Category: A Farewell to Arms

Ernest Miller Hemingway, born July 21, 1899 and died July 2, 1961, was recognized as a very prominent novelist throughout his life. Hemingway based his novel, A Farewell to Arms, on personal life experiences he encountered when he was involved in World War l. Hemingway came from a very competent background as the son of a doctor, Clarence Edmond Hemingway, and a talented but unsuccessful singer, Grace Hall Hemingway (Young). As a child, Hemingway undertook many different hobbies including playing musical instruments, hunting, fishing, and highschool sports but he eventually stumbled upon writing and fell in love with it (McGovern). In school, he exceeded in writing for it was his strongest subject. This is one of several contributing factors to why Hemingway proceeded to work for The Star, a newspaper in Kansas City, Missouri, upon graduating highschool. It was there that Hemingway perfected his writing style. Soon realizing that all of the eligible men around him were leaving for the war going on in Europe, Hemingway tried enlisting for the military. Unfortunately, a defect in his eyesight rendered his acceptance into the war. Hemingway still pursued the war path but as an ambulance driver for the American Field Service instead thanks to the advice of his fellow newspaper reporter, Theodore Brumback. Ernest Hemingway wrote all about the encounters he faced during the war such as getting injured at the Austro-Italian front and falling in love with the nurse who was treating him (“Hemingway’s Short Stories”). These wartime adventures were altered and combined to create one of Hemingway’s most notorious novels, A Farewell to Arms. Ernest Hemingway would go on to win many awards for his striking writing styles and enticing content including the Pulitzer Prize in 1953 for fiction and the Nobel Prize in 1954 for literature (Young). Hemingway proved to be very well-rounded and successful throughout his life. He left a large impact on readers and writers alike and continued to inspire people in literature even after his death.

Form, Structure, and Plot

The text is divided into five books and forty-one total chapters. The book is three hundred thirty-two pages in length. Ernest Hemingway has a specific writing style which he emulates through his use of a mixture of techniques. The plot itself is fairly simple and easily digested. There are some portions of the novel that diverge into side thoughts or emotions, but other than that, A Farewell to Arms simply tells the story of a volunteer ambulance driver who has fallen in love with a war nurse in the midst of the war. The relationship inevitably ends in tragedy when Catherine passed away due to complications during labor and the protagonist, Frederic Henry, is left feeling lost in the world. The general timeline for the text is during World War l, between 1914-1918, so at least four years passed over the span of the book (Bracken). The story is told in past tense, describing the flashbacks Lieutenant Frederic Henry recalled during his time as an ambulance driver for the Italian army in World War l. The very first line of the novel reveals that the events have already occurred and they are just being told in a chronological order in Henry’s point of view. “In the late summer of that year, we lived in a house in a village that looked across the river and the plain to the mountains” (Hemingway 3). The story unfolds as one delves further into the book. Hemingway is also known to use the concept of a stream of consciousness in his works in which a person’s inner thoughts are continuously flowing. “-Then there was a flash, as when a blast-furnace door is swung open, and a roar that started white and went red and on and on in a rushing wind. I tried to breathe but my breath would not come and I felt myself rush bodily out of myself and out and out and out and all the time bodily in the wind. I went out swiftly, all of myself, and I knew I was dead and that it had all been a mistake to think you just died. Then I floated, and instead of going on I felt myself slide back. I breathed and I was back […] I tried to move but I could not move” (Hemingway 54). This quote reveals Henry’s live thoughts and hysterical state of mind during the time of the incident considering that neither Henry nor the readers are fully aware of what is going on. This feature strengthens Hemingway’s book as it adds depth into the emotions and thoughts of the characters. Ernest Hemingway is also well known for foreshadowing events in his novels. As Catherine was lying on her deathbed after giving birth, Henry was pleading for her safety. “Don’t let her die. Oh, God, please don’t let her die. I’ll do anything for you if you won’t let her die. Please, please, please, dear God, don’t let her die […] You took the baby but don’t let her die […] You’re all right, Cat […] You’re going to be alright” (Hemingway 330). Henry’s intense praying to keep Catherine alive foreshadows that something tragic will actually result from the complications instead of a pleasant outcome like he wishes. This is yet another feature that strengthens Hemingway’s writing. In the beginning of the novel, Frederic Henry is eager to get a piece of the action whenever he can. Henry explains how slowly the war was proceeding and he lists some of the places he visited on his leave when the war was down. During the beginning of the text, it is clear that Henry is new to many of the things that are occuring. He gets a little too close to the action and badly injures himself in doing so. Henry meets and falls in love with war nurse, Catherine Barkley, and the two proceed to meet as often as they can over the span of the war. The beginning of the text sounds like the average romantic comedy and the encounters are fairly expected. Towards the end, the novel becomes slightly less predictable. Henry becomes very accustomed to the fatalities of war and he matures a lot from his experiences. He and Catherine are expecting a baby boy but complications with the pregnancy makes them lose not only the baby but Catherine as well. Henry loses a lot more than just those he loves, Henry loses his sense of duty. He chooses to part ways with the Italian army which shows just how much true love affects a person. In the beginning, the reader would never have predicted such an eager boy, ready to take on the world, choose to desert something as important as his duty (Bracken). He becomes a lot less patriotic after suffering such a gut-wrenching loss.The end of the novel is a realistic view on life without all of the sugarcoating, ending the reader off with the notion that if true love could alter a person’s view on duty, it can move mountains. Hemingway does this on purpose to strengthen his theme on love and war.

Point of View

One of the notable features in Ernest Hemingway’s A Farewell to Arms is the shifting of point of view from first to second person narration throughout the book. Hemingway writes a large chunk of the novel in first person point of view in which the narrator and protagonist, Lieutenant Frederic Henry, reminisces on what life was like as an American ambulance driver part of the Italian army during World War l. Lieutenant Henry describes events that have already occurred therefore this novel is considered to be told in the past tense. Readers grow accustomed to this perspective but it shifts partway through the book. Second person perspective is introduced in book three, chapter thirty-two. Instead of using the pronoun “I”, Hemingway uses “you”. “You were out of it now. You had no more obligation” (Hemingway 232). The change of pronouns used is a clear indication that point of view has now shifted showing that the narrator is thinking out loud. Narration or perspective shifts are very important because they can alter the entire experience a reader will have while reading the book. Ernest Hemingway is able to smoothly transfer perspectives back and forth, making his writing very clear and concise.

Character

A Farewell to Arms introduces a multiplitude of different characters throughout the book. It consists of a variety of complex, dynamic, static, flat or round characters. The novel contains around thirty minor characters, not including Catherine and Henry, and a majority of them can be described as flat or static characters because they do not change a lot. The minor characters are still very important to the character development of the main characters because they contribute advice and warnings to the main characters. Some of the minor characters, such as the priest, proved to be flat because his patient personality and kindness towards Henry remained constant throughout the novel. Henry felt like he could confide in the priest because he was always reliable and honest towards Henry. Catherine Barkley was a static character in the novel because she also remained relatively the same in the sense that she was always overly cautious and anxious before and after meeting Henry. She had to constantly get reassurance that he loved her because she was naturally always worried. One complex character in the novel was Catherine’s friend, Helen Ferguson. With Catherine, Ferguson was very caring and concerned. With Henry, however; Ferguson was tougher and showed less compassion because she was worried that Henry was bad for her friend. Helen Furguson displayed a variety of different traits. Hemingway’s protagonist, Lieutenant Frederic Henry, majorly developed as a character. Henry can be described as a dynamic character because his personality changes the most. Though his age is not revealed, one can assume that Henry is in his twenties because not only is he eligible for enlisting into the war, but he easily heals from his injury, indicating that he is young. The readers are also left with interpreting Henry’s physical appearance on their own because Hemingway does not give a clear description. In a nutshell, Henry can be described as courageous, selfless, and loving. Henry went through a personality shift in that he becomes more emotional and sentimental rather than drinking and . He always remained modest.

Henry’s attitude on life shifted from enjoying the action and independence war provided to choosing to devote his time to be with Catherine. Henry fluctuates a lot over the span of the novel after having met Catherine because she ignites his emotional side. Henry serves as a reminder to the readers that loneliness is sometimes a choice. Once Henry found Catherine, he realized all of the great feelings he was missing out on, including love, warmth and stability. “We knew the baby was very close now and it (311)

Diction

Ernest Hemingway is able to make his writing come to life with the types of words he chooses. This novel of his is very special because it involves a mixture of different types of diction. It can go from being formal one minute to colloquial the next, depending on who is doing the talking. For example, in the midst of the action, Henry’s fellow driver Passini becomes injured and he starts screaming mercilessly. “Oh Mama Mia, Mama Mia! Dio te salve, Maria!” (Hemingway 55). This speech is considered colloquial for it is regional and informal. The shift in diction is clear as one starts reading the following paragraph in which Frederic tries to save his friend but realizes it is hopeless. “I unwound the puttee and while I was doing so I saw there was no need to try and make a tourniquet because he was dead already,” (Hemingway 55). Compared to the first quote, this one is free of colloquialism and uses higher vocabulary, indicating more formal diction. Another large distinction in the diction is found in the way Henry speaks when he is talking about the army versus when he is alone with Catherine. When describing things relating to the army, Henry uses very specific and descriptive vocabulary. “My Austrian sniper’s rifle with its blued octagon barrel and the lovely dark walnut, cheek fitted schuetzen stock hung over the two beds” (Hemingway 11). When comparing this speech to a time where he is speaking to Catherine, a large difference is noted. “I’ll love you in the rain and in the snow and in the hail and– what else is there? […] Go to sleep darling, and I’ll love you no matter how it is,” (Hemingway 126). The diction in this sense is much more personal and all around emotional. The author relies heavily on the use of imagery to help readers picture whichever action packed scenes it is that they are reading. “…Then came the chuh-chuh-chuh-chuh– then there was a flash, as when a blast-furnace door is swung open, and a roar that started white and went red and on and on in a rushing wind,” (Hemingway 54). The imagery provides the reader with the sense that the action is occurring in front of their own eyes. The diction in this novel indicates social status as well as region. In a dialogue amongst several men and their singing abilities, regional diction is evident. “You’re just a wop from Frisco,” says one of the men (Hemingway 120). A “wop” is “used as an insulting and contemptuous term for a person of Italian birth or descent” (Merriam-Webster). The diction shows that the conversation is happening amongst a group Italians or possibly in Italy itself. This word choice also refers to social status since the term is being used to belittle one of the singers, noting his decent. Hemingway’s written language is far from plain. His use of metaphors 126=rain 178 and 48=dialogue

Much of the story consists of conversations had by characters. Hemingway formats dialogues to be very concise. The conversations consist of many short sentences combined to form between half a page to an entire page of dialogue. The narrative dialogue of Frederic Henry usually drags on because he is sometimes narrating for long periods of time. This differs greatly from character to character dialogue because that usually consists of short bursts of sentences, packed with a lot of information. Sometimes the characters start arguing and that tension is evident through the use of exclamation and reiteration. Dialogue in the narrative voice is much calmer since the narrator has no one to argue with. A dialogue found in book five, chapter forty-one, is occurring between Catherine and Henry as Catherine is taking her final breaths:

“You’re all right, Cat […] You’re going to be all right.”

“‘I’m going to die […] I hate it.’ I took her hand”

“Do you want me to get a priest or any one to come and see you?”

“‘Just you,’ she said […] ‘I’m not afraid. I just hate it.’ […] ‘You won’t do our things with another girl, or say the same things, will you?’”

“Never”

“I want you to have girls though.”

“I don’t want them”

“‘[…] Don’t worry, darling,’ Catherine said. ‘I’m not a bit afraid. It’s just a dirty trick.”

“You dear, brave sweet.” (Hemingway 330-331)

This passage helps a reader dissect some of the characters, tone, and part of the story’s theme. The theme of love requiring courage is very evident from this excerpt because both Henry and Catherine had to be brave for one another. Catherine had to let Henry go and vice versa. This relays a very somber and tragic tone to the text as a whole. Both characters show bravery in the face of adversity. This next passage is from book one, chapter nine, in which an injured Frederic Henry is being treated after getting badly injured:

“Are you hit badly?”

“In the legs.”

“It’s not serious I hope. Will you have a cigarette?[…] They tell me you’ve lost two drivers.”

“Yes. One killed and the fellow that brought you.”

“What rotten luck. Would you like us to take the cars?”

“That’s what I wanted to ask you.”

“We’d […] return them to the villa. 206 aren’t you?”

“Yes.”

“It’s a charming place. I’ve seen you about. They tell me you’re American.” (Hemingway 57)

The diction presented in this passage shows formality and hints that the man Henry is speaking with may be English. Words such as “rotten” and the formatting of his questions show that the doctor may be from England. This English doctor seems very polite based on the way he is asking Henry all those questions. Henry’s character is also revealed because this passage shows how patient he is. Even though his leg just got blown up, Henry is still calmly answering the doctor’s questions, not making a great deal out of it. As readers will find out later, patience is only one of many great parts about Frederic Henry’s character. This passage also impacts the theme and tone. Henry’s selflessness and courage is shown in this dialogue because it shows that he made sure to check on his other drivers before being attended to. Otherwise, he would not have known the answer to the doctor’s question about the well being of Henry’s drivers. A tone of gloom and tragedy is set from this passage because not only has Henry just lost two of his drivers, but his own wounds are looking very alarming. With the help of diction, indicating tone and theme has become much simpler.

Significance of Title

Book titles can have a large impact on how readers construe a work of literature. Readers have interpreted the title, A Farewell to Arms, in several different ways. First off, the word “arms” is a homonym meaning it has multiple different meanings. “Arms” can either mean weaponry or it can stand for the upper limbs of the human body. This makes it so that people can interpret the title in a multitude of ways. For example, some assume that Hemingway borrowed the title from George Peele’s poem “A Farewell to Arms” written in the sixteenth century in which a knight explains to Queen Elizabeth l that his old age no longer makes him suitable to bear arms for her, or in simpler terms, to fight for her (Bracken). Others say that the title refers to Henry’s desertion of the Italian army. In the sense that “arms” means weaponry, the title expresses Henry bidding goodbye to the war and weapons. Lastly, some readers understand the title to mean that Henry is simply saying goodbye to the loving arms of his beloved, Catherine, as she departs from the existing world and onto the next (Bracken).

Ernest Hemingway has always been a very popular writer among readers in the last part of 20th century not only because of his novels but also because of his life. It’s commonly known that most of his writings present real life experiences from Hemingway’s past and I have chosen 2 of his most representative ones: A Farewell to Arms and For Whom the Bells Toll. Both novels focus on physical and psychological impact of war on soldiers and on their loved ones as well. I chose these novels as they had a great impact on my passion for History and World War I and how it was perceived not only by historians but also by writers of that time. Hemingway’s perception, presentation and characters are alive, very much active and the visual images he creates in his novels had a great impact on myself. I later on found out that he himself was a soldier and his life experience is very much present in his writings.

Hemingway is one of the writers considered part of the “lost generation.” The term “lost generation” is generally applied to those who had actively participated in the First World War and because of this they had realised that life was meaningless. The importance of the First World War in the dethronement of moral and religious values cannot be over emphasised. Those who had gone to the War had fallen into the impression that war was an occasion to seek glory and assert one’s manhood.

Lost Generation, in general, was the post-World War I generation, but specifically a group of U.S. writers who came of age during the war and established their literary reputations in the 1920s. The term stems from a remark made by Gertrude Stein to Ernest Hemingway, “You are all a lost generation.” Hemingway used it as an epigraph to The Sun Also Rises (1926), a novel that captures the attitudes of a hard drinking, fast living set of disillusioned young expatriates in post war Paris.

The generation was “lost” in the sense that its inherited values were no longer relevant in the post war world and because of its spiritual alienation from a U.S. that, basking under Pres. Warren G. Harding’s “back to normalcy” policy, seemed to its members to be hopelessly provincial, materialistic, and emotionally barren. The term embraces Hemingway, F.Scott Fitzgerald, John Dos Passos, E.E. Cummings, Archibald MacLeish, Hart Crane, and many other writers who made Paris the centre of their literary activities in the ’20s. They were never a literary school. In the 1930s, as these writers turned in different directions, their works lost the distinctive stamp of the post war period.

It was the First War in which machine had played a very important role, more important than the men who were fighting the war. The unprecedented hatred of man shook their faith in the goodness of man and even the fact of their manhood. It was the first time that soldiers and generals alike had come to realise that they were helpless in the hands of the destructive weapons that they were using. The machines had become their masters instead of being their slaves. As a result of the domination of the machine over men, men had felt that they were extremely helpless, they were victims of a vast conspiracy in which machines and gods had conspired to strangle the individual’s freedom. They had moved from one trench to another in order to save their lives and when they were killed, they were killed by accident and they did not have any chance what so ever to show their courage or bravery which war is usually supposed to bring out in man.

In other words, it describes the disillusioned young men who survived World War I. It defines the loss of morality and the aimlessness in the lives of soldiers, their feelings at the time. The War destroyed their idea that if you were good, good things would come your way. But for many men who went to the war and experienced death, they returned physically and mentally damaged. The faith that had once given them hope and helped them before had been destroyed by the countless number of deaths.

The novels written during the post war period showed these feelings. Hemingway’s A Farewell to Arms is clear evidence of these new beliefs. Hemmingway explains all the feelings that soldiers of his time felt during and after the war. In A Farewell to Arms Hemingway uses painful experiences of his own life and places them in the novel. The main character of the novel Henry is based on himself and his personal experiences. His personal pain enables him to describe him and his feeling to a great amount of detail. The characters’ views of the world change with war just as Hemmingway’s did. But Henry’s pain is greater than the physically pain he experiences. In Hemmingway’s writing there is always an emotional pain of a past love. Mentally Hemmingway was damaged by a past love. While he was recovering from his wounds, Hemingway fell for a woman by the name of Hannah Agnes von Kurowsky. She was older than him and not very interested in him. They dated but Hemingway had the idea of marrying her. Agnes had another idea. The dating never went farther than a date. So they ended things and parted their own ways. But this caused him a great pain that led him to alienation and to make all his work including A Farewell To Arms to have a tragic end when it comes to love.

War is a terrible event that can have a drastic effect on the soldiers who take part in it. It can destroy their lives and families, but it can also destroy the emotions of innocent civilians. In his novel A Farewell to Arms Ernest Hemingway exhibits this destruction with the theme of love as a response to the horrors of war and the world.

As a lost generation writer, Hemingway, like many others, wrote about World War I. The story takes place during the war where an American ambulance driver is in an Italian front. This American, Frederick Henry, later slowly falls in love with an English volunteer nurse, Catherine Barkley. In Hemingway’s novels, the female characters he writes about are described as women who act in the service of men rather than in their own desires. The women that he describes are more like most women of that time, where it is considered a more traditional role.

However, in A Farewell to Arms, Catherine seems to be a more liberal character who has escaped from the traditional roles of women. Catherine does not suppress her own needs to care for Frederick; neither does she mask her own individuality. Catherine is not affluence by the ambiance around her showing her independence and her strives for her dreams display her ambitious needs, however, she does present some submissive behaviour. Catherine has her own independent personality with an identity of her own. She has more liberal views towards traditional matters. When she and Frederick were in love with each other, Frederick suggests that they should get married. Catherine did not believe that being wedded in a church is necessary for their relationship. Catherine felt that standing before a priest would not hold their union together. She saw doing rituals of any sorts are just empty forms performed, she did not see it having any real effect. Similar to not getting married, Catherine did not see baptizing a child as any useful form.

In this case it was Frederick who brings it up again. Catherine’s refusal to adapt religious ceremonies in her life show that she does not do as Frederick pleases. Indeed, whenever Henry and Catherine are blissful, something comes along to interrupt it, whether it’s Henry’s injury, his being sent back to the front, his impending arrest, or finally, Catherine’s death from childbirth.

Human life was completely devalued in this mechanised war that Hemingway seems to be groping for new gods is apparent from not only the early works but also from the later works. One of the new gods that Hemingway seemed to have accepted was the discipline that a writer must exercise in his writings. He must be true to his talent and in which the reader should experience by himself what the writer has described. Life is sad, tragic, and there is no escape from pain. If this be so, it is useless to try to escape from the inevitable. Therefore, what one can do is to be a man. When man is afflicted with misery, pain or sorrow, or even death, the way to face it is to remain calm, be true to oneself and one’s companions, endure pain as best as one can and to fight as brave as you can. To give up a fight would be unmanly. The undefeated must remain morally victorious even though he has nothing to win. That the winner takes nothing is the core of Hemingway’s philosophy and the code is an attempt to face up to this truth and this is the only reward that man can take with him from this world. There is also another underlying assumption in Hemingway’s philosophy: there is no world beyond the grave. Therefore, one’s victories and losses are to be measured in terms of this world and not in the world beyond the grave. So there is a constant stress on the enjoyment of the good things of this world.

As quoted, “If they killed men as they did this fall, the Allies would be cooked in another year. He said we were all cooked, but we were all right if we did not know it. We were all cooked. The thing was not to recognize it. The last country to realize they were cooked would win the war.” (Hemingway). Warfare has always been a part of history throughout the years. However, the aftermath of the war is a topic often left untouched by society. The first world war had changed the youth of the 20th century, being put into a category of illusion and influenced their way of thinking. In the book, WWI had internal effects on people such as post-traumatic stress disorder (also known as PTSD), societal culture, and how the war helped people understand why thing’s in life happen.

In Earnest Hemingway’s “A Farewell to Arms, men involved in the battles were hurting inside and out, some more than others. Those affected in WWI had some sort of psychological decline, classified as “shell shock”. Doctors described shell shock as having a dysfunctional nervous system, a high sense of irritability, traumatic dreams, and specific reactions to noises. The book shows situations of confusion, and mental struggles, proving that when a man is involved with war, there is a constant threat of injury, death, adaptation, and pain. An example shown in the book would be when Henry is having pasta with other Italian ambulance drivers when they are hit by shellings, causing an image of injury and death that traumatized Fredric.

WWI had a big influence on the societal culture of the infamous roaring twenties, causing domestic effects. Hemingway referred to the youth as The Lost Generation”, meaning that the veterans, survivors, and society had different experiences as the war progressed. The era is described to be full of drinking, partying, going out, emptying their pockets, mentally harming people in a way that they became delusional. Men were seen to have lost their masculinity, while the aftermath of the war made people want a much simpler time. As for Fredric and Catherine, the delusional thought of raising a child and holding major responsibilities was worse, as Fredric had no maturity over the concept of love. Fredric’s idea of love wasn’t the same as Catherine’s, as the society had more of a free-will way of thinking. The 20’s culture was seen as immature by the older generations, causing tension within the era.

Within the book, WWI determined how those involved in the war understood and processed the outcomes. This era was a blueprint for the after-war society to look back at while it progressed, including the want to advance as a society that was delusional and immature by the elders. As shown in Hemingway’s book, there was an understanding that the troubled youth involved internally or externally in the war defined the generations after while the war progressed, and while the war ended. The end of the war defined the fact that as always, the world keeps spinning and societal views will decline or accept, which Fredric realized his splitting with Catherine Berkley as a result of maternal death– pregnancy was a result of love, and her death was a result of people loving each other. Henry and the Priest’s perspectives of love were different, but Fredric came to understand love caused Catherine and the baby’s death. Hemingway’s philosophy indeed showed how the war had affected the decade in terms of how both people had their mannerisms and ways of seeing things in life such as serving, aiding, loving, and leaving the warfare in Italy.

In understanding, not only did Earnest Hemingway’s “A farewell to arms” define the effects of war on people and society itself, but he defined the universe’s symbolism for war: life and death. Although the book went over Fredric’s life story as an ambulance driver for in the Italian force during WWI, the book’s perspective here was observed into seeing how war takes a psychological, physical, and emotional toll on those serving in the war, how the post-war society influenced and semi-justified the way of Fredric’s thinking, and how Fredric’s views towards the end of the war made him change the way he analyzed aftermath realization and understandings of why things in life happen. Hemingway not only put his war experiences in a form of a book, but he described the life events the war can have on people, whether many soldiers had diagnosed with shell shock, how the war affected the culture of the twenties, and how the aftermath of the war made Fredric realize why things in life happen.

Works Cited

1. Hemingway, Ernest. A Farewell to Arms. New York: Scribner, 1957.
2. Harvard Health Publishing. “Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.” Harvard Health, www.health.harvard.edu/a_to_z/post-traumatic-stress-disorder-a-to-z.
3. Polakovic, Gary. “How Did WWI Reshape the Modern World?” USC News, 9 Nov. 2018, news.usc.edu/151487/impact-of-world-war-i-shaping-the-modern-world/.
4. “Popular Culture During WWI.” Remembering WWI, rememberingwwi.villanova.edu/popular-culture/.

We are here today because the value of the literary canon and its influence on the current school curricula has been attacked and questioned. Classics, for English teachers like us, are the ‘Mona Lisa’ and ‘The Last Supper’; the microscope and periodic table; the abacus and calculator. Harold Bloom, a giant defender of the literary canon, once stated that “All canonical writing possesses the quality ‘of making you feel strangeness at home’.” Every word in this type of books seems to express beauty, intellect and creativity. However, we all know that there is something more important than the flowery language. It is clearer than a crystal that classics should still be taught because these are works of literature that had stood the test of time. These are the literary books that continue to have relevant context and message because our society still accept the values and ideologies, we used to have hundred years ago. With this in mind, students will then be exposed to issues and outlooks beyond their immediate experiences, and hopefully will be more prepared for the ‘real’ world once they leave the comforting gates of our school. The pieces ‘A Farewell to Arms’ by Ernest Hemmingway and ‘Catcher in the Rye’ by J.D Salinger are perhaps the greatest examples of classics featuring literary and figurative devices intentionally used to reveal the sociological concerns and cultural norms we had, and still have today.

Inspired by the personal experiences of the author himself, Ernest Hemmingway wrote ‘A Farewell to Arms’ in 1928 in which the novel is primarily set during and after the Italian campaigns in World War I. Hemmingway, similar to the protagonist Lieutenant Henry, joined the Red Cross Ambulance Corps during World War I, where he was struck with a trench mortar along with three Italian soldiers. During his recovery, he met and immediately fell head over heels with a Red Cross nurse Agnes von Kurowsky, the real-life version of Catherine Barkley.

‘A Farewell to Arms’ is considered a classic due to Hemmingway’s unique and outstanding writing style – simple, direct and concise; every single word included is necessary in delivering the context. Another characteristic that identifies this piece as part of the literary canon is its relevant theme. The author presents us with complex insights into human life, particularly during the most difficult times of existence, through the theme reality vs fantasy. This dominates the novel as all characters continuously dream and create fantasies of better lives after war; however, due to the truths of reality, it was just simply impossible. We may not be living during a period of a war, but the unfair conditions still existing in today’s world force some people to live in such hardships and struggles.

Hemingway structures the plot of ‘A Farewell to Arms’ where harsh reality always insinuate and destruct the dreams that the characters construct to make them persevere and hopeful. Both Lieutenant Henry and Catherine Barkley foolishly tries to escape the war itself in multiple occasions, but complications and problems always seem to find and destroy them. For instance, even at the start of the novel, both of them pretended to be in love with each other in the expectations of escaping the pain of reality. However, their ‘love’ for each other was immediately challenge when Henry almost lost his life as he was hit by a mortar shell (p.50). The couple, again, used love as an excuse to escape the ‘real’ world and peacefully live in the mountains of Switzerland where Catherine got pregnant. It was almost perfect, but not quite. Henry was attacked with reality when Catherine had numerous haemorrhages during her childbirth leading to unfortunate death (p.293). By incorporating these incidents in the plot, Hemmingway positions the readers to realise the bitter reality of life- that sometimes, even positive forces such as courage, love and hope appears to be insufficient and worthless.

Throughout the classic, Hemmingway incorporated symbolisms in order to foreshadow the important events that are about to happen. Rain, not only in the ‘A Farewell to Arms’ but also in real life, symbolises death, defeat and darkness. From the beginning of the story, Henry vividly describes the destructive manner of rain:

“At the start of the winter came the permanent rain and with the rain came the cholera. But it was checked and, in the end, only seven thousand died of it in the army.” (p.4)

This fact already associates the rain with death and notifies the readers that weather plays a vital role in this novel. Catherine’s fear towards rain and her acknowledgement to the connection of rain and death is the most obvious evidence of this weather’s symbolic meaning (p.118). Her perception was further justified when the novel ended with Henry coming back to the hotel, drenched from the rain, mourning for Catherine’s death (p.294). Hemmingway successfully reminds the readers through this symbolism that tragedies are inevitable and are thrown unexpectedly; it might be like a light rainfall or it might be a disastrous, life changing rainfall. But, no matter how hard we try, it is impossible to avoid and escape these challenges.

Aside from the similar writing manner, ‘Catcher in the Rye’, published in 1951, is also inspired by the personal reflection of the author J.D Salinger. Before joining the army in World War II, Salinger moved to different universities but was unable to graduate in any of those schools. These life events are similar to the experiences of Holden Caulfield, the protagonist of the novel, who was living in post-World War II conditions and has not managed to finish any of his studies. Although criticisms and controversies were developed due to the novel’s features of adolescent sexuality, this is still included in the literary canon as the dominant theme of isolation is still significant, especially in younger generation. It is apparent that this kind of books should be in taught in school because students are at their point of their lives in which they can feel isolated. Often, older generations tend to just brush it away and deal with it lighter that they should have, making them feel more abandoned. Holden Caulfield represents young people who feels isolated and excluded by the ‘heartless’ and ‘selfish’ society we had and, to be honest, still have today.

Salinger included dialogues throughout his novel in order to lucidly displays Holden Caulfield’s desire for someone who will understand him. He attempted to communicate with others to talk about his emotions and perspectives towards life in general, but their conversations always ended up with him being awkward or the other rejecting him. For example, on the way back to his hotel, he invited the driver for a drink: ‘Would you care to stop on the way and join me for a cocktail? On me, I’m loaded.’ (Chapter 9). Despite his offer to pay, the cab driver declined, making Holden, once again, lonely. He again attempted to speak with someone by paying offering five dollars to a prostitute named Sunny, starting the conversation with the usual “What did you do during the day?” (p.14). Sunny instantaneously replied ‘Sleep. Go to the show.’ (p.14), evidently exposing that she is uninterested with any discussions and all she wants to do with him is the paid sex. By using dialogues like the examples above, the author positions the readers to understand how difficult and challenging it is for a teenage person like Holden to reach out and reveal his personal issues with others. Salinger was also successful in subtly demonstrating the act of selfishness of some people within the society and how they ignore and disregard the emotions of others.

In the society where the value of the widely considered books are declining, it is our responsibility as English teachers to exert effort in bringing back its power and influence. All of the books in the literary canon demonstrate technical brilliance, universal themes of significance and creation of new consciousness thus, they deserve to be part of the current school curricula. Aside from the literary and vocabulary skills, students will be able to comprehend perspectives that they might not be able to experience in real life. They will also be more prepared to enter the real world as they are now aware of the cultural norms that still underpins today’s society. For instance, by reading ‘A Farewell to Arms’, the students will realise that life is unfair and they should be fully prepared to take on any hardships in life because sometimes, there will not be any rainbows after the rain: sometimes, there will be challenges straight after challenges, to the point that it will push them to give up. Classics like ‘Catcher in the Rye’ will teach students that there will be times where circumstances will be tough, and they will feel isolated and rejected. But it will also teach them that once they have overcome these feelings, they will find true happiness and hope again. Overall, classics should only be disregarded in the curricula once the themes and messages presented are no longer relevant to anyone in this society.

A Farewell to Arms Novel Notes

1) How does the author begin the novel?

A Farewell to Arms, by Ernest Hemingway, portrays the complicated relationship between two devoted lovers, Frederic Henry and Catherine Barkley, during the Italian campaign of World War I. The novel begins with the author describing what daily life was like since the war was the most important thing happening during this time period. He explained the degree of fighting going on extremely nearby and how people’s lives revolved around the war. The season was also changing from fall to winter, making the weather rainy and gloomy. The author then sets the scene with Lieutenant Henry, an ambulance driver, taking a winter leave from the battlefront as the war begins to slow down. When Henry returns, one of his friends, Rinaldi, introduces him to a lady that he was interested in named Catherine Barkley. Catherine was described as a beautiful English nurse’s aide that worked in a British hospital close by. Henry is immediately intrigued by her, and Rinaldi soon steps away from the relationship after he realizes that Catherine finds Henry more desirable. Catherine’s fiance perished in the war a year before, leaving her with lasting grief and sorrow. This emptiness makes her eager for someone’s affection, and Henry’s trauma and emotional scarring from the war makes him open to finding a partner. The beginning of their relationship starts at this point, and they have to face many more challenges with their relationship and war throughout the book.

2) What is the novel mostly about?

The novel is mainly about the strong relationship between Catherine and Henry as they embark on their journey to survive through the hardships of World War I. The novel portrays character development for both of the characters and shows how they struggle to maintain their relationship despite the difficulties that distance them throughout the war. As Henry and Catherine fall madly in love with each other, they must fight to stay together and preserve through the obstacles presented by the war. When Henry went to serve in the military, he was badly wounded, suffering a severe injury to his knee. He was transported to a hospital in Milan where Catherine ended up meeting him shortly after. Here he began rehabilitation, and his relationship with Catherine advanced and became more serious. When his leg was healed, he was scheduled to return to the front which meant he would have to leave Catherine once again. However, this time, it was harder for him to leave her because she revealed that she was pregnant. Even though Henry was going to be a father, that did not matter to the people in the military, and he was forced to fight in the war. When he returned to the front, the Italians had to make a retreat, so Henry picked up people on his way out of the area. Everything was going smoothly until he was discovered by a German officer, and he made a desperate escape by fleeing into the river. After drifting away with the current for a long period of time, he finally leaves the river and boards a train to Milan. Henry planned on reuniting with Catherine when he arrived, growing more impatient to see her. Catherine and Henry both meet up again and were more than happy to see one another. The two finally felt relief since they were together, and their relationship continued to grow a stronger bond.

3) How does the novel end?

The novel ends with Henry believing he is not attached to the military anymore when he flees to Milan to be with Catherine. When Henry arrives in Milan, he reunites with Catherine in the town of Stresa. However, the couple must escape quickly so they use a boat to get to their new destination. They row all night and they eventually arrive in Switzerland. In Montreux, a town in Switzerland, the couple spends their last winter alone together preparing for the arrival of their newborn baby. Although Henry is thrilled to become a father, he still bears the numbing guilt of leaving behind his fellow companions when they needed him at the battlefront. In the following spring, the couple makes the decision to move closer to the hospital in another town called Lausanne. After feeling some initial pain, Catherine goes into labor and it does not go as planned. Catherine experiences extreme agony and her labor becomes complicated. They give her a substantial amount of gas to relieve the pain, but Catherine still suffers. After a long labor that ultimately resulted in a Caesarean delivery, Catherine gave birth to a baby boy. However, Henry states that he is not proud of his son because he put his beloved wife’s life in danger. Henry is relieved to know that it is over, but what he does not realize is that the baby was stillborn, crushing Catherine’s dreams. Later that day, she endures many hemorrhages and slips into a coma, passing away quickly. This is the most devastating thing that Henry could have imagined, and he has a difficult time accepting that his only true love is gone. The novel concludes with Henry walking back to his hotel room in the rain, heartbroken and full of immense sorrow.

4) Examine important themes in the work.

One of the major themes in the book is that love comes with loss. Hemingway portrays many instances in the book where love ends up leading to a tragic loss. For example, at the beginning of the novel, the author states that Catherine’s fiance died in the war. This shows how Catherine’s first love ended in the devastating loss of her loving partner. This also foreshadows that the relationship between Henry and Catherine will also result in a horrible way. At the end of the novel, Catherine births a stillbirth baby boy, leaving them both extremely heartbroken. To add to this pain, Catherine ends up passing away after suffering fatal hemorrhages. By incorporating the idea of love and loss going hand in hand, it shows that love is not perfect and it comes with its downfalls. Another important theme in the book is that love has the power to overcome difficult situations. The effects of war have a tremendous burden on Catherine and Henry’s relationship, but this does not stop them from loving each other immensely. Their love gives them the power to overcome the tough hardships of the war. This proves that when a relationship goes through negative times, it often strengthens it, rather than tearing it apart. In addition to the themes about love, another main theme is that war takes a major toll on people’s lives. Whether someone was actually participating in the fighting of the war or they were part of the medical team, everyone’s lives were affected in one way or another. It was almost impossible for people to live normal lives with the war being such a protruding burden to society. Henry was affected both physically and mentally by the war, and it left a lasting impact on his personality. No matter what position characters took in the novel, the war changed their lives in different ways. All of these themes also transfer over into the real world and go beyond the words in the book.

5) Include one important quote/passage with parenthetical reference (your quote should illustrate theme, style or both). What does this quote illustrate? Why did you choose it?

“Often a man wishes to be alone and a girl wishes to be alone too and if they love each other they are jealous of that in each other, but I can truly say we never felt that. We could feel alone when we were together, alone against the others … But we were never lonely and never afraid when we were together” (Hemingway 249).

This passage illustrates the strong bond between Catherine and Henry and it shows that even though they may feel alone individually, they never feel lonely when they are with each other. They have such a passionate love for each other that they are able to overcome the feeling of being alone while they are together. This quote implies that just the presence of each other is enough to satisfy their loneliness and worries. The author uses repetition in this quote by stating the word “alone” repeatedly. This demonstrates the author’s style and how he uses it to make a greater impact on the reader. By repeating this word, it helps the reader understand that Catherine and Henry do not feel alone when they are with each other, and their love overcomes their own loneliness. In addition, the use of repetition reinforces the message the author is trying to convey and emphasizes a detail that is important to the story. This quote also illustrates the theme of love overcoming hardships. The love that the two possess for one another is so strong that it is able to conquer their feelings of solitude to complete the empty void they feel. I also chose this quote because it allows the reader understand that Catherine and Henry’s love was the driving force that kept them from feeling alone and afraid. If they had not met each other, both of them most likely would have suffered through a dreary life, distanced from the people around them.

6) Analyze the literary techniques the author uses. (How does the author craft the novel?)

Ernest Hemingway uses different techniques throughout the book to create a unique and intriguing novel. One major technique that he uses is short lines of dialogue that go back and forth between characters. Hemingway uses this strategy to make the situation seem more real to the reader because it is easier to envision how the scene is happening. He also uses a lot of repetition in his writing style because it enforces the main idea of the passage and emphasizes the importance of whatever is being repeated. The author also makes his writing simple and straightforward so it does not leave the reader questioning what they read. He is very direct and does not make people guess what is going to happen next. Another technique he uses in the book is he keeps everything in chronological order, meaning things do not occur out of order. This makes the book easier to follow since you do not have to continually refer back to past events. Along with these techniques, Hemingway also incorporates some other literary devices such as imagery, diction, and tone to craft the novel. Imagery helps set the scene and the tone affects the overall mood of the story. These literary devices help the author convey some of the important themes in the book, such as the power of love, by providing emphasis and clarity. By combining all of these strategies, the novel is crafted in a more alluring and easy to comprehend way.

7) Discuss one excerpt of literary criticism written on your author. You should paraphrase the critic’s comments in your own words and include a parenthetical reference.

Many people say that Ernest Hemingway is one of the most influential writers America has seen. However, some critics have different opinions. Hemingway experienced and wrote about World War I, making numerous people think he is the best American author. But, critics have said that he is not technically an American author because a majority of his novels were written in places outside of America during the war. They believed that this made him look like he was on an opposing side, from an American’s point of view. He was not portrayed as a true American author and scholarly experts have critiqued him about this. In addition, many people believe that he has a boring writing style that does not keep the reader engaged. A critic from the Hemingway Preservation Foundation states that Hemingway, “is known for creating novels that usually follow a basic chronological order, which some critics deem as boring and ‘typical’ for such a great American author” (Hemingway Preservation Foundation). This means that although his novels convey important messages and life lessons, they may sometimes be boring for the reader since he does not put a twist on the order of his writing. Even though Ernest Hemingway was born an American citizen, many people do not believe he is an American author because of his dull and international writing. http://www.hemingwaypreservationfoundation.org/ernest-hemingway-criticism.html

8) How successful is your author in your personal opinion?

In my personal opinion, Ernest Hemingway is extremely successful. He uses a combination of his unique style, emotion, and organization to craft beautifully written novels that have made a lasting impact on history. Ernest Hemingway is one of the most recognized authors and has written books that most people have either read or heard of. His books convey important life lessons and cause the reader to think deeply about what they have just read. Specifically in A Farewell to Arms, he kept the book interesting by creating scenarios that drove the plot forward. There were also many important messages that could be taken away from the novel and incorporated into real life. The novels he wrote were so prodigious that he went on to win a Nobel Prize for literature in 1954. His success also lead to a fairly large accumulation of money. Although he wrote books that went on to make him successful, he sadly ended up commiting suicide in 1961. Despite his tragic death, he is still seen as one of the best novelists of the twentieth century and his legacy continues to inspire others. Hemingway’s works have influenced a variety of people and inspired them to write novels of their own. Overall, Ernest Hemingway is arguably one of the most influential and talented novelists the country has seen.

The theme in the story “A Farewell to Arms” is based on love and war. Ernest Hemingway offered a different account of war that is unromanticized and more practical. Frederic Henry is the main character of the story. Throughout the novel, his character progresses quite a lot. Hemingway uses the war as an instrument to temporarily separate the two and bring them together. The story is told in a first-person narrative to help readers picture the events that take place. The author also uses weather as symbolism throughout the story. Hemingway portrays the cruel realities of war and how relationships can be formed through such a tough time. He shows that the people serving use their hopes as distractions of the harsh reality they are living in.

The story takes place during World War One. World War one was a time full of sadness and disillusionment. The main character in the story is Frederic Henry who serves as an American ambulance driver in italy. The woman he ends up falling in love with is Catherine Barkley who is an English nurse. In the beginning of the story Frederic was a cocky man; a womanizer. When Frederic hurt his leg he met Catherine who was his nurse. The two spent quite some time together and feelings grew quickly. Catherine wanted an emotional connection whereas Frederic did not. This obviously caused problems. But before he knew it he became madly in love with her and gave up his womanizing ways. Frederic became so disillusioned from the war he then said his “farewell to arms”. He no longer wanted to be in the war but he was not allowed to go home. To help maintain sanity he uses Catherine to fill the void. They end up being separated for quite some time by the war and reunite in Milan. From all of the recent trauma he had experienced, his level of maturity grew greatly to match up with Catherine’s. After he spent a summer with her the change was noticeable and forced him to grow up for good. Frederic’s change was demonstrated in Chapter 34. Towards the end of the story his character development was even more apparent. He started to realize things he never did before. But unfortunately, he has to carry that understanding by himself forever.

From beginning to end, Hemingway uses the weather as symbolism to help enhance the story. In the first chapter, there appears to be rain. The rain portrays death in the story. ‘In the fall when the rains came the leaves all fell from the chestnut trees and the branches were bare and the trunks black with rain,'(Hemingway 1). Catherine made the meaning of rain clear when she says ‘I’m afraid of the rain because sometimes I see myself dead in it,’ she said to him. ‘And sometimes I see you dead in it.'(Hemingway 19). Hemingway kept his audience at the edge of their seat each time rain appeared in the story. When his and Catherine’s baby is pronounced dead he looks out the window and all he sees is rain. We know that Henry will survive the rain because he is the narrator.

“A farewell to arms” is a story based on love and war. Hemingway uses two star crossed lovers to demonstrate how hard the war is mentally, spiritually and physically. He uses a first-person narrative to enhance the audience’s imagery. Not only that but he uses symbolism to create a better plot for the story. Hemingway uses war as an instrument to show how two lovers can use each other to escape reality mentally; and he physically separates them. This story demonstrates how cruel war can be, but how love can conquer all.

World war1 that caused death to million of military and civilians fought between United states, France and Russia on one side and Germany on other and bloodshed everywhere. The main aim of Italian’s were prevent the German troops from reinforcing the Austrian troops on the front as they were an ally of Germany and Austria. The most important event shown in the novel is the Italian retreat that happened on October 24, 1917. Fredric Henry is a volunteer who has to protect his Italian army as an ambulance driver and when all the soldiers arrived at the front, many became disillusioned and few who survived the war were also horrified by their experience. The novel also talk about the love that comes in one’s life and drives them away from the ruthlessness of the world but at the same time due to the same reason they lose people as during war so many innocent people lose their lives.

Summary

The story is based on an American man named Fredric Henry who is working under the Italian as an ambulance service during WWI and he meets Catherine Barkley who is a nurse in the English hospital. She is in depression as her husband is dead due to the war and later Henry gets wounded on his knee and is sent to hospital in Milan for the treatment, where Catherine is kept to look after him and operate him and soon they start to give enough time to each other and develop feelings for each other and soon they fall in love with each other. Catherine turn out to be pregnant by Henry but does not agree to get married and later Miss Van Campas notices that he hid alcohols in the hospital due to which he is sent back to the front, where Italian forces are at war and losing power and soon it is said that German troops are coming closer, so Henry leads his team with the ambulance drivers to evacuate. Later it’s known that he manages to escape the execution by the military police and jumps into the river and reaches to Milan by train and feels peaceful as he thinks that he is no longer connected to the military and soon he starts looking for Catherine and later they meet each other and spent quality time. They escape to Switzerland with a help of a boat and enjoy a beautiful and happy life as they leave the war life behind also they promise to love each other forever. And soon Catherine goes into labor, which results in painful and long surgery due to which she starts to hemorrhage and later dies while Henry sits beside her and tries to say her goodbye to her but cannot, later he comes back to their hotel alone in the rain.

Characters

Lieutenant Frederic Henry is the narrator of the novel as well as the protagonist, who is an American ambulance driver in the Italian army at the time of WWI though he is least interested into his work. He dislikes the war and soon falls in love with Catherine Barkley which helps him distract the brutal world. But the same time he is cool-headed person and is selfless in nature and under real pressure he can do his best at the battle and also remains loyal to Catherine.

Catherine Barkley is an English nurse, who eventually falls in love with Henry and she is beautiful and is described to have the most amazing hair. In the beginning of the novel, she mourns for her dead fiancé, which describes her nature as reckless and longs for love to remove her emptiness and so she accepts Henry’s love and they both escape the devastating world and stay away from war.

Themes:

Love has been the prominent theme of the novel as it describes both for the country and for a person but it’s rare to find love in this destruction of the world. As mentioned in the novel Henry always saw war and killing which made him disbelieve in love and happiness. However, when he fell in love with Catherine, they underwent through many situations but never gave up and it seems the world could not see them happy as each time they seemed to be blissful, something negatives comes along to destroy them and soon he gets injured, is sent back to front or his arrest order and eventually the death of Catherine.

The novel is covered basically about war and how it affects different lives in different ways and makes the reader think about how war can leave a person devastated and realize that war is nothing but just a senseless loss of life. In the novel, Henry always disliked war but the same time stood for his people to protect them though at times he and his team soldiers are broken down due to the violence they are part of it but soon he realized that this does not lead to anything and so he runs away from the damaging world and settles with Catherine.

Masculinity has also been shown through to the story in the strength needed for war, fight for the country and loyalty and also as being men, they drink, smoke and be heroically brave. But as in the end we are human, they too suffer, love and hurt and Henry has all the qualities of masculinity. He ends the end for his love and escapes the army to live peaceful and as an individual refuses to contribute in senseless war and brutality.

The historical sources of human history are telling us that there were many disastrous wars, fights, killings which had happened between enemies and hostile groups to control most area of world until now. The leaders of the countries employed young and inexperienced soldiers by giving them a particular job with salaries in the army forces to fight, also is using different types of weapon system to fight between the countries they spent huge economical sources throughout of war to buy new weapons, tanks, and other necessary items used in military.

One of the most famous wars during the twentieth century is the First World War or the Great War from 28th of July, 1914 to 11th of November, 1918. This period of war presents itself as the background to the novel A Farewell to Arms by Earnest Hemingway. The war, in the previous century, was between some huge countries at that time, and they were divided into two major groups: the first one consisted of France, Russia and Britain which were called Triple Entente, and the second group consisted of Germany, Austria, Hungry and Italy which were called Triple Alliance. That was one of the most destructive wars throughout human history because of some several reasons; the war caused huge population areas to be burned and damaged by fire, explosion, and destructive devices systems like bombs. No one could live in the damaged areas; therefore, most of the farmers and the people of the villages had to leave their own farms and houses groups that caused in the stations some men who worked in military services just fell to pieces and other men did not recover. However, beside the injured, other parts who were related to the military were victims – like medical health specialists, doctors and nurses were dead and lost because of they were apart of military health since there was no food, no clean water and security for their lives.

The population who lived under the hostile groups were in a bad condition in life and needed help for the basic services especially for those countries which had a major role such as Britain, this can be considered as one of the most effective strategic way between the enemies countries as Rosanne states that; ‘When Britain became a belligerent, every country in the world was affected. Those who were Britain’s enemies were progressively cut off from overseas trade by the naval blocked'(Rosanne et. al 7).

For a better understanding of the topic we can ask questions about the psychological and emotional status of the soldiers, the kind of diseases they faced, the use of emotional treatment to help them escape from war, and finding empathy and kindness during war.

It is clear war had more negative impacts on the soldiers than anyone else due to being attacked by enemies. The First World War did not only have physical impacts on human body; it also had psychological and mental effects on the human minds. Among them the soldiers and their family were the most vulnerable people to face diseases because they were the center of the war and the most important part of the military. According to a British psychologist Philip Vernon once described ‘the 1900s as ‘the most exciting decade in psychology since the death of Aristotle’’ therefore, they had an important role in ground forces and military services.

Most of the soldiers were in a bad economic condition. Poor or the working-class who needed money and salary to supply their families had to leave home to participate in the army, navy or air forces because that life condition forced the people to join military services as a way to get limited income for their life

As one of the researchers of soldiers’ life in his reports that, ‘Nearly a quarter of soldiers had a simple explanation for their decision to enlist: They ‘needed to make money,’ especially given the economic turmoil the country’s faced in recent years, The Army can provide me with great education benefits, great career benefits later on,’ one soldier told the researchers.'(keller).

Another reason was motivating the soldiers by the leaders of the countries against enemies to make their country have more energy, power, and control over their desires to be able use weapon devices. Therefore, they trained in national services to be regular professional soldiers to use weapons such as TNT, driving cars, using bombs and others. This had negative impact of most of the soldiers at the beginning of the war. Also some of the soldiers were not aware of the rules and the strategies in horrible states.

‘Life was really hard for the soldiers and their families because of the torment they went through on the brutal battlefields of WWI. None of the soldiers were prepared for the torment, neither were their families truly able to understand the full effects of the War upon their loved ones. WWI ultimately ended in 1919 but not before the lives of millions'(W.W.1 experiences on the Western Front), This quote above declares that they had to briefly fight against enemies and create the pride of their nation, however they were not ready to this war perfectly and not had enough experience because the soldiers were in a social condition which was common.

The heads of military armies of the most of countries had other responsibilities, because the war was to control and rule the most geographical area of the hostile groups there for one of the effective way to guide the soldiers political ideology was to keep the pride of their nation, as Bloom points it out in Earnest Hemingway’s A Farewell to Arms on page 78: ‘these are not simply men fighting but men fighting for (their country, freedom, each other, their pride)’

Another negative psychological issue which faced most of the soldiers and the most common psychological disorder among the soldiers and the military army was Shell Shock, a according to Riddle as an author ‘Shell shock was one of the major side effects of WWI. Many soldiers suffered from it, as it was caused by the heavy explosions and constant fighting associated with the war. Troops suffering from shell shock struggled with sleep. They panicked on hearing gunshots, loud noises, shouting and similar. Sometimes it affected their ability to walk and talk. Shell shock was a scary thing.’ Shell shock could be an emotional and psychological shock brought about by the many horrors that men heard while in the trenches. This situation resulted from the soldiers’ experience of the screams of others in agony, torture, pain and the thought of their own death.

Those who suffered from it might be hypnotized, electrocuted, rested or shocked. Due to the same cause, so many men were lost to it; and after the end of the war, they psychological negative impacts and suffering from the diseases. Otherwise, beside the physical injury, most of the soldiers had psychological diseases or disturbances of their emotional pain without caring about it. Professor Joanna Bourke says ‘By the end of World war one the British army had dealt with 80,000 cases of Shell shock, including those of Siegfried Sassoon and Wilfred Owen.’ It means the war ended, but still there were many other people, who suffered, and they were in a bad situation, and they need to be helped, as one of the journals declared the treatment of the soldiers by;’ For most patients, treatment in PIE centres involved rest, hot food and a programme of graduated exercise, culminating in route 216 E. Jones et al. marches.'(Jones et. tal 215¬¬-223).

Then in the same journal in anther data proves the age of the soldiers who had psychological diseases and issues throughout the war ‘The mean admission was 25 days, and the longest period of treatment was 150 days. The mean age on admission was 26.6 years. The youngest referral was 17 years'(Jones et. tal 215¬¬-223).

Although another way of healthy mental treatment, the soldiers can be cured by emotional and careful treatment with calmness, love, sound relationship and caring about family relations as a way to relaxation of mind which women had the main role to fulfilling emotions and coming out of the surrounding war.

Love and emotional states have an important role of our daily activities. Human emotions can force us to take actions and influence our decisions, love has many positive impacts on individuals especially when they are in horrible conditions, for example soldiers during war time, they got injured, as mentioned before, faced some psychological disorder like shell shock, they ruined psychologically they needed a cure to escape from that terrible conditions, for alone depressed the suppressed soldiers love was not a bad treatment to heal their psyche.

The role of love is the source of relief for depression of human beings. Love has different forms to show this emotional state, but Sometimes woman is a main character to play this role and give sense of love in different ways to her circumstance, especially nurses throughout First World War proved that love replace war and have positive impacts on the life of the most of the soldiers, and how soldiers use it to reduce their mental illness, Nurses played a major role in that war according to the proofs. They stayed at hospitals for many hours they cleaned soldiers wound, and took care of them, sometime dalliance happened between them, young Red Cross one of the stations of the treatment for the military services says ‘nurses spent many hours on the wards tending to wounded soldiers. The men’s conversations, jokes and songs must have provided a welcome relief from all the cleaning; making beds and gangrenous limbs the nurses had to deal'(knight). Sometimes While they serve patient soldiers they fell in love with them, because soldiers saw these women as their cure, and they helped the injured, , One negative impact of these psychological diseases among the soldiers was effecting other members of their families specially women but most of the time besides responding economical condition of the family, women had to manage and get responsibility household duties for the children and their soldiers husband, after coming back many the men who worked in military armies they were injured physically and mentally, suffered because of various diseases and abnormal functions in psychologically like Shell Shock, effects of mustard Gas, depression; for this state they need psychological help treatment to recover from their experience of war, also physical form appearance of their body were in a bad situation of sometimes they got in pieces, they needed a long time to get well again and had long¬-life injured. This condition shows that women had been got more responsibility for entire members’ of family, they rolled source of relief to keep unity to household.

In a farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway the two protagonists are in the same condition, Fredric with Catherin when they met they fell in love and sharing their feeling the come out of the depression of war, because he found love strong enough to feel safe during that bloody and disgusting war.

Behind the best American novel to emerge from World War One, is the embodiment and depiction of the many soldiers who returned to their states broken down and alienated from the war. Lieutenant Fredric Henry, the protagonist in A Farewell To Arms, is a clear illustration of Ernest Hemingway’s idea of the Lost Generation and the idealistic code hero. Like many other of Hemingways’ code heroes, Fredric Henry existentially feels detached from the world and the war. As Fredric faces the harsh traumas and realities of World War One, he continues to reject the traditional values of religion and represents an abstract view on the war. Essentially, Henry conveys the general loss of faith and religion in a convention of morality of the code hero. Opposed to Henry in the poem “A Farewell To Arms” , the knight is the clear depiction of the true ideals of a classic hero: loyalty, traditional values, and a perfectionist. In A Farewell To Arms, Ernest Hemingway uses indirect characterization to contrast the code hero and the classical hero through the ideas of loyalty, rejection of traditional values like patriotism, and impurifications which reflect upon the lost generation.

The most evident contrast is the difference between Frederic’s loyalty towards the war and the knight’s loyalty towards the queen. In the novel, A Farewell To Arms, the Italian Army starts to arrest and kill their own Italian men in search for disguised Germans. After Henry is arrested and taken to the riverbank, Henry makes for a fight or flight moment. Henry’s concise stream of consciousness after he takes action to escape into the Tagliamento river describes his loyalty towards the war: “[I] ran for the river, my head down… The water was very cold and I stayed under as long as I could.” (Hemingway 225). When he submerges into the cold water of Tagliamento River, Frederic’s obligation towards the Italian army washes away and shifts towards the love of his life, Catherine. In total, Frederic flees, not out of cowardness, but out of unwillingness to make a sacrifice towards a large institution and larger cause, such as the war, that is meaningless {in his eyes} showing his true loyalty towards the war. His immersion from the river and flight from the war, signifies his inability to be loyal to large institutions and embodies what it means to be a code hero as opposed to the classic chivalrous hero. In contrast, in “A Farewell To Arms” poem, George Peele describes loyalty as a knight as “And, lovers’ sonnets turn’d to holy psalms …A man-at-arms must now serve on his knees,” (Peele) reinforcing what it means to be a classic hero. He shows that a knight must abide to the loyalty of queen no matter what. Even when the knight lays down his shining armor, he must continue to serve the queen in prayer and spread his ideas to the good of the people. Hemingway’s illustration of Frederic’s loyalty towards a small group as opposed to Peele’s portrayal of the knight’s loyalty towards large institutions shows readers what it means to be a code hero versus a classical hero.

Frederic further differentiates from the knights ideal classic hero through his rejection of traditional values. In the novel, A Farewell to Arms, Frederic presents an entirely different perspective on the war. This is mainly presented when Henry meets the young patriot, Gino. Gino prattles the sacredness of the italian army and his own willingness to die for his own country. However, Henry displays his abstract traditional views of patriotism when he says, “Abstract words such as glory, honor, courage, or hallow were obscene beside the concrete names of villages, the numbers of roads, the names of rivers, the numbers of regiments and the dates,” (Hemingway 185). To Henry, such abstractions like honor, courage, and hallow mean little to nothing for the chaos and destruction war brings upon the people. He diminishes the romanticized “sacrifices” and puts aside the traditional worth of honor and glory of the war. He rejects the traditional values of patriotism and essentially what it means to be a soldier. Contrarily, Peele creates a falsified image of the classic hero through the use of the knight when he says, “And when he saddest sits in homely cell …He’ll teach his *swains this carol for a song”. To Peele, the natural, chivalrous hero will continue to spread his patriotic ideas about the queen as if it were a song. In this statement, Peele uses figurative language to compare the spread of the patriotic ideas of the knight versus teachings through a carol of a song. Overall, the knight doesn’t lose his traditional values of patriotism and will continue to spread his ideas for his queen. The knights values of war and patriotism greatly differentiates from Frederic’s rejection of the traditional values like patriotism, and shows what it means to be a code hero in the eyes of Hemingway.

Frederic departs from the knights classical code hero in his ideas of perfection of an individual. Ernest Hemingway uses the catastrophic events that broke down and alienated the soldiers or the lost generation in order to develop a concept known as the “nada principle.” The code hero’s conceptual idea of the ‘nada principle’ portrays the idea that Henry’s life is filled with pain and suffering regardless of his actions. Henry views alcohol as the only way to escape this reality of war and the “nada principle.” Ernest Hemingway describes Frederic’s conversation with Miss Van Campen shortly after he finds out his world is going to descend into chaos as he is called back to the front: “I suppose you can’t be blamed for not wanting to go back to the front. But I should think you would try something more intelligent than producing jaundice with alcoholism,” (Hemingway 144). Henry believes the only way for him to cope with the emptiness is to continue to drink. The “nada principle” or the code hero idea that life is meaningless has resorted Henry to drink away his problems. In other words, Hemingways ideal code hero, represented by Frederic, uses the imperfection of alcoholism as a way to cope with the problems he comes face to face with. On the other hand, in “A Farewell to Arms” poem, George Peele uses the perfections of the knight in order to effectively portray what it means to be a classic hero. George Peele continues to describe the purities of the knight when he states “But though from court to cottage he depart, His Saint is sure of his unspotted heart.” In reference towards perfection, the poem confirms that even religious figures like the Saint believe that in order to be a classical hero, it is necessary to have an unspotted heart or to be pure. From the time he works with the queen in servitude to his death, the knight must remain perfect and pure. Hemingway uses the “nada principle” in order to portray the impurities that make up Henry while Peele describes the knight as perfect and pure.

Hemingway uses the reflection of his own life and historical issues like the Lost Generation in order to contrast Frederic Henry from the classical hero like the knight. During the late 1500s, the “Farewell To Arms” poem depicts what it means to be a classical hero through indirect characterization. Overall, George Peele portrays the ideals of the classical hero through the use of the knight of Queen Elizabeth. However, Hemingway speaks for the scarred, depressed soldiers like the Lost Generation in order to present new ideas on what it means to be a “hero.” In the novel, A Farewell To Arms, Hemingway presents ideas of flaw, rejection of traditional values like patriotism, and loyalty through the use of the code hero: Frederic Henry. Frederic Henry, suffers the harsh realities of war while trying to find his purpose within life… by the end he finds life is meaningless. Like many other soldiers during World War One, Henry is just one of 6 million soldiers who returned home with a shattered, traditional image on what it means to be a “hero.”

World War 1 was once famously labelled as the ‘war to end all wars’, by President Woodrow Wilson of America, but the grim truth of trench warfare and the senseless brutality was only exposed after the countless deaths of military and civilian lives, accumulating to a huge number of up to 40 millions deaths . One of history’s greatest wartime novels, A Farewell to Arms, written by the terse and minimalist American author, Ernest Hemingway in 1929, evocatively unravels the lugubrious experience of war in the fragmented setting of Italy, during the World War 1 campaign, through the first person narrator point of view of the despondent protagonist, Frederic Henry.

A bequest of wartime novels, most notably All Quiet on the Western Front, along with poignant poetry, including ‘Dulce et Decorum’ represent war in a realistic and unromanticised manner, conveying the concealed veracity of warfare, to condemn the antiquated myth of war as a glorifying and patriotic experience, as signified in the tributary sonnet, ‘The Dead’ (1914). In addition, Hemingway masterfully employs a range of prosaic and generic techniques, including …in order to reveal the violent deterioration of nature, as well as the sense of nihilism in Edwardian society in an era of devout Catholicism, caused by World War One, a global tragedy, that ultimately annihilated a generation forever.

War time literature has profoundly impacted the notion of war, from a valorous and sacrificial idealisation, to a grotesque and barbarous representation, that epitomises the unimaginable truth. There are a myriad of romantic war poems encompassing the Victorian ideal of heroism and patriotism, but the, ‘The Dead’, written by the renowned, English poet, Rupert Brooke in 1914, communicates the obsolete paragons of war, that were supported by the biased propaganda, during World War One. However, the time of production for his tributary sonnet was during the rise of the World War 1 conflict, a time when the macabre revelation of war was not exposed yet and biased propaganda gave enlisting soldiers a false sense of security. Hence, Brooke skilfully constructs a sonnet, as a tribute to honour the soldier’s gallantry and heroism, aligned with the Edwardian society’s romantic vision of war, despite having died by sepsis in WW1. The opening stanza of the Plutarchan sonnet , ‘Blow out, you bugles, over the rich Dead!’, implements assonance, along with an oxymoron in ‘rich Dead’, to promptly praise the soldiers, through the syntax in the exclamation mark and the symbol of the ‘bugle’ – a trumpet that is used in military funerals. Furthermore, the symbolism in ‘Sweet wine of youth…’,expresses the immense reverence for the noble sacrifice of the soldiers and establishes the euphemistic tone of the sonnet, as it disregards the heinous reality of death during wartime. The quixotic and flagrantly patriotic nature of Brooke’s poetry, has lead acclaimed English poet, John Lehmann, amongst other literary critics, to form a criticism against his flawed representation of war, that did not mirror the egregious truth, labelling his poetry as ‘sentimental and unrealistic’. On the contrary, various critics like Eder and Edward A. McCourt, assert that ‘Brooke’s war sonnets perfectly captured the mood of the moment.’ As the atrocities of trench warfare in World War One emerged and the astonishing death toll soared, esteemed poets of World War One such as Wilfred Owen, encapsulated the terror and tragedy of modern warfare in poetry, in an unromanticised and realist style, juxtaposed to Brooke’s idealistic abstractions of war – glory, patriotism and heroism. The posthumous poem, ‘Dulce et Decorum Est’, was published after the end of World War 1 in 1920, therefore all the heinous horrors of war had transpired, resulting in the inherent disillusionment of soldiers, that Brooke had pre-WW1 blindly ignored. The use of pessimistic tone and metaphor in ‘Drunk with fatigue’ and ‘…guttering, choking, drowning’, effectively represents the miserable atmosphere of the reality of war, filled with agony and suffering. Furthermore, the iambic pentameter of the poem together with the repetition in the use of caesura, constructs a fragmented and chaotic mood, that resembles the true reality of war, which in turn negates the preconceived illusions of war. He truly focuses on the melancholic condition of the disillusioned soldiers and he bitterly ends with manifesting, ‘The old Lie: It is sweet and fitting to die for one’s country’, to condemn the antiquated paradigms of war, that had caused one too many individuals to willingly die, which deems war as futile cause. Owen’s excoriation of the fallacious abstractions of war evident in Rupert Brooke’s poetry, has influenced authors part of the ‘Lost Generation’ like Hemingway and Remarque to express similar paradigms of war, that actively denote the disillusionment of the tormented soldiers, contrasted to early idealisations of a glorious and chauvinistic war, that henceforth destroyed a generation.

Ernest Hemingway’s and Erich Maria Remarque’s memorable novels, A Farewell to Arms and All Quiet on the Western Front, changed the face of war time literature by further implementing realism and antiwar zeal to parallel the aesthetics of the work of Wilfred Owen, in order to shed light on the physical and mental ‘wounds’ on soldiers post war. Both compelling novels were published in 1929, more than a decade after the end of a gruesome war and incorporated their personal war experiences to create a fictional plot, that reflected their own autobiographical events of WW1. The literary sensation, All Quiet on the Western Front, written by German novelist and pacifist , Erich Maria Remarque, elucidates the psychological and physical impacts of war, by dramatizing the savagery of war, which challenges humanity’s perception of a military conflict like WW1. The notable epigraph echoes these sentiments and asserts;

This book is to be neither an accusation nor a confession, and least of all an adventure, for death is not an adventure to those who stand face to face with it. It will try simply to tell of a generation of men who, even though they may have escaped shells, were destroyed by the war.

Consequently, this signifies the trauma of the ‘shell-shocked’ past of the soldiers part of the ‘Lost Generation’, highlighting the disorientation and aimlessness of society post WW1, which identifies the destruction of a generation. Moreover, the observant first person point of view narration of the protagonist, Paul Bäumer states, ‘Bombardment, barrage, curtain-fire, mines, gas, tanks, machine-guns, hand-grenades — words, words, words, but they hold the horror of the world.’ The use of asyndeton in successively listing various types of armament, as well as the epizeuxis in ‘words, words, words…’, reinforces the inherent power that weapons hold, to connote that war is simply a dark and heinous extension of the world. It also highlights the advancement of chemical warfare in WW1; the senseless brutality and immoral tactics rather than chivalrous, as the use of poison gas and nuclear bombs emerged.

Similarly, the retrospective protagonist, Frederic Henry in the worldwide classic, A Farewell to Arms, an American ambulance driver on the Italian front in WW1, challenges the obsolete paragons of war about glory and heroism and provides an untarnished depiction of the true reality of war. Furthermore, the emotionally detached narrator, Frederic, mentions, ‘I’m not brave any more darling. I’m all broken. They’ve broken me’ to his love, Catherine in the bleak setting of WW1. The pacing of the terse, sharp sentences part of the interior monologue, emphasises his sense of despondence and anguish, as the war has ‘destroyed’ him completely, even though he has not died. Consequently, this recognises the extreme internal conflict in the supposed war hero and protagonist, suggesting that the exposure to a cruel war, can have detrimental and irreversible impacts on the mental wellbeing of soldiers, leading to PTSD and perennial trauma. From analysing both war protagonists, it can be denoted that the impacts of war were clearly not ephemeral and caused the destruction of a generation – either through physical or mental ‘scars’, that haunted them perpetually.

The egregious truth of war did indeed lead to the disillusionment of soldiers and perennial trauma, but also resulted in the loss of faith in God, that eventually destroyed a generation. Italy in A Farewell to Arms and Germany in All Quiet on the Western Front, were both demolished settings where devout Catholicism was prevalent pre-WW1. However, the atrocious tragedies of war, caused the despondent soldiers to lose their faith in God and turn to nihilism, as they became sceptical about the existence of such a divine force. The spiritually lost protagonist, Frederic, discovers that people had ‘plastic and rubble in their gardens and sometimes in the street’, due to the callous bombing of civilisations. The intense visual imagery created together with Hemingway’s detached and melancholic literary style, reveals the destruction of war, as the wall plaster was stripped from the houses in Gorizia, but also religious beliefs and faith in God has been stripped, due to the macabre reality of war. This conception is further evident in the cynical and hedonistic officers interaction with the Priest, as they flagrantly disparage him, in the narrator commentary in ‘this captain baited him often’. These recurring actions towards the reticent Priest, communicates that the soldiers have minimal respect for religious institutions, as they mock the Priest for his piety and devotion to God. The major asserts that ‘all thinking men are atheists’, which acts as an indirect insult to the Priest and all other individuals who identify with the Church, labelling them as illogical and preposterous for believing in God, through the use of a generalisation, which creates dichotomy between the characters and ultimately the Edwardian society. Society during WW1 turned nihilistic and upheld existentialism, as they were void of the true meaning of life and became desensitised to the inevitability of death, due to the futile brutality of war, that established an atmosphere of violent chaos. The employment of pathetic fallacies and geographical metonyms throughout the novel, in particular the symbols of rain, mud and sludge foreshadowed ominous occurrences, like the countless casualties of war – Quote It functioned as a constant reminder of the destruction of a generation that war caused, but also the lack of spiritual connection to God and loss of religious beliefs in civilians.