A FAREWELL TO ARMS - Ernest Hemingway

Here is a book I finished reading August 11th 2013 at 3:14am

The idea to read this book was based on my desire to try and read all of Hemingway's classic novels in order to prepare me well enough to have good conversations about them with friends that already read the books.  It was all worth the effort.  As mentioned in my other Hemingway posts I have taken in 5 of his books in so far and am holding there for awhile.

This was not an easy read for me like some of his others works such as Old Man and the Sea and The Sun Also Rises.  Instead I had to work a little harder in the beginning to stay interested. However, as the book progressed and the Characters became clearer I found I was locked in and it was hard to put down.

I was fooled originally, after a friend had told me it was one of the best war novels ever written, when I realized the majority of the book is not spent in combat, but is spent, rather, with the main characters time in the hospital and on the run from the war. Perhaps my friend had this confused with For Whom the Bell Tolls?  Regardless, this book is by far one of my favorite Hemingway to date.

Without giving too much away I will keep this simple.  The book follows an American character named  Frederic Henry, serving as a Lieutenant ("Tenente") in the ambulance corps of the Italian Army.  The main focus of which is his love affair with a nurse who I am unable to decipher is English or Scottish from what I remember.  The love they develop is put to the test after Henry defects from the war effort after almost being put to death for retreating in a very 'on the edge of your seat' scene that left me staying up late to finish.  There love affair blossoms and they begin to start a life together and grow older with a twist at the end that broke my damn heart.

There were the classic and notable scenes for me that I have come to expect from Hemingway which include the way in which the characters drink and the rather extended dialogue between men and woman that has become the Hemingway trademark for me.  Seeing entire pages of conversation between characters is not new for Hemingway fans, but he makes it work perfectly and this is what I love most about Hemingway's books; that I am right in the moment as one of the characters, often forgetting that I am reading.

I recommend this book for all Hemingway fans of course, and those looking for a good (yet manly) love story. One must keep in mind that this was written so long ago and the language used is not at all how you might expect one to talk today and I think Hemingway loses a lot of younger readers today due to this and this is a damn shame to say the very least.  This was a major issue for me as well, as just as the lines of reality were beginning to blur and I was fully immersed in the fiction, a line or two of speech that just didn't make sense to me would throw me off and I would have to start back into it.  I hope public schools take note and add more of these types of classics to the reading curriculum so they can be learned to be enjoyed.  Would be a shame to see an entire set of masterpieces disappear.

This book is 332 pages long and it took me 2 days to finish during a busy work week, which is to say that every second I wasn't sleeping or working my nose was buried in it.  On my sliding scale I give this book 9/10 for its ability to throw me right to the edge, and just when I thought I had it figured out and was in the clear...pushed me right over the edge.  Not too often do I leave a book feeling a very REAL sense of loss and pain.  This book hurt me, plain and simple.  Very effective and powerful read.