Prior to "Hills Like White Elephants," I only knew Ernest Hemingway as the famous writer of The Old Man and the Sea so In Our Time was my first full experience of Hemingway.
I have to admit, I didn't enjoy it very much. It felt more like a hodgepodge than a connected series of stories like The Things They Carried. I understand Hemingway's erratic ordering of the stories is representative of the disjointed limbo the world was in post-World War I, but it was often very confusing to follow along.
Hemingway's signature flat prose in and of itself wasn't an issue for me. Though it's not exciting to read, it draws attention to the action by eliminating the distraction of descriptors. The lack of captivating plot to validate it, however, was what disinterested me during most of the book.
There were three stories that I really liked: "Indian Camp," "The Battler," "My Old Man." I found these particular pieces much more compelling than the others. "Indian Camp" featured the grim but significant reality that suffering is a part of both life and death. "The Battler" was driven by the entertaining backstory of arguably the most intriguing character (Ad Francis). And of course, "My Old Man" featured a breath of fresh air in the form of an engaging, non-robotic narrator.
There were three stories that I really liked: "Indian Camp," "The Battler," "My Old Man." I found these particular pieces much more compelling than the others. "Indian Camp" featured the grim but significant reality that suffering is a part of both life and death. "The Battler" was driven by the entertaining backstory of arguably the most intriguing character (Ad Francis). And of course, "My Old Man" featured a breath of fresh air in the form of an engaging, non-robotic narrator.
In Our Time has historical significance when it comes to short stories. I respect that. It just wasn't my cup of tea. How'd you like it?
Yea I also didn't really like the collection of short stories, but to be honest if I read it again in like a year I would probably have a different opinion of it. His rather plain prose lets us paint our own picture from what's going on, but sometimes I put down the book before I get a chance to. I also agree with you that this style of writing where short sentences dominate would still work for me, but like you said it needs a solid plot. Personally, I wouldn't have enjoyed "Hills Like White Elephants" and probably wouldn't have read it if it wasn't for this class, but because we discussed it deeply and read it section by section that I got a grasp of Hemingway and actually got to enjoy it - it was quite fun picking out details and fleshing backstories out of it. However, that's a really REALLY short story, and I also needed an expert to help me out. So do I like Ernest Hemingway? I can't say, because over the summer I read "The Sun also Rises", and I got through all of that. I also think it's fair to say that that book is a lot longer than any of these stories (actually probably longer than the whole anthology), so why did that work for me, but not this? To be honest I don't know... is it because of the school setting?
ReplyDeleteI can sympathize with many of your feelings for this book. I also tended to enjoy the stories with interesting characters or more captivating plot. You pointed out that the ordering and style of these stories as a collection was meant to represent the way the world was after World War I. You also said that this book was overall confusing and hard to follow along. These two comments led me to this question: Is it possible that this was Hemingway's goal for In Our Time? To actually make the reader feel confused and lost? Perhaps, similar to Tim O'Brien, Hemingway wanted to produce that feeling of confusion within his audience. To get them to experience what he and the rest of the world experienced after World War I. Could this be the reason why some stories seemed to have no plot? Maybe the purpose of these stories was not to provide his readers with a fun and interesting read, but rather to (as a collection) stimulate a certain response and emotion out of the reader. Not sure if this is right, but your post made me think about these things.
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