Remembering Ernest Hemingway

This legendary writer got introduced to me rather luckily. In a lunch recess when I was studying in junior college, I found a copy of "Farewell to Arms " in the house of a friend and his mother who was a professor had brought it from her library.

Title attracted me but more was drawn to it because book was being read by a very educated woman and hence I thought it must be good one. My love with English was making me pounce on anything that came to notice.

This book left profound effect on me and characters of Frederick, ambulance driver with shades of grey and Catharine, pristine and caring British nurse and their romance caught the imagination and I was spellbound by the plot that unfolds in Italy's war. Poignant end, background of war, the rain- soaked country, fragile humans and other characters like Rinaldi and Priest also remained itched for a long time. Partly autobiographical this book made me Hemingway fan.

Then I got hold of " For Whom the Bell Tolls" , an account of Spanish civil war and the struggle for Republic and against Fascists. It's some paragraphs depicting discussions of Pablo, hero Roberto, Maria and Pablo's wife Pilar who has a towering presence in a group in Spanish mountains engage you
and evolves intense story which again brings forth famous Hemingway code of " grace under pressure "! Tragic end after heroic attempt and reiterating the fact that Hemingway mentioned once " There is glory in failures too ".

Wanting to know more of him , I got the finest short story ever written and that's " The Old Man and the Sea " changed and inspired my thinking. A story written with conviction that only a writer who experiences and writes can bring. The old man, his relationship with the sea and the past in which he lives and draws inspiration from , the boy, the description of his feeling for the fish and the reason for his killing him and the cathartic analysis of self in the end is something which keeps us drawing to this book time and again.

"The Sun Also Rises " also was a delightful read in mid twenties and got fascinated by Paris he describes and the pit falls of loose living expatriates in that magnificent place and journey to the Spain, the country which he( Hemingway ) had more love for than US and appears here more for the bull fights and chasing of a woman called Brett who he knows will never be his.

And recently read some short stories of his and was saddened by the tragic end of main character in " The Snows of Killmanjaro ".

Traveller in me became more awake by his astonishing description of Africa in his another remarkable book " Green Hills Of Africa " where the plot is about hunting. It's again partly based on his experiences of hunting in that country and he mesmerises you with African countryside, hills, forests, smell of wet lands and mountain trails , hynas, buffallows, streams, breeze from hills and hunting tales.

Sensitive person, sports buff, hunting lover, an idealist , a deserving Nobel Prize Winner , a writer who many tried to imitate, thousands in US and Cuba who tried to follow his way of life had a tragic end. His failing health and mental condition drove him to commit suicide in Idaho. He shot himself and world lost the genius who lived many lives successfully. An American way, some say !

When I visit Spain, Cuba, America and Africa, I don't know when it will happen, for sure is one thing that Hemingway's lithe and laconic descriptions are one reason for arousing interest about these places.

For now, an amateur person that I am will end by remembering his famous code.

" Courage is grace under pressure "