods and bared the golden branches, and danced over the downs, and led a company of scarlet and golden leaves, that had dreaded this day but danced now it had come; and away with a riot of dancing and glory of colour, high in the light of the sun that had set from the sight of the fields, went wind and leaves together or > [@Lovecraft](#): > > What it is, only God knows. In terms of matter I suppose the thing Ammi described would be called a gas, but this gas obeyed the laws that are not of our cosmos. This was no fruit of such worlds and suns as shine on the telescopes and photographic plates of our observatories. This was no breath from the skies whose motions and dimensions our astronomers measure or deem too vast to measure. It was just a colour out of space — a frightful messenger from unformed realms of infinity beyond all Nature as we know it; from realms whose mere existence stuns the brain and numbs us with the black extra-cosmic gulfs it throws open before our frenzied eyes. and you can see that even Science Fiction started getting to the point rather quickly. ---
**Author:** ![NAF1138](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/naf1138/32/3245_2.png) [@NAF1138](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NAF1138)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2012, 11:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hemingways-writing-style-am-i-being-whooshed/619902/25 "2012-04-25T23:29:03Z")
> [@Imago](#): > > Maybe I’ll never know exactly why I’m not drawn to Hemingway. In which case I’m probably doomed to keep picking him up every once in a while and scratching my head. Out of curiosity what have you read? I am not saying you will like him if you try something else, but you might get a better feel for the style reading something other that those two longer works you mentioned. \*The Sun Also Rises \*is more on the extreme side, but his early short stories are really where it is at if you just want to see the style. “The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber” “The Snows of Kilimanjaro” “A Very Short Story” “Big Two Hearted River” Parts I and II “Hills Like White Elephants” “The Killers” and “A Clean, Well Lighted Place” are good ones to try. Hey, they are short. And you should really get a good sample of the man’s work before you toss it aside. ---
**Author:** ![NAF1138](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/naf1138/32/3245_2.png) [@NAF1138](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NAF1138)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2012, 11:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hemingways-writing-style-am-i-being-whooshed/619902/26 "2012-04-25T23:38:06Z")
Triple post! After writing that last post I decided to see if I could find “A Very Short Story” online. It is, after all, very short. [Here it is.](http://records.viu.ca/~lanes/english/hemngway/vershort.htm) It should take about 5 minutes to read and is an extreme example of his style. ---
**Author:** ![Inner\_Stickler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inner_stickler/32/318_2.png) [@Inner\_Stickler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inner_Stickler)\ **Post date:** [April 25, 2012, 11:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hemingways-writing-style-am-i-being-whooshed/619902/27 "2012-04-25T23:57:51Z")
Poor Luz! That was interesting. I will have to read more of his stuff. ---
**Author:** ![NAF1138](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/naf1138/32/3245_2.png) [@NAF1138](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NAF1138)\ **Post date:** [April 26, 2012, 12:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hemingways-writing-style-am-i-being-whooshed/619902/28 "2012-04-26T00:25:50Z")
> [@Inner\_Stickler](#): > > Poor Luz! > > That was interesting. I will have to read more of his stuff. I agree. It is generally viewed as misogynistic but I never saw it that way. But that’s one of the things I do like about Hemingway, it is very open to interpretation. You can easily find many 10-15 page critical essays on that very short story. ---
**Author:** ![Southern\_Yankee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/southern_yankee/32/2800_2.png) [@Southern\_Yankee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Southern_Yankee)\ **Post date:** [April 26, 2012, 1:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hemingways-writing-style-am-i-being-whooshed/619902/29 "2012-04-26T01:35:49Z")
I’m a big fan. Like it or not, his style was a major change in literature at the time. That’s not why I’m a fan, btw. I’m no scholar, but I always felt he was very good at writing about a specific set of traits (honor, fear, loyalty among them) from the male perspective. He wrote very personally. His style was certainly deliberate, and came from his journalism background. The Old Man and the Sea is about as perfect a short story (novella) as was ever written, IMO. ---
**Author:** ![WordMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e8c25b/32.png) [@WordMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WordMan)\ **Post date:** [April 26, 2012, 3:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hemingways-writing-style-am-i-being-whooshed/619902/30 "2012-04-26T03:32:44Z")
Read A Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber. You will remember where you were when you read it. Look, he innovated in his style vs what came before - that matters. But read stories like this and you see that he gets it right every now and then… ---
**Author:** ![Tarwater](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/9de0a6/32.png) [@Tarwater](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tarwater)\ **Post date:** [April 26, 2012, 4:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hemingways-writing-style-am-i-being-whooshed/619902/31 "2012-04-26T04:40:57Z")
> [@Maggie\_the\_Ocelot](#): > > Meh. I like a beautifully turned phrase better than a terse one. I prefer both: [QUOTE=Hemingway] In the fall the war was always there, but we did not go to it any more. It was cold in the fall in Milan and the dark came very early. Then the electric lights came on, and it was pleasant along the streets looking in the windows. There was much game hanging outside the shops, and the snow powdered in the fur of the foxes and the wind blew their tails. The deer hung stiff and heavy and empty, and small birds blew in the wind and the wind turned their feathers. It was a cold fall and the wind came down from the mountains. [/QUOTE] EDIT: > [@Southern\_Yankee](#): > > I’m a big fan. Like it or not, his style was a major change in literature at the time. That’s not why I’m a fan, btw. I’m no scholar, but I always felt he was very good at writing about a specific set of traits (honor, fear, loyalty among them) from the male perspective. He wrote very personally. His style was certainly deliberate, and came from his journalism background. The Old Man and the Sea is about as perfect a short story (novella) as was ever written, IMO. Hemingway arrived at his style after Ezra Pound told him off for writing self-indulgent and flowery prose. His style, as most people would recognize it, came into existence once he started consciouslty lifting it from Gertrude Stein. ---
**Author:** ![Hazle\_Weatherfield](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Hazle\_Weatherfield](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hazle_Weatherfield)\ **Post date:** [April 26, 2012, 6:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hemingways-writing-style-am-i-being-whooshed/619902/32 "2012-04-26T06:18:38Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Hemingway managed, with very few pages, to say what could be said in no pages at all. Effing brilliant! And I even like Hemingway. 😛 ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [April 26, 2012, 9:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hemingways-writing-style-am-i-being-whooshed/619902/33 "2012-04-26T09:58:06Z")
> [@NAF1138](#): > > Triple post! > > After writing that last post I decided to see if I could find “A Very Short Story” online. It is, after all, very short. > > [Here it is.](http://records.viu.ca/~lanes/english/hemngway/vershort.htm) It should take about 5 minutes to read and is an extreme example of his style. Yeah, that’s an interesting project, but a short story? I’m sorry, but I can’t call it that. It’s a bunch of disjointed segments, some of which depending on you haven’t already read it to make sense. For example, “After he got on crutches he used to take the temperatures so Luz would not have to get up from the bed. There were only a few patients, and they all knew about it. They all liked Luz.”–that reads to me like Luz has an illness of some kind that makes her have to stay in bed, and that everyone, not just the main character has a crush on Luz. The only other Hemmingway piece I’ve read is “The Old Man and the Sea”, and my impression there was actually that he goes on and on about nothing. What I remember is entirely an internal monolog without any importance. It read like someone trying to give meaning to the mundane, like trying to catch a fish. Again, interesting for what it was, but nothing I would seek out. Then again, my requirement for any piece of literature is that the story is interesting even without any symbolism, without anything but a surface understanding of what’s going on. Hemmingway seems to go about it the entirely opposite direction: taking what on the surface should be uninteresting and trying to make it so. But I can’t get past that surface because it’s so flimsy. ---
**Author:** ![Imago](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/85e7bf/32.png) [@Imago](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Imago)\ **Post date:** [April 26, 2012, 12:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hemingways-writing-style-am-i-being-whooshed/619902/34 "2012-04-26T12:59:22Z")
Aie! No! Getting to the point and one’s writing being terse or tough are different things. To be terse is to be impolite in the interest of being efficient, so in writing I would think there’d be a certain tension with the reader born of the writer’s earnestness. I’ve yet to find that _anywhere_, let alone in Hemingway. Nor does one have to get to the point for their prose to be tough- my definition of “tough” would simply be effective writing, something that kicks you hard in the guts emotionally without shying away from the harsh bits. > [@WordMan](#): > > Read A Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber. You will remember where you were when you read it. I read it before. I don’t remember where I was when I read it. Here’s what I’ve read besides it, in no order: A Farewell to Arms The Sun Also Rises The Old Man and the Sea For Whom the Bell Tolls The Snows of Kilimanjaro I really don’t think, regardless of how little time it takes, I can be persuaded to read more. I did just read “A Very Short Story” and regret to say it left me untouched. Poor Luz? More like poor shop girl (gonorrhea isn’t fun for anything anatomically female). Think I’ll just go back to David Sedaris now. ---
**Author:** ![NAF1138](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/naf1138/32/3245_2.png) [@NAF1138](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NAF1138)\ **Post date:** [April 26, 2012, 1:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hemingways-writing-style-am-i-being-whooshed/619902/35 "2012-04-26T13:37:45Z")
> [@Imago](#): > > Aie! No! Getting to the point and one’s writing being terse or tough are different things. > > To be terse is to be impolite in the interest of being efficient, so in writing I would think there’d be a certain tension with the reader born of the writer’s earnestness. I’ve yet to find that _anywhere_, let alone in Hemingway. > > Nor does one have to get to the point for their prose to be tough- my definition of “tough” would simply be effective writing, something that kicks you hard in the guts emotionally without shying away from the harsh bits. Raymond Chandler is what you are looking for. Elmore Leonard too, though not all of his work is created equal, so tread lightly. James Cain and Dashiell Hammet to a lesser extent. When people talk about terseness in Hemingway they mean passages like this: > [@a very short story](#): > > Luz stayed on night duty for three months. They were glad to let her. When they operated on him she prepared him for the operating table; and they had a joke about friend or enema. He went under the anaesthetic holding tight on to himself so he would not blab about anything during the silly, talky time. After he got on crutches he used to take the temperatures so Luz would not have to get up from the bed. There were only a few patients, and they all knew about it. They all liked Luz. As he walked back along the halls he thought of Luz in his bed. Where he describes fully everything he thinks you need to know about a 3 month long, blazing hot love affair in 8 sentences. You learn about who he is, what he is afraid of, how their relationship worked, how people view Luz, and a lot about both of their personalities in those 8 sentences. Three months of intense, white hot passion, boiled down to just the most important bits. Like I said, it’s an extreme example which is why I suggested it. Maybe, as BigT suggests, she stays in bed because she is sick. Maybe she is tired because it’s the night shift? Maybe she is pregnant? Maybe she is just exhausted from the fucking they were doing? Maybe some of all of the above? The only thing that is certain is that they are sharing his bed every night, and it’s the only thing that is certain because it’s the only thing that is important. The rest is all extra, fill it in yourself. > [@](#): > > I really don’t think, regardless of how little time it takes, I can be persuaded to read more. I did just read “A Very Short Story” and regret to say it left me untouched. Poor Luz? More like poor shop girl (gonorrhea isn’t fun for anything anatomically female). Think I’ll just go back to David Sedaris now. Regret nothing. I think I have figured out what you are looking for, and I agree, you won’t find it in Hemingway, it’s not what he did. The descriptions that people give to his writing mean a different thing to them than they do to you. “A Very Short Story” isn’t his best work, but it is a very good example of the far extreme of his style. He leaves a lot out. He doesn’t describe anything that isn’t 100% essential, and then leaves the reader to figure out and fill in the rest. (This isn’t what people mean either, and it isn’t what was most influential about his writing, but it is the most important thing about his writing.) You get impressions that you then fill in with your own experiences. Hemingway subscribed to what my 7th grade English teacher pounded into our heads as the iceberg theory of writing. 10% is on the surface, everything else is below the surface. It’s exactly what BigT described, but he viewed it as a feature not a bug. I say poor Luz because I read that story and see a picture of a woman who was infatuated with her hospital lover, and who was romantically in love with the idea of being in love. While he is away they are still bonded by the immediacy of the war and what was, but once the war is over they drift apart (physically and emotionally) and she once again falls in love with another soldier, is likely impregnated by that soldier, and the cycle starts again. It’s sad. His story is sad too, but differently sad. No joke, you can read a 20 page critique of the story as misogynistic autobiography on google books right now that will give you a totally different take and it doesn’t feel like there critic is over analyzing anything. There is a lot of “there” there. [Here](http://books.google.com/books?id=9ps69UBMNqcC&pg=PA33&lpg=PA33&dq=hemingway+a+very+short+story+analysis&source=bl&ots=8r-Oj1OXeJ&sig=eoQue-PWELBpQWPJWT0yjh7YCrE&hl=en&sa=X&ei=X4uYT_CfM6mZ6AHP8bHwBg&ved=0CGkQ6AEwCQ#v=onepage&q=hemingway%20a%20very%20short%20story%20analysis&f=false) (if the link works, google books links don’t always) All that said, if you don’t like it that’s fine. Not everything is to everyone’s taste. Based on what you said you have read I think you have a representative sample, so put it away. It’s not your thing and there is nothing wrong with that. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Captor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f17d59/32.png) [@Evil\_Captor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Captor)\ **Post date:** [April 26, 2012, 3:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hemingways-writing-style-am-i-being-whooshed/619902/36 "2012-04-26T15:38:44Z")
He dropped the book on the table, the well worn cover taking in the droplets of condensation from the iced tea and the crumbs from the fried chicken effortlessly. “Hemingway,” he muttered, unheard by others in the restaurant, “is not very good.” ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [April 26, 2012, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hemingways-writing-style-am-i-being-whooshed/619902/37 "2012-04-26T20:40:56Z")
> [@NAF1138](#): > > Sure. Everyone writing after about 1940 in any vaguely literary way who isn’t consciously trying to ape James Joyce instead. 😉 > > and you can see that even Science Fiction started getting to the point rather quickly. I was thinking of hard boiled detective story writers, but your examples are excellent. ---
**Author:** ![panache45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/panache45/32/64_2.png) [@panache45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panache45)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2012, 2:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hemingways-writing-style-am-i-being-whooshed/619902/38 "2012-04-27T02:07:54Z")
> [@NAF1138](#): > > Triple post! > > After writing that last post I decided to see if I could find “A Very Short Story” online. It is, after all, very short. > > [Here it is.](http://records.viu.ca/~lanes/english/hemngway/vershort.htm) It should take about 5 minutes to read and is an extreme example of his style. Ok, that’s the first work of Hemingway’s that I’ve actually been able to finish. And I’m left with a feeling of “So what?” There’s a difference between telling me \*about \*what happened and \*showing \*me what happened, and I don’t have any feeling of having experienced anything. Instead of \*being \*a short story, it seems more like someone telling me _about_ a short story. I’ve enjoyed films based on Hemingway’s works, but have never been able to read him. His style just bores the hell out of me. ---
**Author:** ![Zsofia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/7bcc69/32.png) [@Zsofia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zsofia)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2012, 3:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hemingways-writing-style-am-i-being-whooshed/619902/39 "2012-04-27T03:21:01Z")
> [@Wakinyan](#): > > Twenty years ago I thought I should read Hemingway and picked up _The Sun Also Rises_, but I didn’t get through the first chapter because I was so struck by his writing style that I went what the fuck and read several biographies, I was so fascinated by _how he wrote_. Then I read \*The Old Man and the Sea \*and _For Whom the Bell Tolls_ and _Farewell to Arms_, which all was very good, and later got back to The Sun Also Rises. Once again, I couldn’t read much more than the first chapter. It was something about the tension, I can’t explain it. I have never before or later quit on a great novel because it is too much, but it is something in this text that grips me and I start studying the sentences and paragraphs instead of just following along with the story. To me, it is just something about Hemingway. It is not “macho”, quite the opposite, it is suppressed _feeling_. He is simply one hell of a writer – fascinating stuff. Thank you for trying to explain what you like about the guy. I tried hard as a (young) adult in grad school and just didn’t warm to him. ETA (but really just after thought and ten minutes)- perhaps I should try again, after reading about Luz. It was a bit of a cheap trick, but there was that gut punch. And maybe I’m getting soft in my old age, because recently I read a letter or something that Hemingway wrote about having to shoot one of his cats after it had been run over by a car, and some asshole’s comments about it. And after that I have more kindness in my heart for the old man. ---
**Author:** ![Kenm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/bc79bd/32.png) [@Kenm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kenm)\ **Post date:** [April 27, 2012, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hemingways-writing-style-am-i-being-whooshed/619902/40 "2012-04-27T15:05:09Z")
FYI, a 1923 Hemingway news story in the Toronto Star [**about a prison break**](http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/article/1164775--kingston-penitentiary-ernest-hemingway-s-story-on-the-dramatic-jailbreak-of-1923). > [@](#): > > McMullen was at the wheel of the Chevrolet — that is, he was hunched over what was left of the wheel. One of Forsythe’s shots had cut the wheel clean in two and smashed McMullen’s left hand. He drove on with his right hand, hunched low, his face paling from the amount of blood he was losing. The other two big men were in the back of the car with “Young” Brown, the wild kid. On the front seat with McMullen sat “Runty” Bryans. One of Forsythe’s bullets ripped through the back of the car and out the front above “Runty’s” head. It would have hit a full sized man in the skull. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hemingways-writing-style-am-i-being-whooshed/619902.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hemingways-writing-style-am-i-being-whooshed/619902.md?page=3)