The foundation of Hemingway’s A Farewell to Arms is based on lies. Hemingway exposes the reality, or truth, of love and war by presenting the story of Lieutenant Henry and Catherine Barkley, lives ironically entrenched in lies. Henry in particular assumes a different role at every turn, pretending, for example, to be a soldier, a civilian, a doctor or Barkley’s dead fiancé.
The lies in Henry’s life begin when he joins the Italian army. Here, he pretends to be “one of the guys,” silently siding with their bawdy humor and macho activities and not the morality of the priest. Hemingway best displays this conflict in the scene where the priest urges Henry to visit Abruzzi while the captain insists Henry visit Naples’ whorehouses. Henry says nothing during this conversation. However, his silence shows Henry does side with the priest. Ultimately, Henry joins the captain at the bordello, the equivalent of conceding to peer pressure. The soldiers traditionally see sexual conquests as a prerequisite for the lifestyle of war and violence, and by following this precedent, Henry plays along with this stereotype even though he would rather be in the comfort of Capracotta, welcomed by the priest’s family.
Just as Henry pretends to be a soldier, he later pretends to be a civilian. When mistaken for a spy during the retreat, Henry escapes but hides his identity as a soldier as not to be recognized and punished as a deserter. A proprietor of a wine shop warns Henry “Do not go out with that coat. … On the sleeves it shows very plainly where the stars have been cut away” (Hemingway, A Farewell to Arms, 239). Henry has made an effort to veil his rank and avoid capture. Later, …
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… room,” Henry changes his mind (318). Now that Henry plays the role of a doctor, if the doctor can eat, so can he: “At two o’clock I went out and had lunch” (318). Henry even goes so far as to say he looks “like a fake doctor with a beard” and begins giving orders to the nurse when the real doctor is absent such as “get another cylinder” (319, 322). Henry pretends to be a doctor, thrown into this role by the situation and playing it very convincingly.
After reading this novel, I still do not have a true understanding of the character of Henry. He plays so many different roles, I do not know whether to view him as an authentic lost soul or the ultimate con man. Every aspect of his life is a great game of “let’s pretend” – when do the lies stop?
Works Cited
Hemingway, Ernest. A Farewell to Arms. New York: Simon
Imagery in Ernest Hemingway’s A Farewell to Arms
Imagery in A Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway
Imagery placed strategically through the novel A Farewell to Arms shows how well Ernest Hemingway is able to prepare the reader for events to come. Catherine Barkley, the English nurse who falls in love with Fredric Henry, an American in the Italian army, states, “I’m afraid of the rain” (125), as they stay in Milan. She goes on to explain “I’m afraid of the rain because sometimes I see me dead in it. … And sometimes I see you dead in it” (126). The foreshadowing this provides is very ominous and frighteningly accurate. Hemingway even continues to strengthen this foreboding by saying, “She was crying. I comforted her and she stopped crying. But outside it kept on raining” (126). He uses imagery from nature to contrast the clarity of the mountains, the danger of the plains, and the unknown of the rain.
For Fredric Henry, the mountains provide a sense of safety. Fredric and the ambulance drivers are eating in a small dugout, waiting for the offensive to start where they will be hauling injured men back to the hospital. A shell lands nearby that shakes the ground. One comments: “‘Four hundred twenty or minnenwerfer,’ Gavuzzi said. ‘There aren’t any four hundred twenties in the mountains,’ I said” (54). This gives a feeling of more safety, because the larger guns are harder to transport in the mountains. Fighting is also less successful in the mountains. Tactically speaking, “a mountain is not very mobile,” (183) so “in the old days the Austrians were always whipped in the quadrilateral around Verona. They let them come down onto the plain and whipped them there” (183). The mountains do not just provide safety in the war; they also help as Fredric and Catherine escap…
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…Arms. Ed. Jay Gellens. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice, 1970. 56-64.
Cowley, Malcolm. “Rain as Disaster.” The Portable Hemingway. Ed. Malcolm Cowley. New York: Viking, 1944. Rpt. in Twentieth Century Interpretations of A Farewell to Arms. Ed. Jay Gellens. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice, 1970. 54-55.
Halliday, E. M. “Hemingway’s Ambiguity: Symbolism and Irony.” American Literature 27 (1956): 57-63. Rpt. in Twentieth Century Interpretations of A Farewell to Arms. Ed. Jay Gellens. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice, 1970. 64-71.
Hemingway, Ernest. A Farewell to Arms. 1929. New York: Scribner, 1995.
Peterson, Richard K. Hemingway: Direct and Oblique. Paris: Mouton, 1969.
Schneider, Daniel J. “Hemingway’s A Farewell to Arms: The Novel as Pure Poetry.” Modern Fiction Studies 14.3 (1968): 283-296. Rpt. in Novels for Students. Ed. Dian Telgen. Detroit: Gale, 1997.