Hemingway

A Reading Log

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IMG_1886We all have our struggles. One of mine is sleeplessness. But I’ve found at least some benefit: I can read during the nights. I’ve begun maintaining a reading log. Nothing fancy, but it helps in at least three ways. First, it helps me maintain a ledger of what I’m reading. Second, I am better able to see patterns among books and thinkers. (Some writers are worth more of my time; others have already consumed too much of it and I move on.) Third, a reading log provides a means of evaluating ideas.

Over the last several months, I have not written much blog-wise due to my current location with the military, but here is a list of some of my recent reading. In the left column is the book; the middle column lists the book’s author; and the third column is my response–usually just a fragment, phrase, or sentence or two. At the bottom are some of the volumes I’m still reading due to their length and/or weightiness. Hope you profit. My thanks to fellow readers who have pointed books and writers out to me that would have otherwise escaped my attention.

Book: Author: Response:
Suttree McCarthy Among the saddest books I have ever read. It may also be the richest book I read in terms of its delight in language and the fecundity of words. McCarthy is—his dark vision aside—a wordsmith on par with Joyce and Shakespeare.
Cormac McCarthy’s Nomads Andersen & Kristoffer A master’s thesis that was large on jargon and intellectual posturing and short on coherence and clarity.
Resolutions: Advice to Young Converts Edwards My only complaint is that I waited this long to read it. Edwards was certainly a theologian/philosopher, but in this volume, you also see he was a pastor with a love of discipling God’s people.
On Reading Well Prior A reminder that some of the world’s greatest literary pieces are explorations of the biblical worldview. A truly good book about books.
The Battle for the Beginning MacArthur I know of no other living Christian writer who is as biblical and clear as John MacArthur. In this volume, he tackles head on the mutually exclusive worldviews of biblical creation vs. macroevolution and materialism. An important book.
The Stranger Camus When I read it as an 18-year old, I thought it masterful. Now, er, hardly. A sad book about life without God, life without hope, and life without redemption.
In the Year of Our Lord Ferguson One of the best books I’ve read in recent memory. The bottom line up front: the true Christian church must always keep her focus on the truth, the gospel, Christ, and purity. Today’s pagan headlines are merely tomorrow’s fertilizer. Keep a biblical perspective.
The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao Diaz Reminded me why I don’t enjoy postmodernism or post-postmodernism. With its trendy style of blending genuine pity with trendy pop-culture and profanity and gender politics, this is just what literary committees adore, but it makes for poor literature. Who will want to read this modish stuff in a few years? Egads.
Killing Jesus O’Reilly This could be helpful for skeptics of the Christian worldview.
Killing Lincoln O’Reilly Very enjoyable. I learned even more to appreciate Lincoln and to pity him.
Killing Patton O’Reilly Leadership for Patton was what he seemed born for. He was a patriot, a very fallen and cruel man, but also courageous like few others. When hell stared him in the face, he spat and kept right on marching. And I thank him and those he led.
Animal Farm Orwell Communism/Progressivism/Socialism fails—everywhere and always. But dogs return to the vomit. And people often act like animals.
The Catcher in the Rye Salinger Hard for me not to gush here. In my view, one of the best novels ever, esp. with regard to narrative voice, point of view, and tone. A masterpiece.
Exit West Hamid People are not reducible to religion, ethnicity, and politics. The human heart is the problem; we are sinners and we need a savior—and government is not the savior. Ever.
Kidnapped by the Taliban Joseph There are good and bad folks everywhere. Sometimes good intentions lead you into bad situations. But grace can still appear and even endure.
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings Angelou An anthem to the artist to sing—if for no else than himself/herself. Some will listen.
Tom Sawyer Twain I preferred Huck Finn. But similar episodes and themes are here—innocence vs. experience; corruption; escape vs. responsibility.
Blood Meridian McCarthy Perhaps the most violent book I’ve ever read (again). Horrific and beautiful. McCarthy descends into the pits of evil and reprobation, and takes us with him. There he writes in graphic detail. But it is so heartbreakingly beautiful in its expression that you endure the rapacity and cruelty and cannot see life the same way.
The Sun Also Rises Hemingway Immature adults taking themselves way too seriously and drinking way too much alcohol get mad at the state of the world, but refuse to take responsibility. This was a much better book when I read it as a 19-year old, if that helps. Probably the last time I’ll do this one.
The Sound and the Fury Faulkner A watershed book in terms of its use of interior monologue, non-linear time, flashbacks, stream of consciousness, etc.
Books Are Made Out of Books Crews A book about the books that have shaped Cormac McCarthy. Appreciative of this book.
A Long Obedience in the Same Direction Peterson Beautifully written by a man gifted with discernment, biblical maturity, and a pastor’s temperament.
Facing the Music Brown A book of Larry Brown’s short stories. Kind of like Harry Crews’ fiction, these are stories of down-on-their-luck southerners who ain’t got no quit in ‘em. Excellent fiction.
Larry Brown: A Writer’s Life Cash A biography of Larry Brown, of his determination, struggles, literary triumphs, and isolation necessary to create.
Everything that Rises Must Converge O’Connor It’s Flannery O’Connor. Read it. Then read it again.
Hitler’s Religion Weikhart Excellent, readable, researched book of Hitler’s worldview (pantheism).
Hillbilly Elegy Vance No matter how successful we are in the world’s eyes, we never really leave behind the boy or girl we were at 12. Our childhood affects us till we die.
A Wrinkle in Time L’Engle Childhood imagination sometimes portends divinity.
Desperadoes Hansen Literary western genre. Beautiful language. A bit slow going, at least for me.
Light in August Faulkner Rich in interior monologue. A slow read for me. The preacher was my favorite character.
Killing the SS O’Reilly There is no bottom to man’s evil.
Love Thy Body Pearcey Read Nancy Pearcey’s books. You do yourself a disservice if you don’t. Logical, persuasive, and clear. Excellent.
Go Set a Watchman Lee Even the folks we think of as ‘good’ are sinners.

 

Currently I’m reading Don Quixote and The Collected Stories of Lydia Davis. Both are excellent. Maybe this helps encourage you. It at least helps me to keep track of some of my reading life and helps me plot my future reading goals. “Take up and read.”

For Whom the Bell Tolls – Thoughts on Hemingway’s Novel

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Hemingway. Just reading his name connotes a persona. Solitary yet brave characters pervade his fiction. Santiago, for example, is the heroic wizened old fisherman in The Old Man and the Sea. Robert Jordan, another example, is the self-sacrificing bridge-blower in For Whom the Bell Tolls. And literary connoisseurs know of Hemingway’s trademark short declarative sentences. Imagine the opposite of Faulkner or Cormac McCarthy, and you get an idea of Hemingway’s terse unadorned style. Most scholars trace Hemingway’s stripped-down style to his years spent in journalism where linguistic precision and minimalism were prized. In less than a week, I fly out to another military deployment, and so I tend to read a lot of war novels and history in the months leading up to going across the pond again. Over the last few weeks I read Hemingway’s For Whom the Bell Tolls, a novel set during the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939). What follows is a three-part examination of the novel–overall summary, analysis, and assessment. Lastly, I pose a question or two for reflection. If you’re a fan of war novels, of Hemingway’s linguistic skill, or of Hemingway’s importance in the Western canon, I welcome your reading.

Summary: For Whom the Bell Tolls is the story of an American Spanish teacher (Robert Jordan) who’s in Spain during the Civil War there in the late 1930s. The war is between the Republicans and the communists/fascists. But Jordan’s not there to teach Spanish to expatriated Americans; he’s a dynamiter of bridges. He is fighting against the communists/fascists, a guerilla warfighter attached to a motley crew of Spaniards who hate communism/fascism as much as he. He falls in love with a Spanish girl (Maria) over the course of the novel. He battles internally over how he might completely love her and simultaneously remain committed to his life’s work of blowing bridges the fascists use, and killing as many communists as possible. About two-thirds of the way through the novel, Robert and Maria are discussing their plans after the war is over. What follows is an example of their dynamic, as Maria speaks:

“We will be in the big clean bed in thy famous room in our famous hotel and we will sit in the famous bed together and look into the mirror of the armoire and there will be thee and there will be me in the glass and then I will turn to thee thus, and put my arms around thee thus, and then I will kiss thee thus.”

 Then they lay quiet and close together in the night, hot-aching, rigid, close together and holding her, Robert Jordan held closely too all those things that he knew could never happen, and he went on with it deliberately and said, “Rabbit, we will not always live in that hotel” (Hemingway, 1940, p. 346).

 At least a couple of things are seen in the above excerpt. First, we sense Maria’s naiveté. Her mind over-inflates the beauties of Madrid as a counterpoint to the carnage she and Jordan are currently in. And secondly, we sense Jordan’s internal recognition of “things that he knew could never happen.” There is, in short, recognition by Hemingway’s main character that the relationship will not end happily. In typical Hemingway fashion, the protagonist suffers this recognition silently. He keeps it to himself. He is a man in love, yes, but a man nonetheless alone.

Analysis: Hemingway wrote For Whom the Bell Tolls just two to three years after being in Spain during their Civil War, and just prior to WWII. In sum, it is a war novel. But what was Hemingway suggesting about war? Was the book only a diatribe against communism? Clearly, communism is shown in the book to be a system of butchery wherein what matters is never the individual but only the state and its power. But I think Hemingway was less focused upon exploring political ideologies than he was in exploring the individual’s role in war (any war) and his significance/lack thereof. Here is one example of what I mean. Robert Jordan is thinking to himself:

If this was how it was then this was how it was. But there was no law that made him say he liked it. I did not know that I could ever feel what I have felt, he thought. Nor that this could happen to me. I would like to have it for my whole life. You will, the other part of him said. You will. You have it now and that is all your whole life is; now. There is nothing else than now. There is neither yesterday, certainly, nor is there any tomorrow. How old must you be before you know that? There is only now, and if now is only two days, then two days is your life and everything in it will be in proportion. This is how you live a life in two days. And if you stop complaining and asking for what you never will get, you will have a good life. A good life is not measured by any biblical span (Hemingway, 1940, p. 169).

 Hemingway shows his hand here by having his protagonist demonstrate his worldview. Jordan is secular. There is no God in his thinking. What matters is this world, the here and now, and he should not look for cosmic justice. Eat, drink, and be merry now, for that is all there is. There is no “biblical span” in this man’s thinking.

Assessment: How do I therefore judge the novel? What are my visceral and intellectual evaluations of the novel and its worldview? Is Hemingway’s worldview, at least as evidenced through this novel, accurate? Is the worldview given the way reality really is?

As a story of a man in war, a man against overwhelming odds, the novel succeeds as far as it goes. As a military man, I appreciated the specifics and accuracy with which Hemingway denotes calibers of weapons, the precision of maps and cartography, the models of aircraft, etc. All of these rang true. How did the novel affect me emotionally? How did it stir me? In short, it stirred me because I felt what it was like to view life as a secularist. Though I am a Christian, I revisited what the Bible calls the natural man’s way of seeing the world. Here is an example of Hemingway’s demonstration of his (and Jordan’s) atheism.

I wish Grandfather were here instead of me. Well, maybe we will all be together by tomorrow night. If there should be any such damn fool business as a hereafter, and I’m sure there isn’t, he thought, I would certainly like to talk to him (Hemingway, 1940, p. 338).

Here I see Jordan’s view of life as a secularist. He longs for ultimate redemption and the benefits of an afterlife to commune with his beloved grandfather but he rejects it, too. It seems foolishness to him. Biblically speaking, redemption is foolishness to the perishing.

A question or two: What if Hemingway was wrong? What if God does exist? Would Robert Jordan then embrace him? I don’t see any evidence of that in the text. What I do see is a man who, because he exiles God from his worldview, becomes an exile himself. He longs for love but believes he is unworthy of it from Maria, and that he will fail her. His god becomes his own pride, valor, courage in battle, and his sense of honor. But what do these terms mean in a universe devoid of the God who offers transcendent value? If all is material, whence come these values? How does the atheist account for objective values? I would argue that he cannot. They are preferences, but not objective values. Jordan is an exile from Eden (in which he doesn’t believe, but against which he nonetheless rebels), and his exile is self-imposed.

Sleeplessness and Disagreement with Hemingway

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Surely others know him. He mocks us as we turn upon our beds. He scoffs at us as we wriggle and squirm into our preferred positions, seeking to close our eyes. Perhaps we fluff our pillows or sip some water. We may arise and check the blinds, making sure they’re drawn, that the doors are locked, and then lie down again. Perhaps we look at our spouse and/or children with envy, as they rest, seemingly untroubled. But we wrestle on…against our mocking foe: sleeplessness. Tonight was such a night. Why? Perhaps it was because my father-in-law is slated for surgery today. Perhaps it was because our college-aged daughter came home last night to accompany her mom to Papa’s surgery later today, as I stay home with our son. Perhaps it was because I was so thankful to see our daughter home, even under the serious family circumstances, that I could not rest. Perhaps it was because God wants me to listen to him. When even the cicadas and frogs have fallen silent, I can listen without disturbance.

thIn Hemingway’s short story, “A Clean Well-Lighted Place,” an older experienced waiter and a young restless waiter discuss an old man who is sitting and drinking brandy alone in their café, late in the night. The older waiter respects the old man, and seems to have a spiritual kinship with him. However, the young waiter is hurried, impatient, and feels the old man is a nuisance. The young waiter wants only to close the cafe for the night, so that he can go home to his young wife.

But the old man remains in the café. He likes to sit in this particular cafe late at night where he can imbibe, not just brandy, but the night’s simple beauties. He takes note of the shadow of leaves in the electric light, th-1and of how clean this café is. He notices a soldier and girl, as they walk by in the street. The light reflects off the brass number on the soldier’s uniform. Details sparkle in the night when the pace of the day has slowed. The combination of light, some brandy, and cleanliness create a sanctuary for the old man, in his world that is otherwise a world of nothingness—the operative theme in this Hemingway story.

As the story unfolds, the two waiters discuss how the old man tried to commit suicide recently by hanging himself. But his niece discovered him in time, and cut him down by slicing the rope the old man had used. The old man had been, according to the waiters, in despair. When one waiter asked the other waiter what caused the old man’s despair, the response is crucial: “Nothing.”

Nothing as a cause? Yes. Why? Because man cannot truly live if his belief system is anchored in nothingness. Philosophically speaking, this is the worldview of nihilism. “He has plenty of money,” one waiter quipped. So fiscal poverty couldn’t be the cause of the old man’s despair. The assumption made is clear. Since the old man has enough money, then despair, that nagging sense of lostness, of nothingness, should not plague the old man. But it does. He’s in spiritual poverty. And so he comes out to cafes late at night, alone, and drinks brandy to dull his despair in order to endure.

The assumption by the young waiter is that if one has a good work/career, a loving spouse, and money, he/she should be fulfilled. In the words of the young waiter, one must only have “confidence.” Speaking of himself, the young waiter boasts, “I have confidence. I am all confidence.” Pity this man; he’s a shell.

This is how masterful Hemingway is. Look at that word carefully. Confidence. It denotes the feeling or belief that one can accomplish something, that success is just around the corner. What’s the root? Confide. It denotes the entrusting of something valuable to someone for safekeeping. And there’s the irony that’s crucial to think through in this story. The older waiter understands the reason for his spiritual kinship to the old man sitting alone in the café, sipping his brandy. Both the old man and the old waiter have lived enough to have lost it all; they’ve experienced the nothingness that life can bring, if it’s lived only in artificial light.

Solomon’s perennial lessons from Ecclesiastes are dangerous if taken in isolation: “And I commend joy, for man has no good thing under the sun but to eat and drink and be joyful, for this will go with him in his toil through the days of his life that God has given him under the sun” (8:15 ESV). It’s vital to read the whole context, because if we don’t understand the overarching story of God behind the existential momentary joys, we are spiritual amputees, like the old waiter and the old man.

They both are seeking light in the night–just a simple café, with clean tables and polished wood and decent brandy. The young waiter is likewise lost, but he’s still so immature, that he’s “all confidence.” He’s just a younger version of the lostness of each man in the story. Why do the old waiter and the old man suffer alone? Because they’re cut off from the confidence the young waiter has, the sense of having life by the tail. They understand lostness, the sense of seeking light and beauty in a world devoid of God.

That light, however, was absent for them because, in Hemingway’s worldview, God was absent. When God is absent, Hemingway had the intellectual honesty to admit, despair and nihilism result. He, like his characters, wanted to entrust his soul, to another. He wanted to confide. He longed for a spiritual confidant. Like the old man drinking brandy late at night alone at the café, Hemingway, too, attempted suicide. But Hemingway’s own end differed in one significant detail. Hemingway’s suicide was actualized. He blew his brains out with a double-barrel shotgun.

The old waiter and the old man had lost almost all hope. And the young waiter’s hope was misplaced. All three men were near to light, but shut it out. Could it be because the true light had come into the world but they preferred darkness (John 3:20)? Could it be that when anyone suppresses the light of God, he/she invariably substitutes other lights—well-lighted cafés, brandy, or activities/busyness?

The young waiter assumes his busyness, his wife, and his activity will stand him in good stead. But the older waiter and the old man share some sad wisdom. Life’s not that neat. The two older men know what happens when those things are taken away. One is left exposed before God. But for Hemingway, as for these men in the story, God was absent.

I’ve read Hemingway deeply for two and half decades now, and I’m continually astounded by his giftedness in evoking catharsis—the pathos engendered by such a masterful writer, where our souls are knit with characters to such a degree that our life experience is deepened. However, I wonder what it would have taken for him to acknowledge that we are always exposed before God. The Bible served Hemingway for more than a few of his titles of his novels and stories (The Sun Also Rises title comes from Ecclesiastes 1:5, and the Lord’s Prayer, found in Matthew 6:9-13, is mocked in “A Clean Well-Lighted Place”).

In Hebrews 4:13, Scripture records this promise from God: “And no creature is hidden from his [God’s] sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give account” (ESV). Often in Hemingway’s writing, the reason we come across men like these, men who are alone, in despair, and teetering over the spiritual chasm, is because they’ve cut themselves off from the author of rest. Perhaps sleeplessness can be a gift to draw those who will listen to the God who grants rest, a Sabbath rest, for those who’ll seek refuge in him. He even calls himself the light. Such light, one might dare to say, outshines even a well-lighted café.