Power and Gender in Hemingway's Hills Like White Elephants
This paper examines the power dynamics between Jig and the unnamed man in Ernest Hemingway's short story "Hills Like White Elephants," drawing on Paul Rankin's critical analysis published in The Explicator. The essay argues that Jig, despite appearing passive, holds greater psychological and experiential power than the man throughout the story. It traces how the man's insecurity manifests in his attempts to pressure Jig into an abortion, how Jig's wider worldly experience undermines the man's sense of authority, and how her growing resolve ultimately leads to her rejection of his framing. The paper also challenges Rankin's interpretation of the "white elephants" symbol, offering an alternative reading tied to Jig's pregnancy and emerging sense of selfhood.
- Introduction: Jig's Concealed Strength: Rankin's focus on Jig's dialogue and power
- The Man's Inadequacy and Jig's Experience: Man's inferiority and Jig's broader worldly experience
- Jig's Vacillation and Final Resolve: Jig's shifting emotions and rejection of the man's pressure
- Disagreement on the White Elephants Symbol: Alternative reading of hills as pregnancy symbol
- Conclusion: Affirming Jig's ultimate strength and resolve
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What makes this paper effective
- The paper engages directly and critically with a secondary source (Rankin), clearly distinguishing between points of agreement and disagreement rather than simply summarizing.
- It grounds its claims in specific textual evidence, quoting dialogue from Hemingway to support each interpretive point.
- The alternative reading of the "white elephants" symbol is argued with personal conviction, showing independent critical thinking rather than deference to the scholarly source.
Key academic technique demonstrated
The paper demonstrates source engagement as critical dialogue. Rather than treating Rankin's article as authoritative, the author positions it as a point of comparison, consistently measuring Rankin's conclusions against their own close reading of the text. This move — agreeing on some points, qualifying others, and explicitly rejecting one — models how undergraduate literary analysis can use secondary sources without being subservient to them.
Structure breakdown
The essay opens by framing Rankin's overall approach and the author's general alignment with it. It then moves through Rankin's three major argumentative points in sequence, evaluating each in turn. The final section isolates the one major point of disagreement — the symbolism of the white hills — before a brief conclusion affirming the paper's central claim about Jig's power. The structure is linear and logically cumulative.
Introduction: Jig's Concealed Strength
The male figure in "Hills Like White Elephants" is inferior to Jig, the female counterpart within the story, yet Jig's realization of her strengths against the male is her power to refuse having the abortion surgery. Of course, the story is never resolved, and many critical analysts of Hemingway's story have sought to predict what decision Jig will ultimately make in the face of such a selfish and immature man. Rankin is no different. The orientation of his article is mostly to analyze the dialogue between the man and Jig, paying special attention to her responses and reactions rather than his. In this way, Jig is always the most important person within the story, due to the fact that she is the one debating whether or not to have the operation.
Rankin takes the position that Jig is stronger than she acts, and these displays of strength play out in her remarks and attitudes towards the man — for example, when the man keeps offering excuses as to why she should get the operation and Jig finally grows tired of it and asks him to stop talking (Hemingway, 214). Rankin's article is mostly in line with my own feelings about the story, except that I do not agree with his final point on what the "white elephants" represent. Rankin argues that they represent the man, but I maintain that they represent a pregnant woman at full term — evident in the way Jig lovingly remarks that the hills "look like white elephants" (Hemingway, 211) and then later becomes despondent as she confronts her decision about the pregnancy.
Works Cited
Hemingway, Ernest. The Complete Short Stories of Ernest Hemingway: The Finca Vigía Edition. New York, NY: Simon & Schuster Inc., 1987. pp. 211–214. Print.
Rankin, Paul. "Hemingway's Hills Like White Elephants." The Explicator 63.4 (2005): 234+. Literature Resource Center. Web. 17 May 2011.
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