Farewell to Arms -- Hemingway Hemingway\'s Well-Critiqued

¶ … Farewell to Arms -- Hemingway

Hemingway's well-critiqued novel, A Farewell to Arms is always a subject of intense literary examination because the structure of the novel has great lessons and examples for the reader and the critic as well. The narrative structure of Hemingway's book is almost considered a textbook example of exposition, rising action, climax, falling action and resolution / denouement. Those literary tools used by Hemingway will be presented in this paper.

A Farewell to Arms

There are many great novelists from English and American history and there are many even in contemporary society. Students that are studying literature and the tools that make good literature are often attracted to Hemingway because not only is he a worthy talent to learn from but his narrative represents different voices based on the conflict that is occurring, or on the character that is being developed. In A Farewell to Arms it is almost as though Hemingway wrote five distinctly different short stories and linked them together brilliantly to engage the reader and develop his theme.

The landscape in Italy during the war is an important part of the exposition in A Farewell to Arms; the author uses exposition to set the table for the characters and the conflict. One way to look at exposition in A Farewell to Arms that it helps prepare the reader for what is to come in this book. There will be conflict (not just because it is about the Spanish Civil War, but because it is a novel and conflict is always a part of good literature). The reader comes into contact with Frederick and he immediately is a sympathetic figure because of the way Hemingway presents the exposition into the novel.

Frederick is in a war, he's a soldier, so he has his job and he can't be too distracted from his responsibilities lest he get killed or cause another solider to be harmed in some way. But the war is just one of his issues; he also loves Catherine, and in wartime romance can be even more emotional than in peacetime. So Frederick is kind of being nudged in two directions -- romance and the killing and bloodshed of a war. When Frederick gets hurt that opens up the literary exposition Hemingway is master at -- and now his nurse during his rehabilitation and healing will be Catherine, a person that has recently been mourning the loss of her finance. Hemingway's exposition has created ample interest and tension going into the main characters and theme.

The rising action in Hemingway's novel becomes quite apparent in Chapters twenty-eight and twenty-nine; the harsh, brutal realities of war are presented in these chapters. It would be fair to term these chapters as the heart of the book. As was mentioned earlier, Hemingway has basically written five short stories; the characters that are later in love, Frederick and his nurse and sweetheart Catherine are not presented in these chapters of rising action. What the reader does encounter is a rising action that relates to morality, as two tough, hard-nosed engineer characters and two apparent Italian virgins are the main focus. The idea that a reader gets from this part of the novel is that there is always evil and good in any setting but especially in a wartime setting there will be a focus on good vs. evil, and vice versa.

This isn't the only scene that depicts a sense of rising action; as Frederick becomes fascinated with Catherine, and makes a strong play for her, knowing how life could be greatly improved with her -- that is another rising action. Again the reader can experience rising action when Catherine expects a baby and her lover has to go back to the battlefield. This is dramatic material; readers can identify with Frederick, his desires, his challenges, and his stresses. The rising action for Frederick reached a climax when he is wounded, which of course brings him into contact with Catherine.

There is obvious evidence of falling action when Frederick decides to desert the war; the reader has certain expectations of the potential of Frederick being shot for desertion, but that fear is relieved when the two lovers are safe in Switzerland. It is interesting that there is falling rain around the time of Catherine's death, and earlier in the novel there was falling snow. Hemingway has the skill to use metaphors brilliantly. When Frederick and Catherine have a wonderful time together in Stresa, the little Italian town, the falling action technique fits perfectly with the couple's need to have some quality time, private time. Earlier, in rising action, Frederick was called back to the front lines; but now, he's away from all that, and the action is climatically falling.

The climax in Hemingway's story happens during the Caporetto retreat portion of the novel. Certainly this is the turning point -- the climax -- of the novel. He is conflicted and confused -- should he go for love or be loyal and go back to his duty as a soldier? When Frederick shoots the Italian sergeant -- the sergeant had deserted his unit -- and then Frederick becomes a deserter himself, this is truly climactic. The resolution / denouement is tragic but it is necessarily for Hemingway to bring the story to some kind of emotionally charged conclusion.

In conclusion, the couple does make it to Switzerland but when Catherine dies along with her stillborn child, that is an extremely sad resolution to the novel. Is this the karma that Frederick has created for himself after killing a man for desertion then deserting him? It's up to the reader to decide that of course. But Hemingway is known for bringing the cruelty and chaos of war to the reader through his novels, and in this case, war is indeed hell and all who engage in it are put in a position of potential tragedy -- there is no way around it -- because love like life, can be fleeting. One can learn a great deal about literature by reading and analyzing Hemingway.

Outline for A Farewell to Arms Paper

I: The technique of Exposition in the novel

a) the author sets the scene of the war -- in Italy