Knut Hamsun-Hunger

As the modern world advances and the memetic consciousness of society changes, more and more great works are considered 'old hat'. This is the case with Knut Hamsun's 1890 novel Hunger, and really most of Hamsun's early work such as Mysteries or Growth of the Soil. In 1890, most famous writers were writing flowery, purple prose about dramatic and fantastic themes. Hunger, in comparison was one of the first stream of consciousness novels. It simply tells the story of a would be writer; homeless, jobless, and penniless in the streets of Kristiana, what is now Oslo, Norway.

Knut Hamsun is a Norwegian author and Nobel Prize Laureate. He is (note the present tense) a very controversial figure for reasons we will get into later. What can't be denied is his worth as a writer. He pioneered the stream of consciousness and internal monologue style of writing. He was more interested in the modernist novel as a reflection of the human mind. To quote, writers should describe the "whisper of blood, and the pleading of bone marrow". He influenced people like Franz Kafka and Ernest Hemingway. Isaac Bashevis Singer said of him "the father of the modern school of literature in his every aspect—his subjectiveness, his fragmentariness, his use of flashbacks, his lyricism. The whole modern school of fiction in the twentieth century stems from Hamsun". Hamsun is perhaps tied with Henrik Ibsen for being Norway's most internationally known writer.

Hamsun was born as Knud Peterson in Lom, situated in the Gudbrandsdal valley in Norway. His family moved to Nordland due to financial difficulties to live with an Uncle on his farm. At the age of nine he was separated from his family and lived with his Uncle Hans Olsen, who was a very abusive man to Hamsun. Finally making his way back to Lom in 1874 he worked a laundry list of odd jobs before spending time in America. He published his first novel in 1877 and had a few successes. It wasn't until this novel, published in 1890 that he received wide acclaim. Breaking ground for its internal monologue and psychological aspect of its protagonist, a starving artist in Kristiana. Hamsun often features strength of prose and intimate connection to Norway and its features and people. Hamsun saw nature and mankind as linked together in a mythical bond. This thought influenced several of his works, including Growth of the Soil, which is credited for his Nobel Prize win in 1920.

Now here's where the controversy comes. Hamsun was not a good person. Hamsun in his early writings expressed racist opinions of Blacks, calling them 'rudimentary organs on the body of white society". His sympathies were influenced by the Boer War, which Hamsun saw as oppression by the British Empire. He had a dislike of the English and America, and expressed sympathy to Germany in both World Wars. In the 1930s much of Norway's right-wing publications supported European Fascist Empires like Italy and Germany, and Hamsun followed suit. During the end of WW2 he was 80, almost completely deaf and got all his information from The Aftenposten, which again, supported Italy and Nazi Germany. That's right. Knut Hamsun supported the Nazis. He wrote several articles over the course of the war stating things like "Germany is fighting for us all and crushing England's tyranny". In 1943 he sent his Nobel Prize as a gift to JOSEPH GOEBBELS to get an audience with Hitler. Which he GOT. He then proceeded to tell HITLER HIMSELF that the German civilian administrator to Norway was doing a crappy job and that Norwegian prisoners should be released.

Otto Dietrich describes the encounter as the only time someone could out talk HITLER and the encounter left Hitler enraged for THREE ENTIRE DAYS. After Hitler died Hamsun wrote a Eulogy for him praising the man. Which went over so great that Norway's citizens decided to have his books burned and him put in a psychiatric hospital and had him tried for national treason. Hamsun was forced to undergo psychiatric evaluation and was ruled to have his mental faculties permanently impaired. The charges of treason were dropped and he was fined 325,000 kroner for his alleged affiliation to Norway's far-right political party. Whether he was or was even mentally impaired is debated to this day. He was able to publish his last novel in 1949 where he criticizes the judges and psychiatrists and makes the point himself that he is not mentally ill. Hamsun died of old age at the age of 92, one of the most controversial figures in Norwegian history. A 2009 interview said "We can’t help loving him, though we have hated him all these years ... That’s our Hamsun trauma. He’s a ghost that won’t stay in the grave.". Regardless of beliefs or even awareness to what he was supporting (Hamsun himself claimed ignorance), Hamsun is one of the greatest and most influential writers. He is an important measuring tool to separate the art from the artist. I think it entirely possibly to praise Hunger and other works like it, and still detest him as a man. Norway certainly has, he's taught in their schools.

Hunger itself is a masterpiece of psychiatric fiction. We follow an unnamed vagrant who only wishes to write. He has no home nor money nor food. What he does have is a strange sense of honor. So adherent to social norms that he often cripples himself in the pursuit of his own happiness. He gives readily to charity and often hoists his own honor above asking for money. His Pride keeps him from explaining his situation. When he is found sleeping by a policeman he merely explains that he is a well off journalist who locked himself out of his apartment, and is able to spend the night in a cell but not receive a free breakfast for the homeless despite his empty stomach because of his lies. The central conflict of Hunger is Man vs Self. All of the protagonists issues are his own. His egotism and obsession with honor cost him opportunities at every point. Despite being hailed as a disturbing novel I was more exacerbated and even enraged. There are disturbing and sad scenes as you see him fall apart. Driven mad by hunger, but it's more the revulsion you would feel at a wounded animal, not a human being. When he bites his finger in his sleep and tastes blood he considers for a moment to just eat his finger, because you don't need all ten right?

Hunger is an interesting novel because never once does the protagonist blame society for his undoing. Sure there are moments where his pride brings him into conflict, such as when he receives an envelope with money in it, and he throws it in a terrible landlady's face who was cruel to him as a final biting of the thumb. It's only later that he bemoans this action because he could have used that money to eat. No, the protagonist moreover blames God. Cursing his misfortune and wondering why God does not punish others as he does himself. The character lacking the self realization and being more protective of his ego than his health is hard to watch. As he gains some money and is able to eat or has something fortunate happen to him, so does he begin to spiral back down. It's like a roller coaster designed by Kafka himself. Like the society around him, you too start to grow weary of his ego. The twists, turns, and loops the emotional journey almost turns what should be a horrifying novel into a postmodern comedy. Regardless if you read Hunger, you are sure to take something away. Whether it is pity, anger, disgust, or sorrow are all avenues that Hamsun has paved for you. Hunger is a masterpiece for it breaking ground but for also being one of the most depressing novels I've ever read, and I couldn't put it down. It no doubt inspired Kafka and other writers of the era that can still be seen to this day.

Of note, if you read Hunger, make sure that you use the edition that I have shown at the top of this essay. The George Egerton translation that I read at first I learned was a terrible translation something that I noticed as I was reading. The George Egerton uses the pound sterling as the currency, which Norway itself does not use, they use the kroner. When I review a book I try to use the cover that I actually own but unfortunately I cannot advocate for a bowdlerized and mistranslated work. If you read Hunger, find the Sverre Lyngstad translation.

Markus Zusak-The Book Thief

This one is going to be an Outlier here because it's what many consider a "Young Adult" or "YA" novel which tend to be looked down upon by the academics, but it really should not be. I first read Markus Zusak's The Book Thief when I was a junior in High School. My copy that I still own to this day was recommended and gifted to me by my lovely Spanish teacher. Senora McCoy, if you're reading this, thank you. This book had a lasting effect on me and I still consider it to this day one of the best books for at the very least, young readers.

First some background, you know how I like to do that. There's not actually a lot I could find on Zusak, probably because he's a living writer. He was born in Sydney to a German mother and a Austrian father who immigrated here in the 50s. He has written six books, The Book Thief his most popular but he is also well known for I Am The Messenger. He studied English and History at the University of North South Wales, and has a Bachelor of the Arts.

The Book Thief in an interesting piece of Literature because of its unusual nature. Set in Nazi Germany during World War 2, it follows a little girl by the name of Liesel as she grows up on Himmel Street surrounded by friends and family. Until they all die in a bombing run except for her. The books narrator however, is not Liesel, but Death itself. Death constantly waxes philosophical on the human condition throughout the novel and uses the life and story of Liesel to show us what he means. Liesel is a young girl who at the start of the story is an illiterate. Her mother is forced to give her and her brother up after being outed as a Communist, cause you know, Nazi Germany, and she moves into Himmel Street with the Hubermans, Hans and Rosa, who adopt her. Because the narrator is Death, we are no stranger to spoilers. Death outright tells you the story is tragic at the beginning and it only gets worse from there. It's not uncommon to see a sentence like "The child's blond hair waved in the wind, like trails of sunshine it was sad when he died". Which isn't to say the impact is lessened at all as Liesel climbs out of her basement to find all of her friends and family dead by a tragic happenstance. Because after all, who would bomb a street named after Heaven?

The book is an obvious take that to Nazi Germany, book burning in particular being seen as a heinous thing. Liesel herself acquires a book, titled The Shoulder Shrug from one such burning. It's this that sparks Hans Huberman to teach her to read. The Book Thief is a perfect representation of childhood wonder put up against the backdrop of one of the most horrific time periods in human history. So often you see children running around covered in coal claiming to be Jesse Owens or Liesel herself expressing her hatred of the Fuhrer for his cruelty and machinations. As the reader we can look at this with an adult lens and feel the tension of the era. Very much so in a To Kill A Mockingbird fashion. The coming of age story of Liesel is one of the most heartwarming and tragic tales I've read in a young adult novel, and I would definitely say even if you're not in the age bracket to pick it up and give it a read. Her friendship with Max, a Jewish boxer her family is hiding during the war is an innocent ray of sunshine in this bleak world, and even when Max is later taken to a camp their reunion is a cathartic release after the tragedy of the Himmel Street bombing. Proving that happiness can be found even in the darkest of times, if one only remembers to turn on the light.

Another aspect of the novel is the childhood romance between Liesel and Rudy Steiner. Rudy is a young upstart child who has a bright future and a kind heart. He is in love with Liesel and the whole book teases their marriage and happiness only to rip it from you when Rudy's body is found among the wreckage of Himmel Street. Liesel giving his lifeless body the kiss he always wanted in the ruins was actually a scene that made me tear up as a child.

If you read the Book Thief as an adult, which you might as well try to do, look at the Book Thief for its deeper themes. Look at the childhood innocence played against the backdrop of Nazi Germany. Appreciate that the characters of the novel are not treated poorly for being Germans in this era. Look at the themes of censorship, family, imagination and knowledge, especially against the grain of those who would take it from you. The Book Thief is a terrific coming of age story and is a masterpiece in its story telling, prose, and design. It takes an almost postmodern bent with Death as its narrator, one of its strongest themes, as Death is affected by Liesel's story as much as we are. Zusak not only gives life and warmth to these characters but to a concept many of us fear. And as Death cradles Liesel's soul and tells her story he says this to close

"I am haunted by humans".

Italo Calvino-If On A Winter's Night A Traveler

-Apologies for missing a day Constant Readers, I had a brief fight with food poisoning!-

My senior quote in High School was "All I want of life is postmodern literature and single malt scotch". This still holds true today, and no one I've read has been more a master of that genre of literature than Italy's own Italo Calvino. Italo Calvino was born in Cuba to botanist parents. His mother gave him the unusual first name "Italo" to remind me of his Italian heritage, but since they moved back to Italy in Liguria before he turned two, Calvino found the name "belligerently nationalist". Calvino went to college reluctantly for agriculture like his family despite his urge to be a writer. In 1943 at the age of twenty, Calvino witnessed the German occupation of Liguria and the establishment of Mussolini's Italian Social Republic. Refusing military service, Calvino went into hiding. After reading on a wide array of subjects, Calvino came to the conclusion that of all the partisan groups, the communists were "the most convincing political line". He later joined the Italian Resistance in the spring of 1944, and because of his refusal to be a conscript, his parents were held hostage by the Nazis. Seeing the horrors of the war only deepened his loyalty to the communist cause, and officially joined the Italian Communist Party after moving to Turin after the war.

It was in Turin that Calvino's first works were published by Ello Vittorini in Il Politecnico, a University Magazine. After graduating with a Master's Thesis on Joseph Conrad (who's Heart of Darkness we will cover soon) in 1947, he began work an the Einaudi Publishing House and later as a journalist for L'Unita, the official communist rag. Finally publishing his first book The Path to the Nest of Spiders in 1947 he won Premio Riccione and sold 5000 copies, a huge achievement for post-war Italy. Calvino would continue to publish realist fiction until 1957, where he became disillusioned to communism due to the Soviet invasion of Hungary the previous year. Citing the violent suppression of the Hungarians and Joseph Stalin's revealed crimes, Calvino resigned from the Communist Party. Calvino would begin to write more and more outlandish works, and in 1968 he relocated his family to Paris where he became good friends and a contemporary to the Oulipo, whose numbers included Roland Bathes and Georges Perec. To go fully into Calvino's numerous awards, achievements, contacts, and honors, would be the length of a novel in and of itself. Notable among his awards was the French Legion d'honneur in 1981. Four years later, Calvino would die of a brain hemorrhage in a hospital in Siena.

Aside from its contents, If on a winter's night a traveler (and yes it is spelled as such for a reason) is not only astounding in its postmodern concept and prose, but also the fact that it was published in 1979, when Calvino was NINETY-THREE. If that doesn't tell you the kind of artist that Calvino was I'm not sure what else I could say to convince you. If on a winter's night a traveler centers on you reading If on a winter's night a traveler. Seriously. It opens with a description of you getting comfortable in your chair, getting the lights right, and sitting down with the very book you're reading, and it describes you reading this novel and your thoughts and bewilderment. There's one catch though. As you end the first chapter of If on a winter's night a traveler, you discover that another book has been stitched into it! How will you ever find out the ending? What could have been the cause? So you go back to the bookstore you bought it from, angry and upset, and you find out that there are no more copies of If on a winter's night a traveler. So you settle for the next best thing, the book that got stitched together with your copy; outside the town of Malbork. (and yes the spelling is important).

You bring outside the town of Malbork home and begin to read only for the same fate to befall you. Exacerbated, you go to the publisher directly. You can imagine how this goes. You get yet another book within a book that is interrupted by yet another book. This turtles all the way down nonsense has you really pissed, but there's another reader, a woman named Lumilla who is noticing the same problem you are. Together the two of you set off to discover the conspiracy of why all these books are being mismatched and ruined all for the quest of finishing If on a winter's night, a traveler. As you draw closer and closer and get dropped into story after story, Calvino seems to also dance a tango with your imagination. He takes you to erotic war stories, apathetic and dry westerns, philosophical waxing translations of Asian novels, and more. Each novel you read affecting the story at large in both prose and style.

As you near the end of the novel, the intentional book fraud is revealed, and you finally get your actual real copy of If on a winter's night a traveler. It ends as you would expect, the book describes you in bed with Lumilla, now happily married, finishing If on a winter's night a traveler. This book is a masterpiece for its post modern stance on the relationship between the author, reader, and all the middle men between such as translators and publishing houses. In the same vein that all these aspects are cogs in the experience of a book, so too are all the titles that you've been forced to slog through in your quest for the truth. As it turns out, they all form one, coherent sentence;

"If on a winter's night, a traveler, outside the town of Malbork, leaning from the steep slope without fear of wind or vertigo, looks down in the gathering shadow in a network of lines that enlace, in a network of lines that intersect, on a carpet of leaves illuminated by the moon around an empty grave; what story down there awaits its end?"

Which when you think about it, is a great first sentence for another book. Truly genius.

Ernest Vincent Wright-Gadsby

A lipogram is a literary work that puts a constraint on a writer. Ernest Vincent Wright's 1939 novel Gadsby, omits the letter "e", the most common letter in English. Aside from its novelty, Gadsby is a novel that stands very well on its own.

There isn't much I can tell you about this book. Gadsby was probably written sometime around the 1930s, as there is a reference to Wright writing the newspaper Evening Independent that he had written a masterful lipogram and that they should hold a contest with 250 dollars for the winner. They turned him down. Eventually Gadsby was published by a self-publishing vanity press in 1939 and the same year a warehouse that held most copies of the book burned down and Wright himself died. The book was never reviewed and to quote "only kept alive by the efforts of a few avant-garde French intellos and assorted connoisseurs of the odd, weird and zany.". The novels popularity in France actually surprised me doing research for this review. The French author Georges Perec, who will get to later, was inspired by the book to write A Void, his own lipogram omitting the letter "e".

Gadsby is an our town style novel that takes places in the fictional town of Branton Hills. John Gadsby is upset with the dying nature of his town and rallies an organization of youth to shape the town up into a thriving city. Through their efforts, through with some opposition to those who resist change, they succeed. Gadsby later runs for mayor and turns the population of Branton Hills from 2,000 to 60,000. It's a wholesome story, going through most of the early 1900s with World War 1, Prohibition, and Warren G. Harding's presidency. The strength  of this novel shrines through with its prose. You would think that without the letter "e" there would not be anything Wright could do to enthrall you. Yet the prose is clean. There is never a single hiccup or stop, unless you count the odd moments where the narrator lampshades just how clever he's being, and clever he is. At one point in the novel a wedding is able to be described in full without using an "e" words that runs for several pages, and at another Gadsby describes a horse drawn fire engine without using any of those three words. The prose flows like a river, and it's a comforting sort, like listening to an older member of your family muse about the good ole days. Gadsby stands not only as a gimmick for its style but as a coherent, moving and simple story that becomes a window to the past, painting a charming and Arcadia esque quality picture of American life in the time period. As you watch the townspeople grow and marry and have children and watch Gadsby himself age into a tired but beloved old man with grandchildren of his own; you'll hardly realize you've read a 50,000 word novel without a single "e".

Ernest Vincent Wright wrote a few other novels and sadly I haven't been able to track them down to read them. Much of his life is unknown as he and his novels fade into obscurity but ever you have the itch for the odd, Gadsby is a masterpiece that should not only be known for its quirks, but it's heart. Since I lack the information to make this review the essasys I normally do, I leave you with the opening of the novel.

"If Youth, throughout all history, had had a champion to stand up for it; to show a doubting world that a child can think; and, possibly, do it practically; you wouldn't constantly run across folks today who claim that "a child don't know anything." A child's brain starts functioning at birth; and has, amongst its many infant convolutions, thousands of dormant atoms, into which God has put a mystic possibility for noticing an adult's act, and figuring out its purport.

Up to about its primary school days a child thinks, naturally, only of play. But many a form of play contains disciplinary factors. "You can't do this," or "that puts you out," shows a child that it must think, practically, or fail. Now, if, throughout childhood, a brain has no opposition, it is plain that it will attain a position of "status quo," as with our ordinary animals. Man knows not why a cow, dog or lion was not born with a brain on a par with ours; why such animals cannot add, subtract, or obtain from books and schooling, that paramount position which Man holds today."

Ray Bradbury-Fahrenheit 451

In his 1967 essay "The Death of the Author", French literary critic Roland Bathes gave name to a 20th century phenomenon. Separating the intent of the Author from the reader's experience and take away from the work. Though later the movement gained traction to discredit authors and simply focus on interpretation than intent, Bathes viewed both as important aspects of the creation process. Some literary works are more cut than dry than others in this aspect. Harper Lee's To Kill A Mockingbird was intended to be a scathing dismissal of racism, and is mostly appreciated as such. The interpretations coming from character's intents or actions. Compare this to John Milton's Paradise Lost, where Milton spells out his intention in the first paragraph. He wishes to "justify the ways of God to man". Yet scholars for centuries have come up with several interpretations, some of them even stating that it's SATAN that is the true protagonist and winner. Him having succeeded in corrupting creation and ruling his own throne in Hell. Such a statement would have Milton's head in the 1600s where it was written. I bring this to mind as to me, there is no work in popular culture that exemplifies this concept in action than Ray Bradbury's 1953 novel, Fahrenheit 451. 

Fahrenheit 451, the temperature at which book paper burns. Ray Bradbury's novel is often cited as a criticism of Fascism and censorship. Bradbury himself was vehemently against this idea. He reportedly walked out of a UCLA lecture about the novel when the students there insisted on this interpretation. Fahrenheit 451 is, in Bradbury's mind, a criticism and borderline satire of the modern age. Bradbury was a grumpy curmudgeon who despite being considered a sci-fi writer, loathed technology. The kind of the man who would write political comics about kids looking for the power button on a textbook. This raving technophobia shows up in a short story by him two years earlier, "The Pedestrian". This short story follows an author, deemed unemployed by the state (because no one reads get it?) walking through a town where everyone is glued to their tv screens. He is later apprehended by a robot police car (because of course it's a robot) that promptly arrests him for going against societal norms. This story is not the only example of Ray's fear of technology. You can find a criticism of the nuclear age in "There Will Come Soft Rains", "A Sound of Thunder" has the entire world thrown into chaos because of the hubris of the rich using a technology they barely understand, "Harrison Bergernon" has people made "equal" and oppressed by use of technology. 

Fahrenheit 451 follows Guy Montag, a fireman in the near future. Firemen in this Universe have a new cause, they burn books as people's homes have basically become fireproof due to advancing technology. Books are seen a dangerous distractions from the placated populace. As the powers that be would rather keep their populace distracted with television, the arch enemy of Ray Bradbury. One day after burning a woman's house down, Guy keeps a book from the burning and takes it home. Later in the novel its made clear that Guy has been doing this for a good while. Interestingly, Guy Montag doesn't act like someone in this kind of dystopia would. He openly tries to get his wife Clarisse to get away from her wall to wall television and in ear headphones (which actually didn't exist when Bradbury wrote this, so props to him). He even starts to read poetry at a meeting with one of her friends, and it gets chalked up to a mental breakdown and he burns the book. It's not the government that is forcing this, it's the will of the people. They don't want to read because reading would make them think, and making them think would upset them. Citizens in this world would rather be calm and placated and THAT is Bradbury's main pitch. 

Things do end up going south for Montag though eventually, as Mildred does report Montag to the firemen. Confronted by Beatty, his boss and foil, Montag is given the choice to surrender and burn his house down. Beatty is an interesting case in this world as Beatty does give the appearance of once being an avid reader before giving up on it due to the conflicting opinions and thoughts found there. Montag is goaded by Beatty to use his flamethrower, and Montag does, on Beatty. A search begins for Montag, who is able to escape to the house of Faber, an earlier ally and former English Professor. Faber urges him to to get to the countryside and escape with other book lovers that live there. The members of this group have each memorized a book in case society would ever need to be rebuilt. Montag realizes that he has memorized a book of the Bible. Staying with the exiles, they later watch as the city is obliterated by nuclear weapons, the leader of the exiles waxes poetic about the phoenix, and they go forth into the city to rebuild anew. 

Despite Bradbury's insistence, Fahrenheit 451 does contain instances of censorship. You can't think of book burning without thinking of fascist empires like Nazi Germany. Even during the McCarthy era that this book was written in, books 'supporting' communism were banned and sometimes burned outright. Book burning continues today with ISIS militants in the Middle East. Book burning was and always shall be a movement to censor knowledge to crush a populace's ability or want to rise up and take power back for themselves. At a late point in the novel, the exiles note that a "Montag" will be captured and killed to restore the peace, and Montag and the exiles watch as an innocent man is killed in his place on a tv. Falsifying media is another big sign of a censorship heavy government. 

Fahrenheit 451 is a masterpiece, even if I don't agree with the fear of technology Bradbury had, because despite it's old age it only gets more relevant as time goes on. Bradbury's media is condensed into easily digestible chunks which bring to mind things like Twitter and Instagram in our World. Even something as simple as people not reading books any more in favor of this entertainment, which was Bradbury's worst nightmare, has come true. Even now, our politics are run like bread and circus shows. Political opponents or threats to the government or erased or covered up. Recent to mind is the case of Jeffrey Epstein, who after being exposed to be running a pedophiliac sex ring committed suicide in his cell. It's widely believed that he was murdered so that he could not indict his followers. The following week there were two mass shootings to draw media attention away from the case. Ray Bradbury's world is a dark but approaching time, the biggest questions lies in what side you'll be on when the time comes. 

Ernest Hemingway-The Old Man and the Sea

Ernest Hemingway is considered one the greatest American writers of not only his contemporaries but of all time. His iceberg theory style of writing, born on his time as a journalist, has influence on countless writers both amateur and professional. Clean sentences. Flat prose. He wrote what he wanted to say and nothing else.

Hemingway, despite his wide body of work of novels, short stories, and articles, is best known for four novels. These novels are of course The Sun Also Rises, A Farewell to Arms, For Whom the Bell Tolls, and of course, The Old Man and the Sea. I consider the latter to be his best novel for several reasons. It's the pinnacle of his life, ideals, and theories. Old Man is his shortest novel, but it says the most about him. Most of Hemingway's novels follow protagonists of manliness, bravado, conviction, and honor. These ideals were of course important to Hemingway himself who threw himself into alcoholism, women, hunting, fishing, and the blood-sport of bullfighting.

Considered the pinnacle of men, Hemingway was born to a doting mother who for a good time of his life placed him in girl's clothes. Dresses and knickers and hats. It was popular fashion at the time, but young Hemingway resented this. It was his father who allowed him to wear men's clothes on their trips into the wilderness to hunt and fish and camp that Hemingway came into his own. As he grew up Hemingway discovered a knack for writing for his High School Newspaper and later joined the Kansas City Star at 17, and was given this style mandate:

• Use short sentences. Use short first paragraphs. Use vigorous English. Be positive, not negative.
• Eliminate every superfluous word.
• Numbers less than 100 should be spelled out, except in matter of statistical nature, in ages, time of day, sums of money and comparative figures or dimensions.
• Do not use evidence as a verb.

This mandate and his larger than life adventures would become the backbone for his literary works. Hemingway spent time with the Star until 1918, where he became an ambulance driver in Italy for the American Red Cross. Hemingway itched for action and to see the front lines, but tragically on a trip to the front lines Italian troops came under fire and a mortar shell wounded Hemingway. He would spend the next six months in a field hospital in Milan where he fell in love with a nurse there. Sound familiar, as that's a similar base line to A Farewell To Arms. The real life inspired elements and themes in Hemingway's work end up making The Old Man and the Sea the masterpiece it is.

The Old Man and the Sea follows Santiago, a fisherman in Cuba. Santiago is old and has long lost his edge for fishing, to the point of considered being cursed by the other fisherman. One day, Santiago tells his apprentice Manolin that he will go into the Gulf Stream to end his unlucky streak. While casting his line and bait, Santiago snares a huge marlin, and an epic battle between them erupts for two days and nights. Both exhausted, Santiago finally is able to reel in and harpoon the marlin, who he has now come to view as a similar spirited brother. Tying the marlin back to his boat, Santiago ventures back to Cuba. He is soon set upon by sharks attracted by the marlin's blood in the water, and despite his valiant efforts, the sharks eat the carcass down to its skeleton. Santiago arrives and carries his mast up the hill to his house and leaves the discarded bones on the beach and goes to sleep. The next day the fellow fisherman measure the 18 foot marlin and are in awe of Santiago's skill, telling his apprentice Manolin to apologize for them. Manolin goes to Santiago's home and finds him exhausted and battered, and cries for the old man. The two make plans once Santiago awakes to fish together, and Santiago returns to sleeping, dreaming of the glory of his youth, perhaps for the last time. 

The Old Man and the Sea is an obvious parallel to Ernest Hemingway's life at the time. Like Santiago, Hemingway had also lost his edge for his craft, being critically panned and having just written the failure of 1950s Across the River and into the Trees. Hemingway fell into a deep depression. Despite his thoughts that he could no longer write, Hemingway wrote his masterpiece, his swan song, and arguably, his suicide note. Similar to Santiago, Hemingway re-earned the respect of his colleagues by publishing The Old Man and the Sea, and it won the Pulitzer Prize in Literature the next year after its publication in 1953. Hemingway's standard bravado of handsome young men in war and strife had been replaced with what Hemingway had become, a tired old man in Cuba. The Biblical martyrdom on Santiago, such as the fishing line cutting into his hands and the carrying of his mast like the cross, was how Hemingway saw himself. 

The Old Man and the Sea was Hemingway's way of telling us that he was done, perhaps without realizing. Hemingway continued to struggle with writing after its publication and his depression worsened. Hemingway also suffered from two separate plane crashes that caused lasting harm for the rest of his life. With his poor health and worsening mental state, he was checked into a hospital where he was administered shock therapy. Once released he continued to have memory problems and lapses of anger and was readmitted for more shock therapy. Eventually admitting in a letter of his deadened senses to the world, Ernest Hemingway shot himself  in 1961. A mere nine years after The Old Man and the Sea's publication. 

The Old Man and the Sea's greatest strength lies in its truth. Hemingway was a man who could have had several books written that is just his life on the page, and he did just that. A Farewell to Arms tying parallels to World War 1, For Whom the Bell Tolls to the Spanish Civil War, and more. The prose of The Old Man and the Sea shines through and showcases a vulnerability that Hemingway had long refused to show. For all the hunting, drinking, boxing, and boisterousness that Hemingway put forward, he was only human, and due to the nature of his death, more human than most. It could be said that his vulnerability and insecurity were fronted by the features he is best known for. However The Old Man and the Sea and its truth, its admission of fatigue and the want of an end, a worthy fight, prove that those vulnerabilities were there.

In his 1929 novel A Farewell to Arms, Hemingway writes the passage "The world breaks everyone, and those it does not break it kills, it kills the very good, and the very kind, and the very gentle impartially. If you are none of these things you can be sure that it will kill you too but there will be no particular hurry." These words applied to the broken Hemingway, who the world could not kill, body or spirit.