Symbolism in \"Hills Like White

Symbolism in "Hills Like White Elephants"

sources at bottom of document

Symbolism allows authors to say things without actually saying them with the written word. Images are used in such a way that readers have to work a little bit to connect the dots, which makes the impact of the story much more powerful. In the short story, "Hills Like White Elephants," Ernest Hemingway demonstrates how to use symbolism and imagery in a story to the best advantage. In this tale, the less Hemingway says, the better. While this couple seems to be carrying on a normal conversation in a train station, the symbols in the story represent chaos, change, and tension. We learn very little from the couple's conversation but if we read the story with all of its rich symbolism, we have a story worth telling and one definitely worth reading. Symbolism in "Hills Like White Elephants," gives us the additional details about the couple and it completse this story in a way that words would only complicate.

Hills generally represent something positive in nature; in this tale, they tell a different story. These hills are white and by using the image of them being shaped like elephants, Hemingway provides the story with the symbol of a womb, soft looking and pale, growing beneath the seemingly calm surface. The white hill also looks like a full-term pregnancy, round and full of life. The term "white elephant" refers to an unusually a large, useless object that is tedious to own and difficult to maintain. Nobody wants a white elephant just as Jig's boyfriend does not want the inconvenience of this baby. The hills also symbolize difficulty in the future; when Jig looks at them, she sees the mountain of parenthood and all of its responsibilities looming before her. The hills before Jig also represent the long climb that stretches out before Jig. Either decision will be like climbing a mountain for her. She will ultimately make it alone and she will carry it with her for the rest of her life. White elephants, in the real world, are rare and they are often treated better than typical elephants because of their looks. They are lovely but difficult and expensive to maintain. Weeks writes that the story's "white elephant child" (Weeks) is like the white elephant in that it is "paradoxical in its nature" (Weeks). Rare and valuable on the one hand and burdensome and on the other. Jig's white elephant is a cute little baby that will complicate her life in ways that she cannot even begin to imagine, sitting at a train station sipping a beer. The distant hills taunt Jig because her choice and her future are not too far away. The hills block what is on the other side of them just as Jig does not know what is on the other side of her decision. She can guess that keeping the baby will mean losing her boyfriend, eventually. He wants to keep the carefree life they have always had but that option is not hers because even if she aborts the baby, she will not be carefree. He can easily look away from her and forget the abortion; she will always look in the mirror and be reminded.

The setting of "Hills Like White Elephants" is significant and symbolic. While the couple appears to be sitting at a station waiting for a train, they are situated between two very different worlds. The station at Zaragoza is a symbol of truth in that the couple is at a crossroads in their relationship and what they decide at this moment will change their lives forever. Maynard writes the description of the train station, which is positioned between two railway lines, "subtly introduces the leitmotif of 'two,' to be reiterated in the story, but in this single instance 'two' appears in an image of division or separation and suggests the actual state of the lovers" (Maynard). The two must decide how they will remain, two or three. Ultimately, this decision will probably also come down to whether or not the couple will be two or one. Maynard even suggests that the symbols of the river, hills, and fields are "oneness" (Maynard) symbols that are direct opposites of the life the couple is experience presently. The fullness of life, the ability to enjoy simply being alive is hampered by this thing that will not go away. Wyche agrees with this notion, adding that the station's position "between two sets of rails, whose significance lies 'in their figurative implications' (Renner qtd in Wyche 34), and between two contrasting landscapes that symbolize the couple's options" (Wyche). One side of the tracks, the landscape gives the couple the scene of the hills and the valley and on the other side of the tracks trees and grain flourish on the banks of the river. This scene "illustrates Jig's choice 'between sterility and fertility'" (O'Brien qtd. In Wyche 19). Johnston writes that the description of the Ebro valley "embodies the poles of the conflict too: It is both barren and fruitful. On the side which they sit facing, there are no trees and no shade, and in the distance the country is brown and dry; on the other side of the valley, there are 'fields of grain and trees along the banks of the Ebro.'" (Johnston). The couple cannot stay at the station forever just as things will not stay the same for them. They are waiting on a train but they are also waiting on Jig's decision. When Jig looks to the hills, she does not see him there with her. It is a desolate world for her no matter which way she goes because something will be lost either way.

Other symbols add flavor to the story. The railroad tracks represent the pair's individual courses in life. Their lives are like two parallel lines that will never met. This is something Jig knows and it is something her boyfriend refuses to consider. This is how things will always be with him, especially if he does not agree with her. The baggage in the story represents the couple's past. This could also point to Jig's boyfriend's future but it cannot be hers nor will the future be anything the two of them share, regardless of what they do. The baby is a burden; like baggage it must be picked up, carried and remembered. Kenneth Johnston also remarks that the couple's lifestyle is represented by their baggage. Their bags have labels on them from different cities and the station "sits between two lines of rails to suggest the two directions in which the couple may go -- toward Madrid and the abortion or away from Madrid toward a settled, family life" (Johnston). The family is the choice Jig would enjoy. We see that she wants to make things "nice again" (Hemingway 1391), but there is no way this can happen now. He wants to erase everything and his lie that an abortion is "not really an operation at all" (1391), "really not anything. it's just to let the air in" (1391), "it's all perfectly natural" (1391) are all said to motivate her to kill the baby and let him live. He tries to play the situation down to something without any moral or emotional implications. Jig suspects it is not this easy and is correct to question him but she may not be strong enough to walk away from him.