July 22, 2024: Revisiting the Canon: Ernest Hemingway

[This pastweekend we celebrated ErnestHemingway’s 125th birthday. While I’ve been very glad to do mypart to diversify our curriculaway beyond the canon, I also believe there are still lots of valuableAmericanStudies reasons to read canonical authors. So this week I’ll make thatcase for Hemingway and four other canonized folks!]

ThreeHemingway short stories that remind us of both his genius and his relevance.

1)     “AClean, Well-Lighted Place” (1933): I said most of what I’d want to sayabout this stunning story in thispost more than a decade ago. Here I’ll add that the publication date istelling—by 1933 the success of novels like The Sun Also Rises (1926) andAFarewell to Arms (1929) had fully established Hemingway’s literarycred, but he was still crafting some of the era’s most perfect short stories.

2)     “BigTwo-Hearted River” (1925): Before those novels, Hemingway began his careerwith the masterful short story cycle InOur Time (1925), a book that grapples with the effects of war and itstraumas just as potently as does the more famous (and also great) TheThings They Carried. “Big Two-Hearted River,” the book’s concludingstory, works best as part of that cycle; but even on its own terms, it’s astrikingly beautiful story that exemplifies Hemingway’s “iceberg theory.”

3)     “Hillslike White Elephants” (1927): “Hills” is the Hemingway story that reallyputs this post and week’s thesis to the test, as it’s so thoroughly canonizedthat virtually every high school student reads it at some point (it’s one ofthe couple texts I teach that I can assume almost every student of mine haspreviously encountered). But here’s the thing—I’ve read literally hundreds ofpapers on “Hills” over the years, and I’m still seeing new layers thanks tothat student work. It’s a formally unique work that challenges ourunderstanding of what a short story is and does, yet at the same time opens upsome of our most familiar and shared themes of relationships, communication,identity, and more. I don’t know that short stories get better, and I don’tthink there’s a better case for still reading Hemingway’s.

NextCanonStudying tomorrow,

Ben

PS. Whatdo you think?