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By-Line꞉ Selected Articles and Dispatches of Four Decades
s/t: Selected Articles & Dispatches of Four Decades
Spanning the years 1920 to 1956, this priceless collection shows Hemingway's work as a reporter, from correspondent for the Toronto Star to contributor to Esquire, Colliers, and Look. As fledgling reporter, war correspondent, and seasoned journalist, Hemingway provides access to a range of experiences, including vivid eyewitness accounts of the Spanish Civil War and World War II. By-Line: Ernest Hemingway offers a glimpse into the world behind the popular fiction of one of America's greatest writers.
Spanning the years 1920 to 1956, this priceless collection shows Hemingway's work as a reporter, from correspondent for the Toronto Star to contributor to Esquire, Colliers, and Look. As fledgling reporter, war correspondent, and seasoned journalist, Hemingway provides access to a range of experiences, including vivid eyewitness accounts of the Spanish Civil War and World War II. By-Line: Ernest Hemingway offers a glimpse into the world behind the popular fiction of one of America's greatest writers.
512 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 1967
121 people are currently reading
943 people want to read
About the author
Ernest Hemingway
2,097 books31.9k followersErnest Miller Hemingway was an American novelist, short-story writer and journalist. Best known for an economical, understated style that significantly influenced later 20th-century writers, he is often romanticized for his adventurous lifestyle, and outspoken and blunt public image. Most of Hemingway's works were published between the mid-1920s and mid-1950s, including seven novels, six short-story collections and two non-fiction works. His writings have become classics of American literature; he was awarded the 1954 Nobel Prize in Literature, while three of his novels, four short-story collections and three nonfiction works were published posthumously.
Hemingway was raised in Oak Park, Illinois. After high school, he spent six months as a cub reporter for The Kansas City Star before enlisting in the Red Cross. He served as an ambulance driver on the Italian Front in World War I and was seriously wounded in 1918. His wartime experiences formed the basis for his 1929 novel A Farewell to Arms. He married Hadley Richardson in 1921, the first of four wives. They moved to Paris where he worked as a foreign correspondent for the Toronto Star and fell under the influence of the modernist writers and artists of the 1920s' "Lost Generation" expatriate community. His debut novel The Sun Also Rises was published in 1926.
He divorced Richardson in 1927 and married Pauline Pfeiffer. They divorced after he returned from the Spanish Civil War, where he had worked as a journalist and which formed the basis for his 1940 novel For Whom the Bell Tolls. Martha Gellhorn became his third wife in 1940. He and Gellhorn separated after he met Mary Welsh Hemingway in London during World War II. Hemingway was present with Allied troops as a journalist at the Normandy landings and the liberation of Paris. He maintained permanent residences in Key West, Florida, in the 1930s and in Cuba in the 1940s and 1950s. On a 1954 trip to Africa, he was seriously injured in two plane accidents on successive days, leaving him in pain and ill health for much of the rest of his life. In 1959, he bought a house in Ketchum, Idaho, where, on July 2, 1961 (a couple weeks before his 62nd birthday), he killed himself using one of his shotguns.
Hemingway was raised in Oak Park, Illinois. After high school, he spent six months as a cub reporter for The Kansas City Star before enlisting in the Red Cross. He served as an ambulance driver on the Italian Front in World War I and was seriously wounded in 1918. His wartime experiences formed the basis for his 1929 novel A Farewell to Arms. He married Hadley Richardson in 1921, the first of four wives. They moved to Paris where he worked as a foreign correspondent for the Toronto Star and fell under the influence of the modernist writers and artists of the 1920s' "Lost Generation" expatriate community. His debut novel The Sun Also Rises was published in 1926.
He divorced Richardson in 1927 and married Pauline Pfeiffer. They divorced after he returned from the Spanish Civil War, where he had worked as a journalist and which formed the basis for his 1940 novel For Whom the Bell Tolls. Martha Gellhorn became his third wife in 1940. He and Gellhorn separated after he met Mary Welsh Hemingway in London during World War II. Hemingway was present with Allied troops as a journalist at the Normandy landings and the liberation of Paris. He maintained permanent residences in Key West, Florida, in the 1930s and in Cuba in the 1940s and 1950s. On a 1954 trip to Africa, he was seriously injured in two plane accidents on successive days, leaving him in pain and ill health for much of the rest of his life. In 1959, he bought a house in Ketchum, Idaho, where, on July 2, 1961 (a couple weeks before his 62nd birthday), he killed himself using one of his shotguns.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 79 reviews
July 14, 2020
4.5 🌟
January 1, 2021
Loved this collection of mostly early Hemingway. It was impressive to see just how damn good he was as a writer in his early twenties. I liked especially his "Christmas at the Roof of the World" which he wrote when he was 24.
August 21, 2017
I will get to all of Hemingway someday and I think the fact that he’s been dead over 50 years (’62) and I am still learning about him make him an incredible literary and historical figure. This book got good reviews, was on Audible and of course is about Papa, so I was in.
There are way too many articles for me to talk about each one. So instead I’ll give thoughts on each time period that is covered here (its over 4 decades and 5 parts).
Part 1:
This is a young Hemingway taking place 1920-1924. While there were many articles I enjoyed, some others were rather dull and tedious. I love a light-hearted Hemingway doing things like getting a shave from a barber college and getting a tooth pulled by a student (these were both funny). As time passes we already get to see glimpses, though, of his realistic views of the world, the state of other countries, his hatred for Mussolini (if only he really had been a bluff as Hemingway stated) and of course his fascination with bull-fighting. The weird part with the bull-fighting is that he admits its a tragedy, the bull always dies of course and sometimes even the matador but he still finds it incredibly exciting and loves to watch.
Part 2:
Here we see Hemingway’s long-standing love for Cuba and of course for fishing and hunting. We also see where he gets the inspiration for “The Old Man and the Sea” , I had always thought this was something Hemingway did but it turns out it was a story about a fisherman off Cuba who struggled with a huge fish for days, only to have it eaten away by sharks. His love of Key West (and boxing) show up here, along with some unexpected humor about birds. Again not the best section of the book, some parts were dull but as a big fan of Papa I still enjoyed it.
Also in this section there is a wonderful part where Ernest gives advice to a young writer. It is similar to things he said in “A Moveable Feast” but still just wonderful for me as a writer myself. He actually gives a long list of books to read and perhaps his best advice (which I’ll paraphrase). “Whatever you write about you have to capture the emotion of it. Whatever it felt like to be there, do to the act, what the other people felt, what they said. If you can capture the feeling of act and make it true, make the reader believe it, then you’re done your job as a writer.”
Part 3:
Hemingway, despite his flaws like animal cruelty, a huge amount of hunting, womanizing, alcoholism, racist tendencies and by some accounts misogyny, was a true patriot, brave, heroic and a great reporter will do go in the most dangerous places to get the truth.
In this part we see Ernest in the Spanish Civil War and right on the front lines. Here we get descriptions of the gruesome sights of war but also the heroics and the strange way life carries on. He also manages to bring us some humor along with the importance of true reporting. He talks of one reporter who wanted a false story reported, a story that had it been discovered would have been death for the poor female tricked into taking it out of the country. Here also we see keen Ernest views of the world have become, he predicts the start of WWII within six months. Even Ernest could not have predicted Pearl Harbor, though, and along with many other Americans feel they should have stayed out of a war in Europe.
Part 4:
This is the best part of the book for me. It starts with a something I’ve never heard before, an interview with Ernest, which I had hoped would actually be audio somehow preserved but no. Still the incredible part is that he corrected it himself, even with just an interview he was always the perfectionist and the storyteller.
His assessment of Japan-China relations is very interesting and it gives details to the war I didn’t know, that Russia was making money by funding both the Axis and the Allies. Again here we are left to wonder if his advice was correct, Japan had some skirmishes with China but never did invade a country so large. If Japan had taken China, they may have continued inland and the whole course of the war may have been different (perhaps its a good thing he was wrong).
He also shows the incredible determination and resourcefulness of the Chinese with a great story of how they build a massive runway with almost no tools, just a lot of people working night and day as hard as they can.
Speaking of, I knew that Hemingway was there in WWII but I didn’t know all the details. His descriptions of his landing on D-Day in France was amazing, how close he came to death just to get a story is nothing short of astounding. He said himself that he could have wrote a book on D-Day, it’s sad that it never happened.
Hemingway was in WWII as a reporter but he stayed so long that the men started to think of him as an officer. He even had fun by telling one man that he couldn’t rise above the rank of Captain because he couldn’t read or write.
This review has gotten long but as always it shows my love of Hemingway and I was on vacation when I wrote this with lots of time to spare. His descriptions of the fight for Paris and then for Germany are incredible to listen to. Especially when they are getting German’s out of this entrenched bunkers. Hemingway, whom I read did fight but got away with it when discovered, threw a grenade and even shot and killed German soldiers. They way I read it, he was defending himself in a time of war and would not have been charged with anything, still though he acted like a solider and really became one that day, when he was a reporter. For me, though, it just cements by vision of him as a hero. How many reporters have you heard of fighting right alongside of troops? I’ve never heard of anyone, except Hemingway.
Part 5:
With the war over we see Hemingway return to what he loves, exploring the world, hunting, fishing and writing. His description of Cuba is wonderful and makes me wish I could have seen the countryside as he did back then (I’ve been to Havana and a resort on Cuba but wasn’t overly impressed). We see Hemingway now as he becomes weary with the world, he gives hints that he is drinking more and that he wants to see people less. He talks about several places he has lived as being ruined and says that Cuba is one of the only true places left for him but even there he knows it will change and he’ll have to leave.
He made me sad when he talks about cock fighting, not just watching it but raising his own roosters just to have them fight and die. It’s always hard to comprehend who someone who loved cats and dogs would want to watch (and participate in) such a brutal act. Some would say it was Hemingway repressing his feelings, that perhaps he was homosexual or at least curious, maybe they are right, I’ve come to see his hyper-masculine activities were certainly a cover for some kind of issue (or issues) he had.
The book ends with another incredible (and sad) story. How he and his wife survived not one, but two plane crashes. Hemingway tells us of a time he was trapped by an angry elephant on top of a small hill, without his gun all he could do was fling rocks at the animal until it finally gave up. The saddest part is that once he does make it out of the wilderness of Africa he has to prove that he is still alive and later becomes obsessed with reading his own obituaries. In fact he wrote this final report to clarify all the mistakes made in the obituaries! Hemingway is in his 50’s here and he knows he is getting older, can feel himself slipping. Still he doesn’t seem like a man who would later take his own life, it is a tragedy that more people couldn’t have helped him after this point, maybe he could have written another masterpiece? He at least could have finish several stories of his. Despite all the sadness here I was also amused at a tale of how he finally agrees to get a bodyguard/assistant. It shows us that Hemingway was an intensely private man and didn’t like all the fame he would get in public places. He loved those friends and associates close to him and he makes an incredibly sad (and true) statement towards the end. Once more I’m paraphrasing, “All of the jerks, idiots and losers live on and on, yet the ones we love, the special people in our lives die all the time. As the years, months and days go by we continue to lose them, their lights forever snuffed out and never to return.” As someone who has recently lost his father I couldn’t agree more, life is terribly unfair and it’s true that the good people seem to die first, old assholes seem to hang on forever.
I’ve always been fascinated with WWII and Nazi Germany in particular. So for me learning more details of the war both the political aspects and the first hand accounts of Hemingway, was wonderful. I’ve always love Hemingway, despite all his flaws. He was an incredible man, an amazing writer and ultimately a sad and tragic figure. Like most great writers he was tortured, in mind, body and spirit and ultimately those demons won. This is an excellent non-fiction collection of Hemingway’s life and his adventures as a reporter. I’ll admit there were times I was bored and I did find it long in places. Still though I highly recommend it. I was sad to have it end. Not for children, due to graphic violence and language I would say ages 16+.
There are way too many articles for me to talk about each one. So instead I’ll give thoughts on each time period that is covered here (its over 4 decades and 5 parts).
Part 1:
This is a young Hemingway taking place 1920-1924. While there were many articles I enjoyed, some others were rather dull and tedious. I love a light-hearted Hemingway doing things like getting a shave from a barber college and getting a tooth pulled by a student (these were both funny). As time passes we already get to see glimpses, though, of his realistic views of the world, the state of other countries, his hatred for Mussolini (if only he really had been a bluff as Hemingway stated) and of course his fascination with bull-fighting. The weird part with the bull-fighting is that he admits its a tragedy, the bull always dies of course and sometimes even the matador but he still finds it incredibly exciting and loves to watch.
Part 2:
Here we see Hemingway’s long-standing love for Cuba and of course for fishing and hunting. We also see where he gets the inspiration for “The Old Man and the Sea” , I had always thought this was something Hemingway did but it turns out it was a story about a fisherman off Cuba who struggled with a huge fish for days, only to have it eaten away by sharks. His love of Key West (and boxing) show up here, along with some unexpected humor about birds. Again not the best section of the book, some parts were dull but as a big fan of Papa I still enjoyed it.
Also in this section there is a wonderful part where Ernest gives advice to a young writer. It is similar to things he said in “A Moveable Feast” but still just wonderful for me as a writer myself. He actually gives a long list of books to read and perhaps his best advice (which I’ll paraphrase). “Whatever you write about you have to capture the emotion of it. Whatever it felt like to be there, do to the act, what the other people felt, what they said. If you can capture the feeling of act and make it true, make the reader believe it, then you’re done your job as a writer.”
Part 3:
Hemingway, despite his flaws like animal cruelty, a huge amount of hunting, womanizing, alcoholism, racist tendencies and by some accounts misogyny, was a true patriot, brave, heroic and a great reporter will do go in the most dangerous places to get the truth.
In this part we see Ernest in the Spanish Civil War and right on the front lines. Here we get descriptions of the gruesome sights of war but also the heroics and the strange way life carries on. He also manages to bring us some humor along with the importance of true reporting. He talks of one reporter who wanted a false story reported, a story that had it been discovered would have been death for the poor female tricked into taking it out of the country. Here also we see keen Ernest views of the world have become, he predicts the start of WWII within six months. Even Ernest could not have predicted Pearl Harbor, though, and along with many other Americans feel they should have stayed out of a war in Europe.
Part 4:
This is the best part of the book for me. It starts with a something I’ve never heard before, an interview with Ernest, which I had hoped would actually be audio somehow preserved but no. Still the incredible part is that he corrected it himself, even with just an interview he was always the perfectionist and the storyteller.
His assessment of Japan-China relations is very interesting and it gives details to the war I didn’t know, that Russia was making money by funding both the Axis and the Allies. Again here we are left to wonder if his advice was correct, Japan had some skirmishes with China but never did invade a country so large. If Japan had taken China, they may have continued inland and the whole course of the war may have been different (perhaps its a good thing he was wrong).
He also shows the incredible determination and resourcefulness of the Chinese with a great story of how they build a massive runway with almost no tools, just a lot of people working night and day as hard as they can.
Speaking of, I knew that Hemingway was there in WWII but I didn’t know all the details. His descriptions of his landing on D-Day in France was amazing, how close he came to death just to get a story is nothing short of astounding. He said himself that he could have wrote a book on D-Day, it’s sad that it never happened.
Hemingway was in WWII as a reporter but he stayed so long that the men started to think of him as an officer. He even had fun by telling one man that he couldn’t rise above the rank of Captain because he couldn’t read or write.
This review has gotten long but as always it shows my love of Hemingway and I was on vacation when I wrote this with lots of time to spare. His descriptions of the fight for Paris and then for Germany are incredible to listen to. Especially when they are getting German’s out of this entrenched bunkers. Hemingway, whom I read did fight but got away with it when discovered, threw a grenade and even shot and killed German soldiers. They way I read it, he was defending himself in a time of war and would not have been charged with anything, still though he acted like a solider and really became one that day, when he was a reporter. For me, though, it just cements by vision of him as a hero. How many reporters have you heard of fighting right alongside of troops? I’ve never heard of anyone, except Hemingway.
Part 5:
With the war over we see Hemingway return to what he loves, exploring the world, hunting, fishing and writing. His description of Cuba is wonderful and makes me wish I could have seen the countryside as he did back then (I’ve been to Havana and a resort on Cuba but wasn’t overly impressed). We see Hemingway now as he becomes weary with the world, he gives hints that he is drinking more and that he wants to see people less. He talks about several places he has lived as being ruined and says that Cuba is one of the only true places left for him but even there he knows it will change and he’ll have to leave.
He made me sad when he talks about cock fighting, not just watching it but raising his own roosters just to have them fight and die. It’s always hard to comprehend who someone who loved cats and dogs would want to watch (and participate in) such a brutal act. Some would say it was Hemingway repressing his feelings, that perhaps he was homosexual or at least curious, maybe they are right, I’ve come to see his hyper-masculine activities were certainly a cover for some kind of issue (or issues) he had.
The book ends with another incredible (and sad) story. How he and his wife survived not one, but two plane crashes. Hemingway tells us of a time he was trapped by an angry elephant on top of a small hill, without his gun all he could do was fling rocks at the animal until it finally gave up. The saddest part is that once he does make it out of the wilderness of Africa he has to prove that he is still alive and later becomes obsessed with reading his own obituaries. In fact he wrote this final report to clarify all the mistakes made in the obituaries! Hemingway is in his 50’s here and he knows he is getting older, can feel himself slipping. Still he doesn’t seem like a man who would later take his own life, it is a tragedy that more people couldn’t have helped him after this point, maybe he could have written another masterpiece? He at least could have finish several stories of his. Despite all the sadness here I was also amused at a tale of how he finally agrees to get a bodyguard/assistant. It shows us that Hemingway was an intensely private man and didn’t like all the fame he would get in public places. He loved those friends and associates close to him and he makes an incredibly sad (and true) statement towards the end. Once more I’m paraphrasing, “All of the jerks, idiots and losers live on and on, yet the ones we love, the special people in our lives die all the time. As the years, months and days go by we continue to lose them, their lights forever snuffed out and never to return.” As someone who has recently lost his father I couldn’t agree more, life is terribly unfair and it’s true that the good people seem to die first, old assholes seem to hang on forever.
I’ve always been fascinated with WWII and Nazi Germany in particular. So for me learning more details of the war both the political aspects and the first hand accounts of Hemingway, was wonderful. I’ve always love Hemingway, despite all his flaws. He was an incredible man, an amazing writer and ultimately a sad and tragic figure. Like most great writers he was tortured, in mind, body and spirit and ultimately those demons won. This is an excellent non-fiction collection of Hemingway’s life and his adventures as a reporter. I’ll admit there were times I was bored and I did find it long in places. Still though I highly recommend it. I was sad to have it end. Not for children, due to graphic violence and language I would say ages 16+.
March 23, 2017
The older I become, and the more I read the writings of Hemingway, the better I like him. This collection of his published newspaper and magazine articles came to my attention after reading another work about World War II. His essay on fighting in Hurtgen Forest was mentioned in that book, and I knew he was embedded with my Dad's unit during that battle. I really only expected to read that one essay and perhaps scan a few more, but I ended up reading all of them. Some were funny, and I had never read anything humorous by him before. I really enjoyed those. Many were philosophical, especially his war correspondence. Some were straightforward reporting, but always with excellent writing! Those interested in the sports of big game hunting and fishing, history of the Spanish Civil War and World War II, descriptions of exotic places, etc. will like this anthology of articles. In these works, he frequently refers to himself as "Your Correspondent." I'm glad that, even though these were written decades ago, as I read, he for a while became "My Correspondent", too.
June 20, 2021
An absolute must-read for Hemingway fans. His articles prior to and during WWII are disturbingly accurate and astute. In a completely different tone, his articles on fishing and bull fighting are moving to the point that you feel as though you are part of the action right alongside Hemingway. I wish there was quality reporting like this today…sigh.
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January 24, 2016αν δεν σας αρέσει το ψάρεμα, το κυνήγι, η ταυρομαχία, η απόβαση στις ακτές της νορμανδίας - ο έρνεστ με λίγα λόγια - δεν γίνεται να μη σας αρέσει ο έρνεστ!
August 8, 2020
Hemmingway's Op-eds are a great look into how his style, personality, view on humanity developed over the years. I loved the articles about hunting lions.
February 21, 2020
I read this many, many years ago so I welcomed the opportunity to reread it this week. Time well spent.
The more of this that I read, the less I liked it. It’s arranged chronologically so you begin reading the stuff Hemingway wrote when he was 20 years old working for the Toronto Star. Back when I was struggling to put together enough words for a term paper in university, he was describing the festival at Pamplona with an insightful eye and ear for detail, even though he was probably getting falling-down drunk every evening.
It’s sad to think of how much better he could have been as a writer if he hadn’t achieved so much fame and fortune so early in his career. I feel like an asshole for even suggesting that a guy who won the Nobel Prize for literature could have done more, but I don’t think that his writing ever eclipsed his early stuff, namely his short stories and The Sun Also Rises.
I get it that he grew up fishing and hunting, but his stuff about hunting in Africa is of no interest to me. I simply can’t understand why anyone would want to kill every animal they happen upon.
I don’t get fishing, not in the least, although I love to cook and eat fish. Fishing just isn’t my cup of tea, although his little article The Best Rainbow Trout Fishing, Toronto Star, August 28, 1920, is thoroughly charming. You can almost see the segue from this into the beautiful scene in the Pyrenes when Jake goes fishing in the mountains above Pamplona one lovely summer afternoon.
Hemingway’s reporting before WWII was mostly completely and utterly off the mark and about as far from prescient as humanly possible, calling for U.S. isolationism, or simply supporting both sides to make money. Why anyone would have asked for his opinion in these matters is a mystery to me.
This volume is filled with examples of Hemingway putting forth on topics he knows little about, or making enormous generalization based on his limited anecdotal experience. The Germans are this way, the Swiss are another. But still, when he could keep himself out of the narrative, he did some really good reporting.
I can barely bring myself to criticize Hemingway because I feel that I owe so much to him. I grew up in the middle of America and had seen almost nothing before I started plowing through my parents’ collection of his books. He made me want to travel, to learn French and Spanish. I did, and for that, I thank him for spurring my previously land-locked imagination.
The more of this that I read, the less I liked it. It’s arranged chronologically so you begin reading the stuff Hemingway wrote when he was 20 years old working for the Toronto Star. Back when I was struggling to put together enough words for a term paper in university, he was describing the festival at Pamplona with an insightful eye and ear for detail, even though he was probably getting falling-down drunk every evening.
It’s sad to think of how much better he could have been as a writer if he hadn’t achieved so much fame and fortune so early in his career. I feel like an asshole for even suggesting that a guy who won the Nobel Prize for literature could have done more, but I don’t think that his writing ever eclipsed his early stuff, namely his short stories and The Sun Also Rises.
I get it that he grew up fishing and hunting, but his stuff about hunting in Africa is of no interest to me. I simply can’t understand why anyone would want to kill every animal they happen upon.
I don’t get fishing, not in the least, although I love to cook and eat fish. Fishing just isn’t my cup of tea, although his little article The Best Rainbow Trout Fishing, Toronto Star, August 28, 1920, is thoroughly charming. You can almost see the segue from this into the beautiful scene in the Pyrenes when Jake goes fishing in the mountains above Pamplona one lovely summer afternoon.
Hemingway’s reporting before WWII was mostly completely and utterly off the mark and about as far from prescient as humanly possible, calling for U.S. isolationism, or simply supporting both sides to make money. Why anyone would have asked for his opinion in these matters is a mystery to me.
This volume is filled with examples of Hemingway putting forth on topics he knows little about, or making enormous generalization based on his limited anecdotal experience. The Germans are this way, the Swiss are another. But still, when he could keep himself out of the narrative, he did some really good reporting.
I can barely bring myself to criticize Hemingway because I feel that I owe so much to him. I grew up in the middle of America and had seen almost nothing before I started plowing through my parents’ collection of his books. He made me want to travel, to learn French and Spanish. I did, and for that, I thank him for spurring my previously land-locked imagination.
October 30, 2021
Hemingway's nonfiction is interesting if you like hyper-masculinized topics like hunting, fishing, or war. These are not my reading interests.
November 23, 2012
Short non-fiction prose gems many from 1920's Europe on socio-political-economic observation of post WW I culture; the best on fly-fishing, bull-fighting, food, and money.
April 23, 2019
Self explanitory
August 11, 2019
I love this anthology. I wasn't going to read it again, one or two, but I couldn't stop.
Hemingway's journalism informed many of his fictional stories and they are damned good pieces of writing. I read it with a mixture of admiration and jealousy. The second has stayed in my mind from the first reading, it's about free things and Hemingway gets a free shave from the beginners at the barber's academy in Toronto. Then he gets a tooth pulled at the dentistry school, which is something I did when I was a young bloke in Adelaide. Worst pair of hands ever in my mouth.
The book recounts various journeys around Europe in the 20s. Hemingway fishes, flies and files his way around Spain, Germany and France in the first part of the book. He introduces Cuba of the 1930s in part two. His writing is like a visual almanac with weights, distances, records and all the necessary detail readers vacuum up subconsciously. When Hemingway writes about game fishing and bull fighting the details of the fight and participants (both human and animal) are all important. He counts enough to know that the biggest fish, at 343 pounds, 156 kilograms, caught in a two-month fishing trip in Cuba in 1933 jumped out of the water 44 times before it was brought in to the gaff. You either count that sort of thing very carefully, like a savant, or make an educated guess, like most hacks, and pass it off as an accurate observation. With Hemingway you'd like to think It probably wasn't the latter.
His political observation is engaging, more political sketch than commentary in the early years, biting later on. Writing for the Toronto Star about the 1922 Genoa conference in Italy, he prepares his readers with a gritty piece about the behaviour of the fascists and communists in Italy. Fifteen-hundred carabiniere from outside the region have been shipped in to keep the peace with orders to shoot. He paints a picture of constant skirmishing where the fascists have the upper hand.
Here, we already see his brilliance for the observational portrait. Later on in the book he talks about observation and the understanding of individuals being the underpinnings of his writing. His passing observation of the Canadian representative, Sir Charles Blair Gordon tells you all you need to know in nine words: "blonde, ruddy-faced and a little ill at ease." A piece called Russian Girls at Genoa teases the reader waiting for the mention of the girls, "the best looking girls in the conference hall" arrive in the second last paragraph. Nothing important was discussed on the opening day. This is wonderful reportage, the day-to-day happenings having been filed separately. While I'd like to see Hemingway's straight news reports this is stuff that historians use as crayons to colour their tomes. His writing is about incredibly accurate description of things and people, their feelings, emotions and the physical manifestations that describe them.
There is an excellent profile of the first Soviet Foreign Minister Tchitcherin at a subsequent conference in Lausanne, "he has plump, cold hands that lie in yours like a dead man's." Hemingway ridicules Tchitcherin for having a portrait of himself taken in a military officer's uniform after revealing the Soviet diplomat had been made to wear dresses by his mother until he was 12. There is awareness of his closet homosexuality if you care to pick it up, coupled with admiration of his intellect and tenacity. "He is all brain and he simply feeds his body because it is a supporting part of his brain." The over-riding conclusion is of an emotionally fragile but intellectually towering advocate fighting single-mindedly for an impossible outcome.
A curiously out-of-place story about a death knock in which he and another reporter have to approach the surviving victims of a tsunami in Japan has always stuck in my mind for one quote. Hemingway is trying to convince a mother to speak to them. The mother is sceptical and doesn't want their names used, saying all newspaper reporters are liars. "They'll promise it and then they'll use them (their names) anyway," she says. Hemingway responds: "Mrs. So and So, the president of the United States tells reporters things in confidence which if known would cost him his job. .... I'm talking about newspaper reporters, not cheap news tipsters." That quote stuck in my mind from my first reading 20 years ago. The real professional honour for a journalist is in getting the story. While Hemingway sticks to his word and doesn't name the woman in his piece he does get the story. Like all his journalism there are paragraphs that could (I'm sure some did) leap onto the pages of a novel. The description of the daughter should if it didn't already. "She went upstairs, quick and lithe, wearing a Japanese kimono. It ought to have some other name. Kimono has a messy, early morning sound. There was nothing kimonoey about this kimono. The colours were vivid and the stuff had body to it, and it was cut. It looked almost as though it might be worn with two swords in the belt."
To read in one anthology a lifetime of journalism you see the man's character change over time. He starts out a great stylist, and ends up, like most of us, becoming a curmudgeon. The drive to write really well is there all the time but it presents itself more in later years. Arguably his greatest book, the one he was awarded the Pulitzer for, and in a large part gave him a Nobel Prize, The Old Man and the Sea, was written in 1951, when the author was in his fifties. You see the origins of The Old Man and the Sea in a letter for Esquire in April, 1936, fifteen years earlier. Which reads like a synopsis: "An old man fishing alone in a skiff out of Cabanas hooked a great marlin that, on the heavy sash cord handling, pulled the skiff far out to sea. Two days later the old man was picked up by fishermen sixty miles to the eastward, the head and forward part of the marlin lashed alongside. What was left of the fish, less than half, weighed 800 pounds. The old man had stayed with him a day, a night, a day and another night while the fish swam deep and pulled the boat. When he had come up the old man had pulled the boat up on him and harpooned him. Lashed alongside the sharks had hit him and the old man had fought them out alone in the Gulf Stream in a skiff, clubbing them, stabbing at them, lunging at them with an oar until he was exhausted and the sharks had eaten all that they could hold. He was crying in the boat when the fishermen picked him up, half crazy from his loss and the sharks were still circling the boat."
We hit the Spanish Civil War and the now world-famous author, Hemingway is a bit more circumspect in his writing, the possibility of death is more apparent but at a distance, which is surprising because it was probably his most dangerous assignment. His piece about World War II London Fights the Robots is considered one of the finest pieces of war writing but I like his writing about running around with the French resistance fighters - for which he was charged with breaching the Geneva Conventions but eventually acquitted.
The last part is a series of pieces from Africa including one describing the two air crashes which led to a number of premature obituaries. His character is strongly set in these pieces and you see him playing down the injuries that plagued him for the rest of his life. The final piece about the Navy NCOs who came to visit him once in Cuba is quite evocative, far from the popular discussion about Hemingway not able to live with the rigours of age and eventually committing suicide, I think it reveals a man trying to come to terms with his position in American life at the end of his career. A man who can sit with the ranks or with Admirals, a man who will give boons, is courteous and self aware. This is a fine anthology and I'd recommend it to any writer or journalist, or those aspiring to be.
Hemingway's journalism informed many of his fictional stories and they are damned good pieces of writing. I read it with a mixture of admiration and jealousy. The second has stayed in my mind from the first reading, it's about free things and Hemingway gets a free shave from the beginners at the barber's academy in Toronto. Then he gets a tooth pulled at the dentistry school, which is something I did when I was a young bloke in Adelaide. Worst pair of hands ever in my mouth.
The book recounts various journeys around Europe in the 20s. Hemingway fishes, flies and files his way around Spain, Germany and France in the first part of the book. He introduces Cuba of the 1930s in part two. His writing is like a visual almanac with weights, distances, records and all the necessary detail readers vacuum up subconsciously. When Hemingway writes about game fishing and bull fighting the details of the fight and participants (both human and animal) are all important. He counts enough to know that the biggest fish, at 343 pounds, 156 kilograms, caught in a two-month fishing trip in Cuba in 1933 jumped out of the water 44 times before it was brought in to the gaff. You either count that sort of thing very carefully, like a savant, or make an educated guess, like most hacks, and pass it off as an accurate observation. With Hemingway you'd like to think It probably wasn't the latter.
His political observation is engaging, more political sketch than commentary in the early years, biting later on. Writing for the Toronto Star about the 1922 Genoa conference in Italy, he prepares his readers with a gritty piece about the behaviour of the fascists and communists in Italy. Fifteen-hundred carabiniere from outside the region have been shipped in to keep the peace with orders to shoot. He paints a picture of constant skirmishing where the fascists have the upper hand.
Here, we already see his brilliance for the observational portrait. Later on in the book he talks about observation and the understanding of individuals being the underpinnings of his writing. His passing observation of the Canadian representative, Sir Charles Blair Gordon tells you all you need to know in nine words: "blonde, ruddy-faced and a little ill at ease." A piece called Russian Girls at Genoa teases the reader waiting for the mention of the girls, "the best looking girls in the conference hall" arrive in the second last paragraph. Nothing important was discussed on the opening day. This is wonderful reportage, the day-to-day happenings having been filed separately. While I'd like to see Hemingway's straight news reports this is stuff that historians use as crayons to colour their tomes. His writing is about incredibly accurate description of things and people, their feelings, emotions and the physical manifestations that describe them.
There is an excellent profile of the first Soviet Foreign Minister Tchitcherin at a subsequent conference in Lausanne, "he has plump, cold hands that lie in yours like a dead man's." Hemingway ridicules Tchitcherin for having a portrait of himself taken in a military officer's uniform after revealing the Soviet diplomat had been made to wear dresses by his mother until he was 12. There is awareness of his closet homosexuality if you care to pick it up, coupled with admiration of his intellect and tenacity. "He is all brain and he simply feeds his body because it is a supporting part of his brain." The over-riding conclusion is of an emotionally fragile but intellectually towering advocate fighting single-mindedly for an impossible outcome.
A curiously out-of-place story about a death knock in which he and another reporter have to approach the surviving victims of a tsunami in Japan has always stuck in my mind for one quote. Hemingway is trying to convince a mother to speak to them. The mother is sceptical and doesn't want their names used, saying all newspaper reporters are liars. "They'll promise it and then they'll use them (their names) anyway," she says. Hemingway responds: "Mrs. So and So, the president of the United States tells reporters things in confidence which if known would cost him his job. .... I'm talking about newspaper reporters, not cheap news tipsters." That quote stuck in my mind from my first reading 20 years ago. The real professional honour for a journalist is in getting the story. While Hemingway sticks to his word and doesn't name the woman in his piece he does get the story. Like all his journalism there are paragraphs that could (I'm sure some did) leap onto the pages of a novel. The description of the daughter should if it didn't already. "She went upstairs, quick and lithe, wearing a Japanese kimono. It ought to have some other name. Kimono has a messy, early morning sound. There was nothing kimonoey about this kimono. The colours were vivid and the stuff had body to it, and it was cut. It looked almost as though it might be worn with two swords in the belt."
To read in one anthology a lifetime of journalism you see the man's character change over time. He starts out a great stylist, and ends up, like most of us, becoming a curmudgeon. The drive to write really well is there all the time but it presents itself more in later years. Arguably his greatest book, the one he was awarded the Pulitzer for, and in a large part gave him a Nobel Prize, The Old Man and the Sea, was written in 1951, when the author was in his fifties. You see the origins of The Old Man and the Sea in a letter for Esquire in April, 1936, fifteen years earlier. Which reads like a synopsis: "An old man fishing alone in a skiff out of Cabanas hooked a great marlin that, on the heavy sash cord handling, pulled the skiff far out to sea. Two days later the old man was picked up by fishermen sixty miles to the eastward, the head and forward part of the marlin lashed alongside. What was left of the fish, less than half, weighed 800 pounds. The old man had stayed with him a day, a night, a day and another night while the fish swam deep and pulled the boat. When he had come up the old man had pulled the boat up on him and harpooned him. Lashed alongside the sharks had hit him and the old man had fought them out alone in the Gulf Stream in a skiff, clubbing them, stabbing at them, lunging at them with an oar until he was exhausted and the sharks had eaten all that they could hold. He was crying in the boat when the fishermen picked him up, half crazy from his loss and the sharks were still circling the boat."
We hit the Spanish Civil War and the now world-famous author, Hemingway is a bit more circumspect in his writing, the possibility of death is more apparent but at a distance, which is surprising because it was probably his most dangerous assignment. His piece about World War II London Fights the Robots is considered one of the finest pieces of war writing but I like his writing about running around with the French resistance fighters - for which he was charged with breaching the Geneva Conventions but eventually acquitted.
The last part is a series of pieces from Africa including one describing the two air crashes which led to a number of premature obituaries. His character is strongly set in these pieces and you see him playing down the injuries that plagued him for the rest of his life. The final piece about the Navy NCOs who came to visit him once in Cuba is quite evocative, far from the popular discussion about Hemingway not able to live with the rigours of age and eventually committing suicide, I think it reveals a man trying to come to terms with his position in American life at the end of his career. A man who can sit with the ranks or with Admirals, a man who will give boons, is courteous and self aware. This is a fine anthology and I'd recommend it to any writer or journalist, or those aspiring to be.
May 6, 2021
A substantial collection of Ernest Hemingway's journalistic writings spanning four decades. It is a bit hit-and-miss – as, I suppose, any editorial collection would be. Many of the selections are dated newspaper articles reporting facts and (then-)current events, with Hemingway understandably not striving for literary greatness; these ones, of course, do not make for interesting reading nowadays. There is an undercurrent of obligation that I detected in many of these pieces and Hemingway lacks the artistic freedom that is allowed by the crafting of literature. On the other hand there are a number of real gems, particularly among the longer Esquire articles of the 1930s, where the writer is allowed to breathe. Whilst it is a truism that Hemingway's journalistic output never matched his literary output, some of these Esquire articles come damn close. Indeed, they serve as a better representation of Hemingway in the 1930s than his only novel published in that decade: To Have and Have Not.
What surprised and gladdened me the most about By-Line was the amount of humour Hemingway uses throughout. Perhaps because he never intended his journalism to be judged alongside his literature, perhaps as a reaction to the restrictions of writing to order for newspaper editors; for whatever reason, Hemingway cracks jokes and is in general more light-hearted and communicative with the reader than he often could be in his novels and his short stories. This gives you a greater appreciation of the writer's character, allowing you to flesh out the individual in a way that you cannot if you just read, say, The Sun Also Rises or Men Without Women.
The book as a whole can serve as a great introduction to Hemingway's writing, for it covers just about every topic that was of interest to him in his writing career. It covers fishing ('On the Blue Water' contains a passage which clearly served as the basis for The Old Man and the Sea), bullfighting, war ('Notes on the Next War' is as eloquent an anti-war message as anything in A Farewell to Arms or For Whom the Bell Tolls), big-game hunting ('Notes on Dangerous Game') and literature ('Monologue to the Maestro' is a gold mine of advice to writers). It also covers events of his life which he never really addressed in his fiction, such as his two plane crashes in Africa (recounted here in 'The Christmas Gift') and his experiences in World War Two. The latter are particularly good, if admittedly not on a par with the Esquire articles. What Hemingway aficionado could resist reading his experiences of a landing-craft on D-Day ('Voyage to Victory') or the battles for Paris ('How We Came to Paris') and Germany ('War in the Siegfried Line')? Overall, there are enough strong articles and enough literary flourishes to make By-Line a worthwhile read and a stellar addition to the Hemingway canon.
What surprised and gladdened me the most about By-Line was the amount of humour Hemingway uses throughout. Perhaps because he never intended his journalism to be judged alongside his literature, perhaps as a reaction to the restrictions of writing to order for newspaper editors; for whatever reason, Hemingway cracks jokes and is in general more light-hearted and communicative with the reader than he often could be in his novels and his short stories. This gives you a greater appreciation of the writer's character, allowing you to flesh out the individual in a way that you cannot if you just read, say, The Sun Also Rises or Men Without Women.
The book as a whole can serve as a great introduction to Hemingway's writing, for it covers just about every topic that was of interest to him in his writing career. It covers fishing ('On the Blue Water' contains a passage which clearly served as the basis for The Old Man and the Sea), bullfighting, war ('Notes on the Next War' is as eloquent an anti-war message as anything in A Farewell to Arms or For Whom the Bell Tolls), big-game hunting ('Notes on Dangerous Game') and literature ('Monologue to the Maestro' is a gold mine of advice to writers). It also covers events of his life which he never really addressed in his fiction, such as his two plane crashes in Africa (recounted here in 'The Christmas Gift') and his experiences in World War Two. The latter are particularly good, if admittedly not on a par with the Esquire articles. What Hemingway aficionado could resist reading his experiences of a landing-craft on D-Day ('Voyage to Victory') or the battles for Paris ('How We Came to Paris') and Germany ('War in the Siegfried Line')? Overall, there are enough strong articles and enough literary flourishes to make By-Line a worthwhile read and a stellar addition to the Hemingway canon.
May 6, 2017
Let’s face it, we all know that Ernest Hemingway is a phenomenal writer, but this book here is what proves it. See, he started work as a journalist nearly 100 years ago, and the first piece of work in this collection is dated March 1920, a piece on a free shave by an apprentice barber in Toronto. It was journalism which paved the way for Hemingway’s literary career, and this book collects together 75 articles written over the course of 35 years.
As you can imagine, it’s a fascinating read, and not just because it’s interesting to see how much the world changed across the intervening years – Hemingway’s gift for words is just as apparent here as it is in his novels, and it’s potentially even more powerful because he’s writing about true events, the majority of which happened either directly to him or to his contacts.
The sort of stuff that he covers is pretty typical for Hemingway – hunting, fishing, bullfights, women, booze, etc. He was the first great writer to make himself a reputation for being a great drunk, too – he’s had many imitators, both in the way that he lived his life and the way in which he writes, but nobody has ever proved themselves his equal. In my opinion, no-one ever will, and it’s fantastic that his personality has been thoroughly stamped on his journalism, as well as in the rest of his work.
Ultimately, you’re probably not going to want to read this if you’re not a Hemingway fan, and even if you are then I wouldn’t blame you if you stuck to his novels, at least to begin with. But then, as with most great writers, even the lesser-read and seemingly less appealing work emerges in all of its triumphant glory, once you read it. My honest opinion is that you’d be a fool to pass this over just because a book of journalism doesn’t sound particularly interesting, and that you’ll learn a lot more about the world as it was and as it is than you’d expect to.
Of course, what with this being a classic, it includes commentary, a foreword and even, bizarrely enough, an introduction called ‘Hemingway Needs No Introduction‘. With most classic novels, it becomes something of a chore to have the author’s work intruded upon by references – Noel Coward once said that “having to read footnotes resembles having to go downstairs to answer the door while in the midst of making love.” Here, though, the extra notes just add to what you’re reading, in a way that few other books ever manage.
As you can imagine, it’s a fascinating read, and not just because it’s interesting to see how much the world changed across the intervening years – Hemingway’s gift for words is just as apparent here as it is in his novels, and it’s potentially even more powerful because he’s writing about true events, the majority of which happened either directly to him or to his contacts.
The sort of stuff that he covers is pretty typical for Hemingway – hunting, fishing, bullfights, women, booze, etc. He was the first great writer to make himself a reputation for being a great drunk, too – he’s had many imitators, both in the way that he lived his life and the way in which he writes, but nobody has ever proved themselves his equal. In my opinion, no-one ever will, and it’s fantastic that his personality has been thoroughly stamped on his journalism, as well as in the rest of his work.
Ultimately, you’re probably not going to want to read this if you’re not a Hemingway fan, and even if you are then I wouldn’t blame you if you stuck to his novels, at least to begin with. But then, as with most great writers, even the lesser-read and seemingly less appealing work emerges in all of its triumphant glory, once you read it. My honest opinion is that you’d be a fool to pass this over just because a book of journalism doesn’t sound particularly interesting, and that you’ll learn a lot more about the world as it was and as it is than you’d expect to.
Of course, what with this being a classic, it includes commentary, a foreword and even, bizarrely enough, an introduction called ‘Hemingway Needs No Introduction‘. With most classic novels, it becomes something of a chore to have the author’s work intruded upon by references – Noel Coward once said that “having to read footnotes resembles having to go downstairs to answer the door while in the midst of making love.” Here, though, the extra notes just add to what you’re reading, in a way that few other books ever manage.
July 2, 2020
I'm not a huge fan of Hemingway's fiction, but this book was different. It included articles he
wrote as a newspaper correspondent as well as articles he wrote for Esquire, Look, True and
other magazines.
He was a fearless war reporter. He was right in the thick of the fighting during the Spanish
Civil War and was imbedded with front line troops during WWII. In fact at times one
wonders if he's reporting the action or directing it. The account of D-Day was an article
written for Collier's magazine and it truly did make you feel as if you were on the LCV
with the soldiers. It caught the feelings of anxiety, the disorganization, the mayhem,
the stalwart resolve and bravery of the troops. It is memorable.
He was in Asia prior to the US entering WWII. He described the drive of Japan to get
control of oil and iron. And explained how their war with China was impeding their
ability to attack more southern area. This was all very educational history for me.
One of my favorite articles was "Chinese Build Air Field". Nelson Johnson who was the
U.S. Ambassador to Chung-King told Hemingway "China can do anything that China wants
to do.". Hemingway was skeptical, but then Chiang Kai-shek discovered that he did not
have airplane runways that would accommodate the Fly Fortress , Boeing B17. He told
Chen Loh-kwan an engineering graduate to build a runway in about 2 and a half months.
It was all built without modern equipment. The workers hauled sand in wheelbarrows and
baskets on carrying sticks. They crushed stone with hammers. They build ditches to carry
water to the construction site. The cement was mixed with their feet. Then they rolled it
with huge rollers--pulled by manpower. The runway was finished by the deadline.
Also his story of taking a trip with his wife in Africa on small planes and experiencing
not one, but two plane crashes. It says something about the man that he ever agreed to
fly again.
I wasn't crazy about his articles on hunting and fishing, but I could tell he was very
knowledgeable and passionate about the subjects.
wrote as a newspaper correspondent as well as articles he wrote for Esquire, Look, True and
other magazines.
He was a fearless war reporter. He was right in the thick of the fighting during the Spanish
Civil War and was imbedded with front line troops during WWII. In fact at times one
wonders if he's reporting the action or directing it. The account of D-Day was an article
written for Collier's magazine and it truly did make you feel as if you were on the LCV
with the soldiers. It caught the feelings of anxiety, the disorganization, the mayhem,
the stalwart resolve and bravery of the troops. It is memorable.
He was in Asia prior to the US entering WWII. He described the drive of Japan to get
control of oil and iron. And explained how their war with China was impeding their
ability to attack more southern area. This was all very educational history for me.
One of my favorite articles was "Chinese Build Air Field". Nelson Johnson who was the
U.S. Ambassador to Chung-King told Hemingway "China can do anything that China wants
to do.". Hemingway was skeptical, but then Chiang Kai-shek discovered that he did not
have airplane runways that would accommodate the Fly Fortress , Boeing B17. He told
Chen Loh-kwan an engineering graduate to build a runway in about 2 and a half months.
It was all built without modern equipment. The workers hauled sand in wheelbarrows and
baskets on carrying sticks. They crushed stone with hammers. They build ditches to carry
water to the construction site. The cement was mixed with their feet. Then they rolled it
with huge rollers--pulled by manpower. The runway was finished by the deadline.
Also his story of taking a trip with his wife in Africa on small planes and experiencing
not one, but two plane crashes. It says something about the man that he ever agreed to
fly again.
I wasn't crazy about his articles on hunting and fishing, but I could tell he was very
knowledgeable and passionate about the subjects.
May 31, 2024
What a wonderful compilation of Hemingway’s journalism going back to 1920 and through 1956, less than 5 years before his death.
I recently heard a comment that Hemingway was a Neanderthal who couldn’t string two sentences together. Hemingway’s writing can certainly feel choppy and he does not have the melodic prose of the great writers that came before him.
I don’t read him for his prose or intellectual abilities (or inabilities as some might think). My absolute favorite thing about his fiction writing is that he transports me right into the moment of time of when his stories are taking place. I feel as though I am in his shirt pocket. I can see and hear everything that is happening and smell and taste and feel everything that he does and these articles are no exception. In fact, I think some of his journalism is better than any fiction he ever wrote. (I was extremely impressed with the articles he wrote for The Toronto Star during his early 20s)
I picked this book up because I had read a couple of the his articles written for Esquire in the 1930s and had enjoyed them immensely. From this collection of Hemingway’s journalism, I thought I would read an article here and there and pick my way through it over time while reading something of “more substance.” That did not happen. I didn’t pick up another book to read along side of it and I also halted my audiobook.
Part of my intrigue of this particular series of stories is that I enjoy the things he’s written about. I love being on my boat. I love fishing. I love hiking. I also love history and specifically the history of the World Wars. These subjects may bore other readers and exclude them from finding the extreme enjoyment that I did but I don’t believe anyone could read these articles without agreeing that he led a rich and exciting life. So, Mr. Hemingway, I thank you for sharing your life and providing me with more than a just a glimpse of your adventures. I was able to experience an entire cinematic movie in my imagination.
I recently heard a comment that Hemingway was a Neanderthal who couldn’t string two sentences together. Hemingway’s writing can certainly feel choppy and he does not have the melodic prose of the great writers that came before him.
I don’t read him for his prose or intellectual abilities (or inabilities as some might think). My absolute favorite thing about his fiction writing is that he transports me right into the moment of time of when his stories are taking place. I feel as though I am in his shirt pocket. I can see and hear everything that is happening and smell and taste and feel everything that he does and these articles are no exception. In fact, I think some of his journalism is better than any fiction he ever wrote. (I was extremely impressed with the articles he wrote for The Toronto Star during his early 20s)
I picked this book up because I had read a couple of the his articles written for Esquire in the 1930s and had enjoyed them immensely. From this collection of Hemingway’s journalism, I thought I would read an article here and there and pick my way through it over time while reading something of “more substance.” That did not happen. I didn’t pick up another book to read along side of it and I also halted my audiobook.
Part of my intrigue of this particular series of stories is that I enjoy the things he’s written about. I love being on my boat. I love fishing. I love hiking. I also love history and specifically the history of the World Wars. These subjects may bore other readers and exclude them from finding the extreme enjoyment that I did but I don’t believe anyone could read these articles without agreeing that he led a rich and exciting life. So, Mr. Hemingway, I thank you for sharing your life and providing me with more than a just a glimpse of your adventures. I was able to experience an entire cinematic movie in my imagination.
Read
May 22, 2023“Hemingway’s literary apprenticeship was served in journalism, and his later work in the field earned him money and sent him to places where he wished to be. Yet his enthusiasm, his compassion, and his imagination made such writing far more than just timely stuff. Some readers will no doubt view the material as rounding out the Hemingway record; others, it is to be hoped, will regard it simply as among the best newspaper and magazine reporting available in our troubled times.
—William White, By-Line: Ernest Hemingway (February 16, 1967)”
This is a collection of Ernest Hemingway nonfiction pieces, specifically for journalistic outlets that cover a wide range of topics. The opening section calls Hemingway one of the best journalistic writers of the 20th century, and maybe with enough qualifications you can make a claim like that and have it make sense. Instead, I think Hemingway is one of the best writers of the 20th century, and his nonfiction writing is often very good, but I can’t tell you at all whether or not he’s any good at journalism, as these are mostly musings and travel sketches, with some light opinion pieces in as well. He’s similar enough to Orwell in style for that, though this does not include criticism pieces, so it’s hard to make that exact comparison. And of course Hemingway and Orwell differ quite a bit in style, so that comparison is not there either. Instead, what really emerges here is how much Hemingway sets the tone or in the same vibe as tone-setting writing from the 50s, 60s, and 70s with Tom Wolfe, Hunter Thompson, and Norman Mailer, all of whom write very differently from Hemingway, but are taking on most of the same subjects.
—William White, By-Line: Ernest Hemingway (February 16, 1967)”
This is a collection of Ernest Hemingway nonfiction pieces, specifically for journalistic outlets that cover a wide range of topics. The opening section calls Hemingway one of the best journalistic writers of the 20th century, and maybe with enough qualifications you can make a claim like that and have it make sense. Instead, I think Hemingway is one of the best writers of the 20th century, and his nonfiction writing is often very good, but I can’t tell you at all whether or not he’s any good at journalism, as these are mostly musings and travel sketches, with some light opinion pieces in as well. He’s similar enough to Orwell in style for that, though this does not include criticism pieces, so it’s hard to make that exact comparison. And of course Hemingway and Orwell differ quite a bit in style, so that comparison is not there either. Instead, what really emerges here is how much Hemingway sets the tone or in the same vibe as tone-setting writing from the 50s, 60s, and 70s with Tom Wolfe, Hunter Thompson, and Norman Mailer, all of whom write very differently from Hemingway, but are taking on most of the same subjects.
June 4, 2025
I picked this up out of curiosity. I've read all of Hemingway's novels and most of his short stories so when I found something that I hadn't read by him, I thought that I had to give it a try. The thing that I wasn't expecting was to like this as much as I did, given that this is mostly a collection of writings that I don't believe Hemingway expected to have read by the general public beyond the publication that the individual articles appeared in originally.
This is an incredibly interesting read for anyone, watching as Hemingway's style develops over the course of decades is fascinating, but for someone like me whose read just about everything else that he wrote, it especially compelling. What really surprised me was how towards the end of the collection (which is organized chronologically) his articles don't differentiate all that much from his works of fiction. It's too early in the year to say that this is my favorite book that I've read this year, but I wouldn't be surprised if it ended that way.
This is an incredibly interesting read for anyone, watching as Hemingway's style develops over the course of decades is fascinating, but for someone like me whose read just about everything else that he wrote, it especially compelling. What really surprised me was how towards the end of the collection (which is organized chronologically) his articles don't differentiate all that much from his works of fiction. It's too early in the year to say that this is my favorite book that I've read this year, but I wouldn't be surprised if it ended that way.
November 30, 2021
A series of articles Hemingway wrote for magazines and other publications between 1920 and 1956. Historically interesting, Hemingway writes of then current events (the Spanish Civil War and WWII) when he was directly involved. Other articles discuss his lifestyle (fishing and big game hunting...not interests of mine, so I found those tedious to read). One of my favorites was "The Christmas Gift" (published in Look Magazine in 1954). His Christmas gift to his then wife ("Miss Mary") was a trip to Africa. The trip went terribly wrong, with not one by 2 plane crashes. He and his wife were reported dead and newspapers around the world published his obituary. After rescue, he become 'addicted' (his word) to reading them.
November 15, 2021
eight months later, and i’ve finally worked my way through this collection of journalism. i’d never read hemingway before this and there is no doubt he is a phenomenal writer. i loved reading his early works (especially as an early-career reporter myself) and the articles that discussed his career and the craft of writing. however, i admit to skipping the fishing and hunting articles - they dragged on so much and i frankly have no interest in the topics. the war correspondence was fascinating and made you feel like part of the action, but my knowledge of WW2 is just too lacking to fully appreciate the dispatches for what they are.
March 10, 2022
It's obviously isn't as good as a book by Hemingway but reading articles that he wrote through the years is definitely very interesting. I liked his early stuff (for example where he made fun of people who go to apprentice dentists & barbers), his articles from both wars are mostly good too. The 'killing of animals' part was very annoying as nowadays one knows that all of this hunting by white males of the previous generations was one of the causes that brought the wildlife to the sorrowful condition it's in today. Though Hemingway is always treats the animals with respect this whole idea that you need to kill it if you love it very alien
June 3, 2025
Uno degli aspetti che contraddistingue le opere di Hemingway è il suo stile di scrittura, breve e diretto, semplice e scarno. Il suo background iniziale include infatti una formazione giornalistica, uno stile di scrittura basato fortemente sulla presentazione dei fatti in modo conciso e chiaro, lasciando trasparire dialoghi e conversazioni. L'autore stesso affermò una volta che lo stile di uno scrittore dovrebbe essere diretto e personale, con una formulazione semplice e vigorosa: e questo è "dal nostro inviato", un gruppetto di fogli di giornale e opinioni, non essenziale ma interessante, (ho adorato l'articolo su Mussolini) da sbocconcellare sui mezzi come popcorn.
May 20, 2017
Ambition must be a cruel mistress. Hemingway didn’t seem to put much stock in his journalistic work. The sort of writing in this book filled the time between his literary pieces. Yet, had he never written a word of fiction, these stories would show him as a master all on their own. The articles and dispatches are brilliantly written; and, dare I say it, I like them even better than his novels. This is prose so beautiful that it will take your breath away or bring tears to your eyes.
November 22, 2023
A massive collection of journalism from throughout Hemingway's career. It took me almost a year and half to finish, which is far longer than I've spent on any of his other books. It gets 3 stars pretty much by default - there were *so* many articles that naturally some were good and some were bad and it all just balances out in the end.
I got this book from the Ernest Hemingway Birthplace Museum in Oak Park, IL. So it will always be special to me for that reason.
I got this book from the Ernest Hemingway Birthplace Museum in Oak Park, IL. So it will always be special to me for that reason.
August 2, 2019
Hemingway has never been my favorite author, and I wasn't keen on the hunting/fishing/bull fighting parts of this book, but his current events and political commentary were outstanding. I loved his description of Mussolini and was stunned by his description of the Thrace refugees. Knowing what happened historically, I was fascinated reading his analysis of events leading up to WWII.
May 25, 2022
Having read much of the fiction, this volume of selected reporting works as a companion volume, contrasting the manner in which life informs a great author's creations. (It is unfortunate to see the naivete in his earlier journalism where open bigotry tended to be more prevalent, but the greater portion was interesting.)
December 26, 2018
There were too many essays about hunting and fishing for my taste. He was a good war correspondent, but at times those essays became repetitive. They wouldn't feel that way of you were reading month to month, but reading them back to back wasn't the best idea.
December 2, 2021
Good, except for the dreadfully boring and cruel fishing and hunting stories. And the bar stories. And the bullfighting stories. What a great writer, documenting an era where men took great and foolish risks to impress others.
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