There is something truly fulfilling in Mr Hemingway's achievement in 'A Farewell to Arms'. One can't help but speculate whether another novel will follow in this remarkable manner and whether it doesn't complete both a period and a phase. The story commences with such beautiful mannerisms, a subtle way to embark on a book where the center stage is that of war. The love-making between the young American hero, Henry, a volunteer in the Italian Ambulance Service, and Catherine Barkley, an English nurse in the British hospital at Goritzia, is a central theme. At first, Henry is just amusing himself, but the affair soon blossoms into real passion.

Henry, who has delightful and fresh relations with the Italian officers in his mess, is wounded with a smashed knee in a night assault near Plava. He is then sent from the field hospital to the American hospital at Milan, where he is the first case. Here, Miss Barkley gets a transfer to nurse him. All the descriptions of life at the front and in the hospitals, the talk of the officers, privates, and doctors, are crisply natural and create a convincing narrative. Catherine, who might be a younger sister of the heroine of Fiesta, is most skillfully modeled as the eternal soul in nursing dress.

During the moments spent in the Milan hospital, where love laughs at matrons and maids, the author tightens his hold over us and spells out that even with our worst fears, the compassion of others can sometimes be enough to give hope in the darkest of days. The story appears to deepen in force when Henry, patched up, returns to the Isonzo front. The year has been a serious one for the Italian army, and the breakthrough of the Germans at Caporetto brings disaster. The last 50 pages of book three describe the Italian army in retreat, the block of transport on the main roads, the bogging and abandonment of Henry's cars on a side road, the Italian privates' behavior and their hatred of the war, and finally the shooting of the elderly officers in retreat by the Italian battle police at the Tagliamento - these pages are masterly and devastating.

The American hero escapes death by diving into the river and later avoids arrest by concealing himself in a gun truck till it reaches Milan. Then, in mufti, he gets to Stiesa and meets Catherine, and the lovers escape to Switzerland by a long night row up the lake. The scenes on the Italian plains hold more atmospheric truth than those of the mountain roads, but all are admirably wrought. The impartiality of the presentation of war is as remarkable as the sincerity of the record of love passion. With remorseless artistic instinct, Mr Hemingway proceeds to match the horrors of human slaughter with his final chapter of Catherine's agony and death as, "a maternity case". Here he rises to his highest pitch, for Catherine's blotting-out is but complementary to the massacre of the millions on the fronts. Henry's coolness of observation in its detailed actuality is perhaps too stressed in the last pages, but the author's method prevails and triumphs in the last line. Hemingway's masterpiece touches in so many ways.

A Farewell to Arms somehow gives you a hint that Hemingway's end might well involve a shotgun.

It's truly that sorrowful. From beginning to end, this is one of the more melancholy novels I've come across. It's about Henry, an ambulance driver in World War I. He gets wounded and falls in love with Catherine, a nurse. They engage in strange banter. They fall deeply in love during a summer in Milan (and really, who could resist?). He gets Catherine pregnant and then goes back to the front. Sadly for him, he's fighting with the Italians, and as the Italians are known to do, he soon finds himself in a full retreat. (I'm not sure why the French get such a bad reputation; the Italians haven't won a war since sacking Carthage). Henry is captured by military police and is in danger of being executed, but he manages to escape. He reunites with Catherine and, inexplicably, ends up living with her in Switzerland. For a while, things are idyllic. The lazy, relaxed life is reminiscent of The Sun Also Rises.

Then, of course, life intervenes.

The end is tragic and heartbreaking. The writing is brilliant, as seen in Hemingway's famous line about how the world breaks us all:

We were never lonely and never afraid when we were together. I know that the night is not the same as the day: that all things are different, that the things of the night cannot be explained in the day, because they do not then exist, and the night can be a dreadful time for lonely people once their loneliness has started. But with Catherine there was almost no difference in the night except that it was an even better time. 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. If you are none of these you can be sure it will kill you too but there will be no special hurry.

There's no cynicism here, just bitterness. It's classic Hemingway. The sparseness and terseness interspersed with long, emotion-laden sentences. I place this novel in the middle of For Whom the Bell Tolls, which has a bad ending but is full of passion and love, and The Sun Also Rises, which is like an early 20th century The Real World.

If you are looking for a book where the author makes fun of you in 400 pages and then after you finish the book, you sit down and get angry, you have chosen a good book!

The idea of the story may only lead to the pain of becoming a screenplay, and the love plot of the story and even the war plot are very watery and lackluster.

So don't waste your time, watch the movie and don't go for this story.

:|

“A Farewell to Arms” is an absolute masterpiece about love and war, penned by Hemingway at the zenith of his powers. The story follows Henry, an American ambulance driver in WWI, stationed at the Italian front between Milan and Venice. He falls deeply in love with Catherine, an English nurse, and then heads off to the front. While sharing cheese and pasta with his comrades in a trench, he narrowly escapes death when an Austrian trench bomb explodes. Catherine nurses him back to health, but she becomes pregnant just as he is sent back to the front. As the Italians begin to retreat after part of the front collapses, Henry gets separated from his driver, nearly gets executed as a deserter, and has to flee down the frozen river, holding on to a branch for dear life. He eventually manages to hop a train to Milan, reunites with Catherine, and flees military arrest by crossing into Switzerland with her. The story unfolds at a breakneck pace, making the pages seem to fly by.

Hemingway’s terse style and his realistic staccato dialogues truly bring the story to life and draw the reader in. I was particularly enamored with the fishing stories, the descriptions of his mountain stay in Switzerland, and his drunken conversations with friends like Rinaldi and the priest. It is an unforgettable book that lays bare the brutality of war and juxtaposes it with the complexities of relationships and the challenges of becoming a father (or not).

Don't miss my review of the Meyer biography of Hemingway: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

Ernest Hemingway's A Farewell to Arms is a remarkable work that showcases his experimental prose.

He strips away the excess of language, focusing on repetition, diction, and rhythm to evoke the physical quality of the object or experience.

The novel delves into the themes of war, love, and death, presenting a monochromatic yet powerful look at these essential aspects of life.

The story follows Lt. Frederic Henry, an American wounded in WWI, and his love affair with Catherine Barkley, a nurse.

While their love is central, Hemingway also provides detailed and vivid descriptions of the horrors of war.

The battle scenes are rich in detail, as Hemingway aimed to frame his story with exacting particulars based on his own experiences.

Lt. Henry's disillusionment with the war is palpable, as he rails against the empty words of glory and sacrifice.

Ultimately, he manages to escape the war and reunite with Catherine, but their story takes an unexpected turn.

Hemingway's view of death is also a significant part of the novel, with the world seemingly stacked against all mortals.

The ending, which was the result of 39 attempts, is both quintessential Hemingway and a parody of his prose.

Written almost a century ago, A Farewell to Arms still holds up today, despite some valid criticisms of Hemingway and his writing.

The language may seem simple, but it is deceptively so, with the tempo playing an important role in telling the story.

Overall, it is a novel that invites readers to suspend disbelief and immerse themselves in the lives of its characters.

It's wonderful and charming! The last third of the book was such that I couldn't put it down! I'm in love with the style of these short sentences like this, and also its sweet jokes that are in the dialogues of the characters. My last word: I liked this more than "The Old Man and the Sea" :)

This book truly has a unique allure. The way the story unfolds, especially in that final third, keeps you on the edge of your seat. The short sentences give it a brisk pace, making it easy to read and yet highly engaging. The sweet jokes add a touch of lightness and humor to the conversations between the characters, making them come alive even more. It's a delight to immerse oneself in this world created by the author. Compared to "The Old Man and the Sea", this book has its own special charm that makes it even more likable in my eyes. I can't wait to share this wonderful reading experience with others.

Hamid Mohammadi's "Farewell with a Gun" is the second book of his that I have read. The first one was "The Old Man and the Sea" when I was 14, and I was so amazed by his descriptions that to this day, I'm scared of what I might face when I say goodbye with a gun. The only reason it didn't get 5 stars from me was its short length. I think it should have delved deeper into the events rather than just skimming over them in a short time. But I'm not sure about this either.

I borrowed this book from the university library. It's bound and its cover is green for the year 1954, with the stamps of "National University" and "Messy binding".

The first poem in the book is for the distant years when I was a student and wrote with a pen. The back of the book is pasted with those cards that are used to record the borrowing and returning of books. I wish it was like this and everyone who reads it could see. Inside the book, there are different readers' marks. One person seems to have the intention of editing the text and changes commas to periods. Numbers are written beside the lines and their comments are added. Another dear person has underlined a sentence in the last chapter about the weather and the change from winter to spring in blue ink and marked it with the date 81/12/1. Some of my friends who are also book lovers are very sensitive to this, but I really liked it. My own books are also like this, but I don't dare to do it to the library books. The reason for this is not clear to me either.

In short, these are the visual conditions of the book. But the words inside, with their old print, are very charming. If you're afraid of the bitterness of war, don't be, because you won't be too sad when you read about it. You will experience the multilayered nature of Mohammadi's prose that they talk about.

You will read more about love, and just like the first character and the narrator of the novel don't want to talk about the war, they won't. In my opinion, this is a very, very, very realistic book, both about war and love, and the expectations that make these two similar. Expectations of leave, expectations of seeing a cat, expectations of an attack, expectations of ambush, expectations of a chance to escape, expectations of escape, expectations of a child, and expectations of a cat...

The poetic form, in my opinion, didn't have much, and I read a few of the endings of the forty-six chapters, and if I'm not mistaken, this is a real and literary ending; it had no fluff.

One of the chapters in the book describes a way of death, and in one of the possible endings of that description, it was used in a smart way, but it wasn't chosen because it wasn't supposed to just say its meaning with words and have an ending that could be separated and maybe come across on virtual pages today. The ending dedicated to "literary" and dedicated to the reader of "Farewell with a Gun" was very clear, correct, and beautiful.

Just like the sentence that the dear person who wrote the beginning of the book also wrote a beautiful sentence at the end, "It remains" for the person who reads this unique green-covered book.

Some parts of the book's text:

"Always, the word is not very beautiful."

"×We are really both one and we should not create misunderstandings especially."

"_+We don't."

"×But people do, they love each other and especially create misunderstandings and suddenly they see that they are no longer one."

"A person has many friends and acquaintances during the war."

"I didn't say anything. I always used the words sacred, proud, sacrifice, and the expression 'useless'. We had heard these words: sometimes under the rain, we had almost stood outside the trench talking; in such a way that we could only hear the words that were shouted. And we had read these words: in the announcements that were pasted on other announcements. And now some time had passed and I hadn't seen anything sacred, and the things that were proud had no pride, and the sacrifices were like the cattle and sheep in the Chicago slaughterhouse if they didn't do anything with the pieces of meat except bury them. There were many words that a person no longer had the strength to hear, and finally, only the names of places had eyebrows... Mere words, like pride, honor, courage, or sacred, empty beside the names of villages, road numbers, unit numbers, and dates, looked naked."

"I don't know what I expected to see, but I didn't see anything but the slaughterhouses and the leafless trees and the rain that was falling. I drank wine, but it didn't make me happy. They had preserved it too much and it had decomposed and lost its quality and color. I went out and it got dark; a very dark darkness came. With that black night rain in front. When it got dark, it was no longer useful to go out, so I went towards the piano. It was asleep and I didn't wake it up, but sat beside it for a while. The man was thin and had a heavy sleep."

After a while, I woke him up and we set off. That night was a very strange night. I don't know what I was waiting for, maybe death by shooting in the dark, and escape; but nothing happened. When a German convoy passed, we lay down behind the ditch beside the long road and waited. Then when they had gone, we crossed the road and continued our way north. Twice we got close to the Germans under the rain, but they didn't see us. Without seeing any Italians, we left the city and went north. At that time, we reached the main roads of ambush and walked all night towards Taliaamento. We had realized how huge the ambush was. The whole land was also moving with the army. We walked all night; we advanced in the conditions of transportation. My feet hurt and I was tired, but we were going well and fast. The action of Bo Nello, who had chosen to be captured, seemed stupid. There was no danger. We had passed safely between the two infantry armies. If Aimé hadn't been killed, it would never have seemed dangerous. When we were clearly walking along the railway line, no one had bothered us. Sudden and unexplained death came. I don't know where Bo Nello is.

Damn. That ending. Even while still dusting off the cover (it's been lying around for ages), I already knew its finale. It's simply been impossible to ignore. It even cropped up in three or four films I have seen over the years.

Knowing it is one thing, but actually reading it is quite another. So, the big question is - did this in any way tarnish the novel for me? In a word, No. As once I truly got stuck into Hemingway's compulsive narrative, all was forgotten. His presentation of war was just as remarkable as his sincerity in presenting us with love.

Both leading characters were simply two of the 20th century's most memorable - the all-American hero Henry, a volunteer in the Italian Ambulance Service, and the sweet-natured English nurse Catherine Barkley who adds a subtle feminine charm throughout the novel.

All the descriptions of life on the WW1 front and in the hospitals, the talk of the officers, privates, and doctors, are crisp, clear, and so natural, making for a convincing narrative the whole way through. Even though Henry perhaps felt a little too mature and experienced for a young man, Catherine I saw as the more credible character. She was most skilfully modelled as the eternal feminine in nursing dress. Difficult to work out at first, but oh God how I fell in love with her.

It comes as no surprise to me that it was a book I found easy to read, like other Hemingway books. It was made even easier after the head-scratching and exasperation at the hands of Faulkner's The Sound and the Fury prior to this.

Hemingway dramatically intensifies the narrative after the halfway point, and the story deepens on an emotional level as Henry, patched up from a war wound, returns to the Isonzo front. The year has been a serious one for the Italian army, and a breakthrough for the Germans at Caporetto spells disaster.

The Caporetto retreat, which forms the background for an entire portion of the book and furnishes the action, is simply a masterly piece of descriptive narration. After escaping death by diving into a river and later arrest by concealing himself in a gun truck till it reaches Milan, the novel really does showcase two people very much in love. It reminded me of the deep love shown in Pasternak's Doctor Zhivago. I can't think of too many other novels I have read where I have felt a love so great and pure.

Some of the scenes held such an atmospheric truth, whether in love or war, that it's easy to see why it's probably Hemingway's most read novel, even though it might not be his best.

The story of Henry and Catherine could have been overly polished with sentimentality (one of my pet hates), and probably would have been had Hemingway been around in the Victorian era. Thankfully, there is only as much as a slight echo. This no doubt deserves to be branded as a classic, and it didn't let me down. A Farewell to Arms was simply a most moving and beautiful thing. The reason for not dishing out the five stars is that I still preferred The Sun Also Rises and A Moveable Feast. But that's just me.

Unknowingly, I have delved into so many classics. At the very beginning, when I first read them, I didn't even classify them as such.
After a decade, I reread this book. I still vividly remember the characters. The way Frederic and Catherine discovered love within a short period, the way they met and exchanged sweet nothings, it all captured my heart. It was so innocent, sweet, and seemingly meant to be.
At the start, I was really angry with Frederick and felt sorry for Catherine for falling for such a guy.
Oh my goodness! It turned out to be one of the most enduring love stories ever. I blushed, smiled widely, and yes, I also cried and sobbed.
I can never forget the scenes where Catherine was pleading for morphine. Sometimes her pain was so intense that I felt it too, becoming breathless when she struggled for breath.
Their lives were becoming so beautiful and sunny, but the ending had to be tragic.
I wasn't prepared for the ending. I thought they had endured and suffered enough. Well, a part of me died when the ending came too abruptly.
Towards the last few pages, I started hating Frederick again as he seemed a bit too self-absorbed and uncompassionate at times, as if he didn't care enough.
Nevertheless, in the end, I couldn't truly hate him.
I really wished he could have felt something regarding the unborn child.
It ended so sadly and tore me apart.
Ernest's simple writing style truly charmed me.
I'm definitely going to reread this book again, and this time I'll try to focus more on other aspects aside from the main characters and their personal relationship.
I'm really looking forward to it

Wow, I finally finished the story!!!

A peaceful romance in the heart of war...

This short sentence seems to hint at a complex and emotional tale. It makes one wonder about the nature of this romance that blossoms in the midst of the chaos and destruction of war. How did the two lovers meet? What challenges did they face? And what was the outcome of their relationship?

Perhaps the story will explore the power of love to overcome even the most difficult circumstances. It could show how, in the face of danger and uncertainty, the characters find solace and hope in each other's arms. Or maybe it will be a tragic story, highlighting the futility of love in a world torn apart by conflict.

Whatever the case may be, this brief description has piqued my curiosity and left me eager to read more.

The literary detective Michael Moor connected the suicide of the American writer Ernest Hemingway with the murder of Agnes von Kurowsky, or Aggie as our writer calls her, who was his love and muse in his beautiful novel "A Farewell to Arms".

When Hemingway volunteered in the war, he miraculously escaped death after a bomb fell beside the ambulance he was driving. He then spent a period of treatment in a Milanese hospital under the care of his nurse Aggie. Their feelings developed, and they understood each other until Aggie was transferred to a Florence hospital. After a period of exchanging letters, Aggie suddenly stopped writing to Hemingway during the time when his wounds healed and he had to return to America. He searched in vain to find her and returned empty-handed, filled with emotions and memories of this period of his life.

When "A Farewell to Arms" was published, Aggie finally wrote to Hemingway, praising his novel and scolding him for revealing some personal details. She said in her letter: "I am not the good girl you think I am. Everyone has their flaws. I didn't want you to see my true face if you married me. For sure, you would have known everything and would have hated me, and that's something I couldn't imagine. Do you think I could stand you hating me? Death is easier for me than that."

Hemingway replied to his lost love through the end of the letter. He went to Naples to find that she had married an Italian duke. The duke received him in their home with great respect for Hemingway's shining literary name. During a wonderful party where Hemingway was present with Aggie in the dance hall and the duke and his friends in the garden, suddenly a gunshot was heard and Hemingway was seen shouting: "She's dead! Why!"

Aggie was found with a bullet in her head that took her life, but the shooter was never found. Strangely, the police investigation was stopped because of the influence of the duke, Count Crastellu.

After Hemingway's suicide, a reader found a sheet of paper in the public library with Hemingway's handwriting dated the day before his suicide. It was written: "I can't take it anymore. She haunts me day and night. In her beautiful eyes, there is a look of revenge and scorn. She wasn't afraid of me. How low I was! But I didn't mean it, Aggie."

Moor speculates that Hemingway's wife or servant hid the paper in one of the books at the moment of its discovery. With Hemingway's suicide and Aggie's death, the little one took them both with him to the grave. All that remains for us as readers is to enjoy Hemingway's memories of love and his philosophy of life, and his novel inspired by a living and eternal love story.

British ambulance drivers were sometimes killed. However, I firmly believed that I would not meet such a fate. Not in this war. It simply had nothing to do with me. In my eyes, it seemed no more perilous than the wars depicted in the movies. Oh, how I wished to God that it would all be over soon.

Frederic Henry, who is essentially Ernest Hemingway himself, is a volunteer in the Italian Army during World War I. He gets wounded in battle and has to spend time recovering in a hospital after his leg is operated on. While there, he falls in love with British nurse Catherine Barkley. The novel chronicles their attempts to flee the war and commence a life together. On the surface, this isn't truly a book about war; rather, it's a story about two individuals striving to lead a normal, happy life while the entire world descends into chaos around them.

I had a rather lukewarm attitude towards this one. For Whom the Bell Tolls is far superior. Firstly, it delves into something much larger than just two people attempting to get married. Robert Jordan grapples with the concept of heroism and how war transforms people, whereas Frederick Henry merely desires to have sex. Additionally, the characters in A Farewell to Arms are significantly less complex and interesting compared to those in For Whom the Bell Tolls. Moreover, Catherine Barkley is an absolute nightmare of a character. She has no distinguishable personality and exists solely to satisfy and worship Henry, to the extent that she makes Bella Swan seem like an independent, strong woman brimming with self-esteem. Think I'm exaggerating? Well, here are some lines of actual dialogue that Catherine utters to Henry: "I'll say just what you wish and I'll do what you wish and then you will never want any other girls, will you?" "I want what you want. There isn't any more. Just what you want." "I'm good. Aren't I good?" "You see? I'm good. I do what you want."

Good grief. And that all occurs within a single scene, by the way. Catherine isn't a real person; she's a terrifying Frankenstein's monster cobbled together from desperation and male wish fulfillment. To Hemingway's credit, Henry truly does love Catherine, so at least we can find solace in the fact that her senseless devotion was reciprocated to some extent (although Henry never expresses his feelings with the same intensity as Catherine does, because that would be considered unmanly).

The reason this receives three stars instead of two is because Hemingway is still Hemingway. Amidst all the poor characterization and sluggish pace, he manages to craft these small snippets of beautiful writing that make everything seem okay, at least for a brief moment:

"Often a man wishes to be alone and a girl wishes to be alone too and if they love each other they are jealous of that in each other, but I can truly say we never felt that. We could feel alone when we were together, alone against the others. It has only happened to me like that once. I have been alone while I was with many girls and that is the way you can be most lonely. But we were never lonely and never afraid when we were together. I know that night is not the same as the day: that all things different, that the things of the night cannot be explained in the day, because they do not then exist, and the night can be a dreadful time for lonely people once their loneliness has started. But with Catherine there was almost no difference in the night except that it was an even better time."