Muitos diálogos que permitem uma leitura fluida (detesto esta palavra) e tão desinteressantes que se podem ler em diagonal sem prejuízo da compreensão do enredo;
Uma história de amor trágica — coisa que aprecio bastante mas que me emocionou tanto como andar vestida de amarelo e riscas verdes;
Uma personagem feminina submissa a raiar a imbecilidade;
Uma personagem masculina cujos sofrimentos me sensibilizaram menos do que os da mosca que o meu gato está a perseguir neste preciso momento.


_____________
Prémio Nobel da Literatura 1954
Ernest Hemingway nasceu nos Estados Unidos da América (Illinois) em 21 de julho de 1899 e morreu nos Estados Unidos da América (Idaho) em 2 de julho de 1961.

This one is pretty classic in nature. The novel set mainly in Wharton Itlay of 1917-18, the story focuses on Frederic Henry, an American ambulance driver for the Italian army. He met a young English nurse, Catherine Barkley, at a military hospital and they begin a relationship which gradually becomes passionate.
The story of the romance is set alongside a powerful portrayal of the horrors of war and its threat of the total destruction of civilization.

I'm not a Hemingway guy. I yearn for internal dialogue, various and ladened spiritual questioning, and deep psychology in my characters. I prefer writing that is smooth and philosophical. Hemingway gives me little of this.

But the settings of this book were beautiful, and the dialogue between characters, poignant. By the end, I found that Hemingway had craftily fucked with me to the point of my complete immersion into the novel.

It made me cry.

ارنست همینگوی پس از اینکه کتاب وداع با اسلحه را در نسخه‌ی اولیه به پایان رسانید، طی نامه‌ای به ناشر خود، مکس پرکینز، چنین گفت: دوست دارم دو سه ماهی آن را کنار بگذارم و دوباره آن را بازنویسی کنم. بازنویسی آن بیش از شش یا دو ماه طول نخواهد کشید. اما خیلی برای من مهم است که پیش از بازنویسی، آن را برای مدتی کنار بگذارم و کاری به آن نداشته باشم.
سپس در ادامه گفت: می‌خواهم مطمئن شوم که آن را به اندازه‌ی کافی کنار گذاشته‌ام تا بتوانم به نکاتی برسم که موقع نوشتن فراموش کرده‌ام به خواننده منتقل سازم.

Once, there was a time when I would have struggled through this one, convinced that since it was a "classic", there must be some redeeming quality to it. I'd have struggled to the bitter end, hating it more and more, and I'd have been disappointed by it even if there was something worthwhile at the end. Because getting there was tedious, boring, painful, and annoying.

This book has a lot of very varied reviews and opinions. Lots of people loved it, lots of people hated it. I can see why. It's a book that some people will definitely like. Masculinity, heavy drinking, etc will naturally appeal to some more than others. The love story aspect will appeal to some that aren't so much into the other stuff, and the war stuff will do for still more, maybe. Usually, the war and the masculinity and stuff would be my thing - but this just didn't do anything for me.

I think that this was due to the writing, and the reading. I didn't like the reader at all. He had a kind of clipped reading style, and since the writing was full of short sentences, it made it hard for me to settle into the reading and listen. A good reader needs a quality that draws a listener in - but this one did just the opposite. I struggled on through about 3 discs and I just could not stand the reader enough to get into the story. And the story wasn't doing much to help. Staccato sentences, back and forth. Lots of pointless dialogue that, I suppose, in the end would have painted a full picture and come together, but I just found myself not caring at all.

And this featured my very least favorite writing trick ever: using dialogue to replace explaining action...
"Here drink this. No all of it. It will do you good!"
"I don't want it. Put it on the table."
"Here - you drink it all up! There's a good boy. You'll see. It'll do you good like I say. No, sit down. Listen to me now."
"Answer the door, I think it's unimportant person number 4 coming to tell us something unimportant. What's he saying?"
"Go sit back down, I'll tell you everything in a minute. Here, drink more of this. Good."

The romance aspects, what little I saw, were just as abrasive and annoying.
"Oh, I love you! Do you love me? Say you love me."
"Yes I love you."
"Oh, you're just saying that! It's the war. You don't mean it."
"Yes, I do."
"No, you don't"
"Yes, really."
"Ok, sure. Because I love you, but you don't have to lie to me."

BLAH! Shut up. Who cares?! I just struggled along, in this three-against-one uphill battle... And they won. I raised my white flag and gave up. No mas, por favor.

An American studying architecture in Rome, Frederick Henry, is transformed into a Lt. in the Italian Army, when World War I starts. He volunteers even though America doesn't enter , the Great War, for another 3 years ! Why? He probably can't say, himself , but young men want excitement in their dull lives. He joins the ambulance corps on the northern front , in charge of four drivers , and a few motorcars, picking up the badly wounded soldiers, when feasible, the dead are carried outside the vehicles , no need now. Austrians are the enemy, but the high snowy mountains, freezing weather , make battles difficult, to fight, swollen rivers dangerous to cross , the artillery flashing in the night, screaming mortars above , and coming down no-one knows where, except the unfortunates, but too late for them. Rinaldi a very capable surgeon in the Italian army , getting better every day, putting back together the wounded bodies, saving lives, most of the time . Is Lt. Henry's affable roommate, always joking, and best friend, in a good house, in a mostly undamaged village, near the war, for officers. A man who loves women, to a certain degree ( lust may be the correct word), he has seen his latest enchanting female, but to his deep regret, not a mutual feeling between the two. The gracious doctor tells the lieutenant about the beautiful blonde, tall British nurse, Catherine Barkley, even introduces him. It doesn't take long for a romance, she lost her fiancee in France, last year, 1916, in the trenches, at first she , then he too falls in love , not wanting or expecting it, her best friend and fellow nurse Helen Ferguson , disapproves. Lonely people amid a terrible conflict somehow require something to continue their joyless existence. Shortly after, while waiting in a ditch at the front, for the bombardment to halt, a mortar shell hits, killing one of his men and badly wounding him, in both legs.The ambulance will take the driver for a ride not in front, this time, but in the back, he the young American, feels a warm liquid dropping from the top, the blood oozing out of another soldier, will not stop, Henry can't move, just endure, until there is no more. The vehicle ceases traveling, heavy rains pouring down, the dead man put on the muddy ground, and another victim carried inside. They finally arrive at the unsanitary field hospital, safely navigating the treacherous mountain roads and bombs. Catherine becomes the Lt.'s nurse and much more. Since Milan, is not far away and an American hospital has just opened (this is 1917), a better place for treatment. Catherine gets assigned there, never a difficulty, she says mysteriously. But the recovered Mr.Henry, must go back to the front when he is healed, their happiness is over. A novel based on Hemingway's experiences in the war, he was a 19 -year -old ambulance driver, almost dying of battle wounds, and having an unhappy affair with an older nurse.

حوصله ریویو نوشتن ندارم فقط میگم خیلی خوب بود

I feel a bit torn with this one and ended up settling for 4 stars (after fluctuating between 3 - 4.5 stars as I was reading). For me, there were moments of brilliance and in several parts of the novel I felt gripped and moved. Throughout the book I really felt for the protagonist and wanted to find out what happened in the end. There are several important and compelling themes in this book and I got the sense that this book did capture the horrors and reality of war to some extent.

However, at times I found it difficult to connect with Hemingway's sparse and direct writing style. Also, some aspects (especially the portrayal of the female characters) felt slightly lacking. There was lots of repetition in dialogue and little depth to some of the secondary characters.

This was an okay reading experience, however as I was reading I couldn't help but compare this to other wartime novels that I believe are extraordinary such as The English Patient and The Narrow Road to the Deep North. I was able to become more fully immersed with these books compared to A Farewell to Arms.

A few quotes that stood out:

"I was always embarrassed by the words sacred, glorious, and sacrifice and the expression in vain. We had heard them, sometimes standing in the rain almost out of earshot, so that only the shouted words came through, and had read them, on proclamations, now for a long time, and I had seen nothing sacred, and the things that were glorious had no glory and the sacrifices were like the stockyards at Chicago if nothing was done with the meat except to bury it".

"If people bring so much courage to this world the world has to kill them to break them, so of course it kills them. The world breaks every one and afterward many are strong at the broken places. But those that will not break it kills. It kills the very good and the very gentle and the very brave impartially".

For me think was a mediocre historical fiction / romance story set to the back drop of World War. I failed to connect with any of the characters as I listened to this one on audio and it became pretty annoying with the over use of certain words and I didn't engage with any of the dialogue which seemed trivial and never ending.

A story of a young American Frederic Henry who volunteers for service with the Italian Army in World War I and falls in love with his English Nurse.


I am not a fan of "romance Stories" or tales of all consuming love and that is pretty much how I felt about this one, and it wasn't what I was looking for in War novel. It was an ok read for me but certainly not one for my favourites shelf. I just couldn't engage with the characters and I found Catherine's character so annoying and strange. The overuse of certain words and ridiculously long sentences grated on my nerves. The narrator was quite good but because there was such a repetition of certain words I felt he kept over emphasising them.

This wasn't at all what I was expecting from an Ernest Hemingway novel and I picked this one up expecting something quite different and this book just didn't deliver and perhaps I should have paid better attention to the blub of this one as it had too much love story and not enough war action for me.

My favourite fiction novels on World War one are n  nBirdsongand n  nA Long Long Way

چه رویاهایی که تبه گشت و گذشت
و چه پیوند صمیمیت ها که به آسانی یک رشته گسست.
"حمید مصدق"

این دومین کتاب از همینگ وی بزرگ است که تجربش کردم. کتاب اول پیرمرد و دریا بود و 14 ساله بودم و همان اعجاب توصیف هایش مرا گرفت تا امروز بترسم که قرار است در وداع با اسلحه با چه چیزی مواجه شم. تنها دلیل که ۵ ستاره از نگاه من نشد حجم کم کتاب بود. به نظرم باید بیشتر از این پرداخت میشد نه از نظر طول زمان روایت از پرداخت بیشتر به همان حوادث. روی همین نظرمم م��مئن نیستم شاید همین قد�� کافی بوده من کجا و همینگوی کجا‌.
این کتاب رو از کتابخانه ی دانشگاه گرفتم. صحافی شده و جلدش سبزه برای سال ۵۴ و مُهر" دانشگاه ملی" و "مخرنِ "بی نظمی خورده..‌
شعر اول متنم برای سال های دوریست که دانشجویی با مداد نوشته‌. ته کتاب از اون کارت هایی که زمان رفت و برگشت کتاب رو میزنن چسبیده. کاش همین جوری بمونه و هر کی خوند ببینه. داخل کتاب رد خواننده های مختلف هست . یکی که اصلا انگار قصد ویرایش متن رو داشته جای ویرگولا رو میکرده نقطه.کنار خط ها شماره می ذاشته و یه جاهایشو نظراشو اضافه میکرده. یک عزیزی هم با خودکار آبی زیر یک جمله ی فصلای آخر که به وضع هوا و تغییر از زمستون به بهاره، خط کشیده و به تاریخ 81/12/1 نشانه گذاشته.‌یه سری از کتاب خوان ها که دوستای خودم هم جزوشونن خیلیییی حساس هستند به این کار، ولی من خیلی بهم خوش گذشت. کتاب های خودم هم همین شکلیند ولی کتاب کتابخانه رو جرئت نمیکنم

داستان :
"وداع با اسلحه" از یک روز عادی در جنگ جهانی اول در جبهه‌ی ایتالیا شروع می‌شود و کم‌کم روزمرگی‌های افسری امریکایی به نام "فردریک هنری" را روایت می‌کند که در بخش پزشکی و آمبولانس‌ها مشغول به خدمت است.
بعدازاینکه هنری مجروح و در بیمارستان بستری می‌شود به پرستاری انگلیسی به نام "کاترین بارکلی" دل می‌بازد و پس از فرار از جنگ باهم به سوییس می‌روند تا اولین فرزندشان به دنیا بیاید.

ضعف‌های داستان:
۱.عنوان کتاب و تعاریفی که شنیده بودم این تصور رو در من ایجاد کرده بود که با رمانی ضد جنگ مواجهم، ولی جنگ بسیار کمرنگ است و حرفی برای گفتن در این زمینه ندارد.
۲. رابطه‌ی عاشقانه‌‌ی داستان بسیار کلیشه‌ای است و حالات و روحیات افراد چندان خوب وصف نشده و در بسیاری مواقع خشک و بی‌روح و تصنّعی به نظر می‌رسد.
۳. توصیفات و صحنه‌پردازی ضعیف است.
۴. داستان کند پیش می‌رود.

بخش‌هایی از کتاب:
▪️یک طبقه‌ای بر این کشورها حکومت می‌کنه که کودنه، هیچ چیزی نمی‌فهمه، هرگز هم نمی‌تونه بفهمه. به این علته که ما گرفتار این جنگیم.

▪️وقتی آدم چیزی نداشته باشه که ببازه، اداره کردن زندگی چندان سخت نیست.

▪️اگر یک وقتی شما مومن شده بودید و من مرده بودم، برای آمرزش من دعا کنید. من از چندتا از دوستانم خواهش کرده‌ام این کار را بکنند. من منتظر بودم که خودم مومن بشوم، ولی هنوز خبری نشده.

▪️دنیا همه را در هم می‌شکند، ولی پس از آن خیلی‌ها، جای شگستگی‌شان قوی‌تر می‌شود.

۰۱/۲/۱۵

Literary activism begets such gems like A Farewell To Arms. Somebody who had experienced war first-hand writes about why exactly there shouldn't be any wars in the first place. Touched by the honesty and the elegant nonchalance with which he has depicted some of the brutalities of war, the world has handed him the Nobel Prize for Literature and forgotten all about the message that the writer had intended to convey. And that is why wars still keep breaking out and will continue to do so.
One of the most poignantly written specimens of fiction to have emerged in the first half of the 20th century, A Farewell To Arms recounts the story of two individuals trying to escape from a world, driven mad by the bloodlust of war. One is the young American ambulance driver named Frederic Henry and the other is the beautiful English nurse Catherine Barkley, who meet in Italy against a landscape of bloodshed and mayhem. In each other's arms, they find a sort of a safe haven and a tiny little ray of hope of surviving the war and having a future together.
Henry's romance with Catherine is interwoven with his experiences at the war-front and coupled together they make for one of the most emotionally riveting reads ever.
At the end of the book, I was tempted to think that Frederic and Catherine's romance was perhaps, too, an allegory of war.  The bitter tragedy of Catherine's death along with the birth of her stillborn child coinciding with the end of World War I was perhaps, the author's way of saying that even if war ends it does so after causing unimaginable devastation.
If I'm to point out the fallacies of the book or the seemingly weaker points, then I must say I have a bone to pick with the dialogue. Lines such as 'You're such a sweet girl.' or 'You're so sweet' or Rinaldi's constant references to Henry as 'baby' are a dime a dozen. But then again this must have been the common way of speaking a hundred years back. So it's not really a shortcoming, in the literal sense.
In the end, I would like to remember A Farewell To Arms as an eternally true and enduring tale of human misery that is bound to move readers to tears for generations to come.