Preview

Hemingway

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
711 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Hemingway
Theme and Elements 1.

Elements of Hemingway

Lisa Cearfoss

ENG125: Introduction to Literature

Instructor: Alessandra Cusimano

March 18, 2013

Theme and Elements 2. As we mature, we come to realize that there are decisions we make and they are not always easy ones. Symbolism can tell us as much about a story than the actual explanation in clear words. You have to pay attention to what you are reading and things will make sense. In the story, “Hills Like White Elephants,” Hemingway uses intricate detail in how the story is told. The theme of the story, “Hills Like White Elephants” by Ernest Hemingway (1927) is that the girl, Jig says that she is fine when in reality she is struggling with a decision of whether or not to get the abortion. She wants the American man to love her no matter what decision she make, but she wants the baby and it is obvious in her sarcasm throughout the story. Another reference to the theme is that of the distant hills that look like white elephants, which symbolizes that the girl really wants to escape from her troublesome decision and just have things back to the way they were before she was put in this position to have to contemplate such a life altering decision she is about to make. She feels trapped by consequential outcomes of either side of the decision to get the abortion or not to get it. “Every story narrows a broad underlying idea, shapes it in a unique way, and makes the underlying idea concrete.” Clugston, R. W. (2010).



References: Clugston, R. W. (2010) Introduction to Literature. San Diego, CA: Bridgepoint Education Inc. Retrieved from http://content.ashford.edu/books/ENG125 Justice, H. K. (1998). ‘Well, Well, Well.’ Cross-gendered Autobiography and the manuscript of “Hills Like White Elephants.” Hemingway Review, 18(1), 17. Retrieved from: web.ebscohost.com.proxy-library.ashford.edu Weeks Jr., L. E. (1980). HEMINGWAY HILLS: SYMBOLISM IN “HILLS LIKE WHITE ELEPHANTS.” Studies In Short Fiction, 17(1), 75. Retrieved from: Web.ebscohost.com.proxy-library.ashford.edu

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    In our story we see two major symbolizations that have been used, the white elephants that Jig called the hills and the rail road station. The author has used these three elements to develop a theme to this story in which the girl has identified her problems in a scenario mixed with a complex argument that is going on in between them. The white elephants develop into a different meaning and change the tone…

    • 882 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Although most of the features of "Hills Like White Elephants" have been well discussed and understood, so that Paul Smith, in his 1989 survey of opinion on the story, can wonder if there is anything left to say about it (209), what has not been satisfactorily resolved is the question of the ending. In view of the fact that Hemingway leaves virtually everything, even what is at issue between the girl and the American, for the reader to "figure" out, meanwhile unobtrusively supplying what is needed to understand the story's structure and conflict, it seems logical to assume that he also expected the reader to be able to answer the question left by the story's ending: What are the couple going to do about the girl's pregnancy? Yet the ending…

    • 175 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Sometimes it takes a life-changing moment to awaken a person in a relationship the realities of those around them, Hemingway’s “Hills like White Elephant,” showcase techniques that express the relationship among the man and the girl who were in a short-flawed altercation about the girl going under an abortion operation.…

    • 689 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    In the early 1920’s, editors ignored Hemmingway’s story “Hills Like White Elephants” because, they felt it was not what the public wanted. Not until the 1990’s did it become one of Ernest Hemmingway’s most anthologized short stories. “Hills Like White Elephants” has a single storyline and it takes place in a single day. The male character “Man” appears to mirror Hemmingway’s own life with his not so wise way of handling difficult situations with the opposite sex, while the female character who is referred to as “Girl” appears to be seen as weak and unsure. This Hemmingway story creatively and subtlety gives many implications and his two characters unfold these implications through…

    • 1289 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Ernest Hemingway’s “Hills Like White Elephants” portrays the turmoil a couple endures when faced with an unplanned pregnancy, the choice to hold onto their current life or to begin a new life. Readers are allowed to intrude on a conversation between an American man and a girl, further conflict is presented through Hemingway’s use of symbolism. The man wants to go through with an abortion while the girl is unsure about which track she should take. Throughout the story, Hemmingway’s use of abundant details about the setting, rather than providing much detail about the characters, reveal a conflict between the man’s desire for the girl to have a “perfectly natural” (Hemingway 116) procedure and the decision to forgo an “awfully simple operation”…

    • 1025 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    In Ernest Hemingway’s short story “Hills Like White Elephants”, an American man and a young woman must face the challenge of having to make a life altering decision, in a limited amount of time. Hemingway uses a very short timeline to tell his story, he makes time relevant in the story’s setting, and also in his written dialogue. This short story demonstrates that although time can sometimes be forgotten, it can surely be of the essence.…

    • 1952 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    The story "Hills like White Elephants" by Ernest Hemingway is a fascinating story about one couple having faced with an unexpected pregnancy. The theme of the story is about the couple's decision between life and death. The main character Jig and The American are in disagreements on weather to keep their baby, or have an abortion. The couple's lack of communication creates the conflict in the story. For example, Jigs says, "We can have all this..." "And everyday we make it more impossible" While this problem is going on, the couple is sitting at a train station in the middle of a valley. Each side of the valley represents either life or death. As Jig moves about in the story, she faces different sides of the valley, which helps to determine the decision she will make. With the many descriptions and symbolism throughout the story, the final decision seems as if Jig is keeping the baby.…

    • 949 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    It is his works, such as Hills like White Elephants, which subtly address modern issues that bring forth the question of morality and purpose to a general population (A Farewell to Arms, 3). It is his short, direct style, exemplified by his six word story “Baby shoes for sale, never worn.”, allows for a clear and deep expression of emotion (A Farewell to Arms, 4). His involvement of incorporating the reader through active reading breaks an emotional barrier set forth by usual text. This action allows for the reader to directly examine Hemingway’s characters, and thus reflect on their own behavior. Hemingway’s mastery of language, subsequent to his fluency in the Romantic languages, allows his works to be overall reflective of human behavior and relate to the reader in an emotional context (A Farewell To Arms,…

    • 797 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Throughout his work “Hills Like White Elephants,” Ernest Hemingway uses symbolism and condensed metaphors to sensationalize the power, yet subtleness of the main theme: happiness. While the title does not blatantly represent the characters pursuit of happiness, the simile used in the title does epitomize Hemingway’s writing style as well as the diverse use of symbolism throughout the narrative. Hemingway uses this symbolism to convey the unspoken thoughts and emotions of the characters and the ultimate decision made to begin her journey on the pursuit of happiness.…

    • 986 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    There are several themes and symbols that can be taken out of the short story by Ernest Hemingway, “Hills Like White Elephants.” The first symbol that is significant and deepens the story, is indeed the white elephants. In the beginning, the girl states that the hills look like white elephants (9). This comparison of the hills and white elephants can symbolize several things. White elephants are a symbol for something that is unwanted, or a burden. This baby, like a white elephant is supposed to be a gift, that the man see’s as useless, something that doesn’t hold enough importance to keep. This relates to the fact that the girl is pregnant, and he doesn’t want the baby. Like a white elephant, the baby should be sacred, and special, a gift. The girl, at the beginning, says that the hills look like white elephants at first glance. After all, she begins to realize that the hills to do not resemble white elephants…

    • 493 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    ernest hemingway

    • 307 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Hemingway is known for being economical with his words, and he used many understatements and creating believable literary figures.…

    • 307 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Better Essays

    parents were no exception. In fact he spent much of his life trying to escape…

    • 1531 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Better Essays

    Hemingway's Metaphor

    • 1282 Words
    • 6 Pages

    In the book The Old Man and the Sea, Ernest Hemingway uses many literary devices including metaphors. Hemingway uses the metaphor of the ocean to show life and the role that people play in their lives.…

    • 1282 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Ernest Hemingway

    • 1213 Words
    • 5 Pages

    “Ernest Miller Hemingway, was born in July 21, 1899 in Oak Park, Illinois, there he started his career as a writer in a newspaper office in Kansas City at the age of seventeen. After the United States entered the First World War, he joined a volunteer ambulance unit in the Italian army. Serving at the front, he was wounded, was decorated by the Italian Government, and spent considerable time in hospitals. After his return to the United States, he became a reporter for Canadian and American newspapers and was soon sent back to Europe to cover such events as the Greek Revolution.

During the twenties, Hemingway became a member of the group of expatriate Americans in Paris, which he described in his first important work, The Sun Also Rises (1926). Equally successful was A Farewell to Arms (1929), the study of an American ambulance officer's disillusionment in the war and his role as a deserter. Hemingway used his experiences as a reporter during the civil war in Spain as the background for his most ambitious novel, For Whom the Bell Tolls (1940). Among his later works, the most outstanding is the short novel, The Old Man and the Sea (1952), the story of an old fisherman's journey, his long and lonely struggle with a fish and the sea, and his victory in defeat.

Hemingway - himself a great sportsman - liked to portray soldiers, hunters, bullfighters - tough, at times primitive people whose courage and honesty are set against the brutal ways of modern society, and who in this confrontation lose hope and faith. His straightforward prose, his spare dialogue, and his predilection for understatement are particularly effective in his short stories, some of which are collected in Men Without Women (1927) and The Fifth Column and the First Forty-Nine Stories (1938). Hemingway died in Idaho in 1961.”…

    • 1213 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Hills of Life

    • 354 Words
    • 2 Pages

    In Ernest Hemingway’s classic story, “Hills Like White Elephants,” we are taken to a train station in between Madrid and Barcelona with a couple that has to make a life altering decision. Besides each side of the train station lies the land that can either mean life or death to the child that the woman is bearing.…

    • 354 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays