"In the old days he would not have worried, but the fighting part of him was tired now, along with the other part, and he was alone in all of this now and he lay on the big, wide, old bed and could neither read nor sleep."

It seems like there is always enough to worry about in the world, no matter what times you live though, and once you hit the age when you lose the "fighting part" of your inner rebel spirit and it fades into a tired "nah - I don't like that!" instead of "I AM GOING TO RAISE HELL ABOUT THIS!". And it also seems the stupid worrying invariably comes with a loss of sleep and reading ability - which is even more annoying than the worrying as such.

My cure more often than not is to revisit old favourite authors - preferably those who died a long time before the specific kind of worrying I am indulging in at any given moment showed up uninvited - and to force-feed my mind with the kind of literature that makes me think of other things to worry about than those that actually haunt me in real life. Making sense? Maybe not, but Hemingway's problems - to me - are at the same time very relatable and very much not MY current problems, and therefore his stories are soothing even in their most laconically bleak moments.

So to have or not to have the ability to hide from reality, that is the question, and the answer is a strong MAYBE!

Hemingway says it with the usual eloquence...

3.5/5 ⭐️

I don't know, Marie Morgan was thinking, sitting at the dining-room table. I can take it just a day at a time and a night at a time, and maybe it gets different. It’s the goddamned nights. [...] I’ve got to get started on something. Maybe you get over being dead inside. I guess it don’t make any difference. I got to start to do something anyway. It’s been a week today. I’m afraid if I think about him on purpose I’ll get so I can’t remember how he looks. That was when I got that awful panic when I couldn’t remember his face. I got to get started doing something no matter how I feel. [...] That’s the only feeling I got. Hate and a hollow feeling. I’m empty like an empty house. Well, I got to start to do something. [...] Ain’t nobody going to come back any more when they’re dead. [...] Nobody knows the way you feel, because they don't know what it's all about that way. I know. I know too well. And if I live now twenty years what am I going to do? Nobody’s going to tell me that and there ain't nothing now but take it every day the way it comes and just get started doing something right away. That's what I got to do. But Jesus Christ, what do you do at nights is what I want to know.
How do you get through nights if you can't sleep?I guess you find out how it feels to lose your husband. I guess you find out all right. I guess you find out everything in this goddamned life. I guess you do all right. I guess I'm probably finding out right now. You just go dead inside and everything is easy. You just get dead like most people are most of the time.

Guns and testosterone on the ocean waves.

To Have and Have not is without question the most macho of the Hemingway novels I've read so far. It's mean, it's brute, it's rum-soaked, and it's also quite miserable. Especially for the women. I wouldn't be surprised if he wrote this under a dark cloud of Alcoholism. Thankfully, his no nonsense simple prose that doesn't try to do anything fancy is here, but, when I think of novels like The Sun Also Rises and A Farewell to Arms, this just wasn't as pleasing on the eye.

I was surprised to learn that this is the only novel Ernest Hemingway set on American soil, and marked perhaps the only time in his writing career that he chose to follow prevalent literary trends rather than creating his own. Whilst the main protagonist; the washed-up and aggressive boat captain Harry Morgan was indeed a memorable one, the narrative overall ran into problems. The novel is told awkwardly using third and first-person narration, and there is clear reason for that, as it's really made up of two short stories - Originally called 'One Trip Across and 'The Tradesman’s Return' plus a novella loosely linked, added to the longer part of the book. This just didn't flow like a proper novel should, and was distinctly inferior to the other two Hemingway novels I mentioned above. Criticized for its fragmented form, its hard-boiled obsession with cojones, and its ham-fisted approach to politics, it wasn't received well, and in several places, including Detroit, was even banned for being classed as too obscene.

This might be my least favourite Hemingway, but he did capture really well the economic ravages and desperation of trying to stay afloat during the depression era, and the setting of Key West and Cuba was a refreshing change from what I've been used to. Whilst there is a lot of action taking place in boats on the Florida Straits, my favourite scenes, even though they made me feel sad, were those taking place in bars. Man, how I miss the bars & restaurants. I look forward to the day so much when I can drink like a fish in a bar.

I will likely at some point watch Howard Hawks' movie starring Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall, and I wouldn't be surprised if it turned out better than the book. Even if it isn't, at least I'll get to see Lauren Bacall in her prime.

No matter how a man alone ain't got no bloody fucking chance.

Don't stare at it too long. Hemingway can write a little better than this crude assembly of improper grammar, this frayed string of incomprehensible nonsense. I know this, despite certain times of doubt while reading his works. But in To Have and Have Not, all the contemptible characteristics of Hemingway's style work together seamlessly and, more importantly, with profound effect. I nearly glimpsed the genius which the literary world ascribes to Hemingway. But instead I feel like I shook hands with a man, a unique man, who knows something which no one else cares to know, and would rather hold secretly and serenely within his soul than save the world by preaching it. And this shared moment comes during one of the most violent books in his catalog!

Hemingway begins immediately by writing to his audience in the first-person perspective as if we have all grown up between Cuba and the Keys and know the guys who loiter around Freddy's place. He does not write to us. He speaks to us, as best as Harry Morgan can. Then in the following chapters, he shifts into the third-person, describing Harry's episodes without any idea that we just listened to Harry himself out in the black waters of the Gulf, bobbing lazily between lighthouses casting lines of yellow light through the shimmering white luminescence of the moon. And we know Harry as Some Harry, just like they do. I admit, towards the end, it seems as though Hemingway lost control a bit and fell back into his stream of redundancy and run-on sentences. But I have to believe that he intentionally drops the chains which had kept his pen proper. We read to know people, and the experiences of these characters, expressed often by these characters, cannot hide behind the rules of the craft. Hemingway, as the writer, becomes an absent tour guide but still guides the tour somehow.

As the title would suggest, Hemingway portrays images of those who have and those who have not. Near the end, those who have not might realize the riches they possess in family and friends while the trust-fund junky blows a hole in his head because he might have to live on just over $200 a month. Those who have might realize the joys of family time on a luxurious yacht drifting in the moonlit heat while those who have not face off at gun point for a bag of money stowed away below deck. All in all, the pursuit of wealth pits one caged animal against another, clawing at the cash green bars while their fellow man does the same in his cage, warning the other to stay away.

Honest work drives honest men to make dangerous deals because it cannot support a family. Revolutionaries compromise their decency in order to collapse the cage which imprisons the common class. Soldiers wail on each other because they have no place else to go. All these animals rage against their cages and only serve to hurt themselves. Those who have not must either decompose within their cage or rage with the full might of the human spirit. And yet the more they rage the more their spirit seeps from their hearts and minds. They relent to immoral demands and sacrifice their integrity in order to support their families or free a land they love. And as their spirit dwindles, they find no solace in each other, no rekindling of their humanity in another's embrace. These cages isolate people. The bars bring focus to their own plight and implant an alarming apathy for the lives of other animals. Alone in these cages, they degenerate and cannot survive because of the harm they inflict on themselves through weaponized relations. They rage uncontrollably, yearning for a life outside of the cage only to realize that they can never escape. And if they could, they would only bleed to death in freedom. When each person views the world as their opponent, they set out alone and meet a worthy adversary equally intent on a fight.

And now, Oh Marie...what now? Does the cycle of collapse begin again in you? Do you resign yourself to the cage, dumbstruck by the clicking lock, waiting for the flames in your eyes to char your skin and singe your hair? Though the world vacuums the life from your soul, the charm from your smile and the bounce from your body, you will go on. You have truly lost your riches but you will go on...somehow.

سه رمان همینگوی به ترجمه‌ی کسایی‌پور از نشر هرمس ارزش خواندن دارند: «خورشید همچنان می‌دمد»، «آن‌سوی رودخانه، زیر درختان»، و همین «داشتن و نداشتن». این همان رمانی‌ست که بر گرته‌اش «ناخدا خورشید»ِ خودمان ساخته شده؛ مثل رمان‌های جاده‌ای من عاشق نوشته‌های بندری هستم، ساحلی، دریاکناری، رودباری، چه می‌گویند به این نوع رمان‌ها و داستانها؟ تنها رمان دهه‌ی ۳۰همینگوی‌ست، خط و ربط‌هایی هم با «برف‌های کلیمانجارو» دارد، انتهای کتاب هم یادداشت مفصل خوبی از مترجم آمده که من‌بابِ آشنایی با این کتاب و همینگوی و پاریسِ پس از جنگ اول جهانی به خواندن می‌ارزد و به یاد می‌ماند. جالب اینکه کاغذش و طرح‌جلد کتاب از «خورشید همچنان می‌دمد» بدتر است اما آماده‌سازیِ کتاب بهتر است و تهیه‌ی نام‌نامه در انتهای کتاب پانویس‌های صفحات را حذف کرده و مخلِ رمان‌خوانی نمی‌شود.

İki sene önce bulunduğum bir cenazede bütün günü birlikte geçirdiğim modern zamanların cenaze levazımatçısı Hasan Bey’ geldi aklıma bu kitabı okurken. Hemingway benim kalem. Sanki onu benden başka bilen yok bu koca dünyada. Hasan Bey daha doğrusu Hasan abi. Bazı adamlar sadece abidir. Abi olarak dünya gelmişlerdir sanki. Vakar, centilmen, ama uzaktan bakıldığında pek bir şey ifade etmeyen bir görüntüsü vardı Hasan abi’nin. Sıradan.Eve gidip portakal yiyip yatan biri. Yaptığı işe bütün gün tanık olduktan sonra dehşete kapılmıştım. Etkilemişti beni. Sükuneti, davudi sesi ve beyefendiliği ile yaptığı işi bağdaştıramamıştım. Kimsenin anlatamadığı sıradan adamlardan biriydi o. Hemingway’in bu kitabını okuyunca yıllarca anlattığı Hemingway karakterlerinin ete kemiğe bürünmüş haliyle karşılıklı sigara içtiğimi, beraber gasilhaneye gittiğimi hissetttim. Bi tuhaf oldum. Bir Büyücüyle başbaşa kalmıştım sanki. Sarhoş olup saatlerce yazmak istedim. Beni kimse yazacak mıydı?

Con Hemingway si viaggia prima nella Parigi di Fiesta, poi in Africa, tra le "verdi colline", e qui tra Key West e Cuba. Hemingway, da amante della caccia e della pesca, ci mostra qui due sue passioni incarnate nella figura di Harry Morgan, un contrabbandiere che si circonda di migranti e clandestini.
I personaggi qui descritti sono tutti reietti, anime dannate, anime che lottano tra ciò che hanno e ciò che non hanno, tra "avere e non avere" aggrappandosi con disperazione alla vita, a ciò che hanno di più caro.
A differenza di altri romanzi, Hemingway non riesce a toccare il suo apice migliore, non riesce ad emozionare e il lettore precipita nell'abisso "coi vagabondi ancora addormentati lungo i muri".

!همینگوی و تهرون

هفت-هشت ماه پیش میخواستم برم تهرون. کردستان ایران که بودم توی شهر مریوان، این کتاب رو گیر آوردم تا توی راه سیزده-چهارده ساعته تهرون بخونمش.. چرا همینگوی رو انتخاب کردم؟ نمیدونم.
خلاصه تقریبا نصفشو خونم ولی نزدیک همدان حوصله‌ام سر رفت و کنارش گذاشتم. چند روز پیش بازم از نو شروع کردم و خوندمش. بنظرم خوب بود ولی خیلی خیلی نه! میگفتن همینگوی عالیه و بخاطر همین توقع بالاتری ازش داشتم. با این حال، کی میدونه شاید اون کتاب دیگرش پاریس جشن بیکران بهتر از این یکی باشه و بیشتر به دل بچپسه..
و فهیدم توی راه طولانی اصلا کتاب خوندن خوب نیست، پدر آدمو درمیاره. اگه خوابت بیاد و بگیری بخوابی، از هر چیزی بهتره ولی میترسم همچو خاله هایده‌مو میگه: انگار که خوابی کابوس میبینی! به قول عمو صادقم به درک! والا
:))))))

خیلی غم‌انگیزه اثری از نویسنده‌ای که دوستش داری، برات جذاب نباشه؛
خوب نبودن کتاب رو می‌تونم به دلایل زیادی نسبت بدم که به فرم رمان و شیوه‌ی نگارش اون برمی‌گرده و نه درون‌مایه‌ش. چون فکر می‌کنم هر مضمونی رو می‌شه به بهترین شکل نوشت اون هم برای کسی مثل همینگوی. حتا فکر کردم شاید این اثر از کارهای اولیه‌ش باشه که ویکی‌پدیا حرفم رو رد کرد.
به نظر من بخش دوم بهترین بخش کتاب بود که می‌تونست یه داستان کوتاه عالی باشه امابخش آخر چار افول شد و ورود شخصیت‌های تازه بی اون که تاثیری روی داستان اصلی بگذارند ذهن خواننده رو درگیر این مسئله می‌کنه که توی بخش آخر کتاب در حالی که چیزی به پایان کار نمونده این شخصیت‌های جدید قراره چی کار کنند! علاوه بر اون شخصیت‌پردازی و انتخاب راوی هم هوشمندانه نبود. شخصیت هری مورگان که شخصیت اصلی رمان بود بیشتر از طریق مونولوگ‌های درونی مستقیم و توی ذوق‌زننده معرفی می‌شد و راوی دانای کل هم به شکل ناخوشایندی توی ذهن همه می‌رفت. به طور کلی مونولوگ درونی وسیله‌ای برای باز کردن گره‌ها و رفع ابهام خواننده بود و سادهترین روش برای بیان مستقیم ناگفته‌های داستان.

Hemingway's tale of the later life and times of Harry Morgan, a fisherman, turned rum and people runner, living in Florida and running his boat to and from Cuba, for under the counter payments. Ernest Hemingway renders the numerous tragic scenes with an economy of words, but a lot of power, but overall I don't really get into this. 4 out of 12

I want to start out by saying that I love Ernest Hemingway. I think The Old Man and the Sea is one of the greatest books ever written, and I have not even read many of his best novels yet, like The Sun Also Rises and For Whom the Bell Tolls, so it's possible his work gets even better than what I've already experienced. That being said, I highly doubt any of his remaining fiction can get any worse than To Have and Have Not, which is a complete dumpster fire.

The novel tells the story of Harry Morgan, a fisherman who gets down on his luck and eventually starts smuggling human beings and liquor between Cuba and the Florida Keys. The main problem with To Have and Have Not, and it's an enormous one, is that the story is basically completely finished at page 150 (my edition is 219 pages, so I am referring to that length throughout this review). If Hemingway had taken the first 150 pages and glued onto them the last few pages of the book, which also deal with concluding the story from the first 150 pages, this would probably have been a 3.5 star book. The problem is that Hemingway didn't do that. The 70 or so pages between page 150 and the last few pages are filled with completely meaningless content.

I'm not even joking; it's 70 pages of random people getting drunk in bars every night, cheating on their wives, beating each other up, and then a random profiling of a bunch of different groups of people on different boats that happen to be parked at the same dock. None of it involves the main characters in the book, or the main storyline. It writes a lot like Hemingway was contracted to write a full length novel, but finding himself completely finished the story at the length of a novella added a bunch of random garbage onto the end to fulfill the length of a full novel and thus the terms of his contract.

On top of that, this is the most racist and misogynistic book I've ever read. There is even a Publisher's Note in my edition to warn the reader about this! The n-word is said in this book probably at least thirty times, there is heavy racism against people of colour, Asians, and Jewish people, many of whom are treated like animals in the story. Wives are cheated on, physically abused, and ordered around like they are sub-human servants. And as if all of that wasn't enough, the main character is also a complete a** hole, being not only a huge racist and misogynist but also a bully, bullying every person he comes into contact with over the course of the book. I don't even know what else to say. I'm so disappointed in Ernest Hemingway for this novel, for so many reasons. This is one of the ten worst books I have ever read, and might actually be in the top five.