Perhaps you know that one of the highlights of my summer was reading Hemingway's A Moveable Feast. It prompted me to pick up The Paris Wife which was equally engrossing, and now I want to read everything Hemingway's ever written.
I'd stop every so often while reading their story told from his first wife Hadley's point of view to look up his works she'd just mentioned. Yesterday I grabbed the short story collection I'd purchased at the bookstore of his home in Key West so that I could read My Old Man (a heartbreaking work about a young man's love for his father, a jockey with less than an honorable character). Last night I stopped in the middle of the description of the Hemingways' visit to Pamplona, Spain, to see the bullfights so that I could order The Sun Also Rises. Today, I downloaded a sample of The Torrents of Spring on my nook because I wanted to read the satire he wrote about Sherwood Anderson, John Dos Passos and other writers of this era.
But, it's more than the background of Hemingway's work which has me enthralled. It's the story of a marriage, told so eloquently through Hadley's eyes, that has me anxious to get home from graduation parties and errands so that I can continue reading. I spent all day yesterday on the couch reading, ever so slowly, of their young love. Of their apartment in Paris, trips to Austria, parties with Gertrude Stein and the Fitzgeralds, birth of Bumby. And now we come to the affair with Pauline Pfieffer, and I feel the conflict as acutely as they must have suffered it themselves.
Paula McLain wrote a mesmerizing biography of this famous couple, a deeply compelling read which will stand next to Hemingway's memoir as two of the most fascinating reads of my Summer.
Find more thoughts on this book from A Work in Progress, A Book Sanctuary, The Crowded Leaf, Bookbath, and Christbookarama.
Sounds like a great book & one that seems to be a perfect bookend to moveable feast.
ReplyDeleteI've been listening to it on my Ipod when I go for walks, but since I haven't been OUTSIDE since Thursday I've fallen a little behind. ... though it sounds like we can't possibly complain about the weather to someone who lives near Chicago! :) I just started My life in France, though, and guess who's made a guest appearance... Hadley!
ReplyDeleteI've been wanting to read this book all summer, and I'm so glad to hear you enjoyed it. I'm moving it up to the top of the list!
ReplyDeleteI also love when a book sends you looking for other books. I had the same experience last week when I read A Good Hard Look, which is a marvelous novel featuring Flannery O'Connor in the cast of characters. I've got her collection of letters on hold at the library.
I'm hoping the audio version is just as good (have it on my iPod). It's always great to see a blogger so enthused about a book.
ReplyDeleteThis sounds like a book I'd love!
ReplyDeleteOh I'm so glad you loved it too! And very excited to see you are reading The Sun Also Rises - can't wait to read your thoughts on it - definitely on my list to read soon too.
ReplyDeleteBTW, I have finished The Elegance of the Hedgehog - wonderful but I feel I've just skimmed the surface and that I want to go back to the start and read it again.. 0:)
My holidays have started and as well as packing up your review has made me really really want to find time to disappear into a great book.
ReplyDeleteI received this book as a gift not long ago; it was to be next on my list, but I think you've moved it up, Bellezza. Your anxiousness to return to the book reminds me of a co-worker who stayed up all night with Hadley because she could not put this down!
ReplyDeleteGreat review, as always. I love the way you stopped in the middle to research things & order Ernie's books. :D
This book sounds very interesting, thanks for the recommendation :)
ReplyDeleteI so want to like Hemimgway but I just can't click with his work. Maybe I just haven't found the right one yet?
I don't really have any desire to read Hemingway, but even so I am dying to read this book.
ReplyDeleteI generally don't like fictional accounts of real people's lives, they all seem somehow dishonest to me, but you've got me thinking about this one. I'll probably end up re-reading Hemingway again instead, though.
ReplyDeleteAll this talk about this one and A Moveable Feast for the Paris in July event had me looking him over in the public library this afternoon. I do remember 'My Old Man.' That is a good story.
I've a feeling I'll get to something by or about Hemingway very soon.
Okay, so I HATED The Old Man and the Sea, so I have mostly avoided anything to do with Hemingway. I am a bit curious now... That is saying a lot...
ReplyDeleteI didn't know that there is memoir by Hemingway's wife Hadley. I want to read it now! Thanks for writing about it, Bellezza :) I am glad to know that you are enjoying 'Things Hemingway' :) Wonderful to know that 'The Sun Also Rises' is on the top of your reading list. It is one of my favourite books and Hemingway's descriptions of bullfighting and fishing are some of the most beautiful passages that I have read. Hope you enjoy reading it. I am looking forward to hearing your thoughts on it.
ReplyDeleteI just started listening to The Paris Wife yesterday. It's a perfect follow-up to A Moveable Feast, so the Hemingway fixation continues for me, too! Love the idea of having his works handy for reference. It seems like he wrote many stories during the Paris years... a trip to B&N may be in order this week;-)
ReplyDeleteUpon your recommendation, I'm now following the line on hold for this book at the library. Just checked, I'm 259. It must be so sad to read the ending, knowing the short marriage will end so soon. And what happened to Bumby after, I wonder. I await your review of the rest of the book.
ReplyDeleteBTW, I've put a link of my review of A Moveable Feast to BookBath's comment section, signed up there a few days ago for the Paris In July event, and posted the icon on my blog... but received no reply or linked back... wonder if it's because I'm with Wordpress and it's a Blogspot event that I can't join.
Parrish, I think the two really ought to be read together; in fact, as I continue on with The Sun Also Rises I'm thinking one should read Hemingway in a package. This, from a girl who never liked him when she first read his work. Shows you what high school required courses do: produce anathema.
ReplyDeleteAudrey, I, too, have been stuck inside; we only took our first walk of the week yesterday afternoon. I loved your thoughts on Julia and Hadley; what a wonderful post!
ReplyDeleteBecca, I've never read anything by Flannery O'Connor, although my cousin was honoring her for a month within her book club in Virginia. I think I should begin! I imagine that letters would give a lot of insight, too, just as Hemingway's memoirs did. They give you so much background information!
ReplyDeleteDiane, I wonder who's reading it on your audio version. I'm never very good with listening skills, but I know that the narrator's voice can make a huge (wonderful) difference in the experience of the book. That happened to me with Little Bee.
ReplyDeleteBermuda onion, I think you would!
ReplyDeleteTracey, look what 'you've' started here! A Hemingway mania Chez Bellezza. :) I'm halfway through The Sun Also Rises which is wonderful after reading The Paris Wife because I can connect the pieces of Hemingway's experience with his novel. I could reread The Elegance of The Hedgehog, too; such a wonderful novel.
Joan Hunter Dunn, finding the great book is often such a difficult feat! I read thousands, it seems, and so often I'm lukewarm or worse. But, this is truly a terrific read. Hope you can fit it in!
ReplyDeleteDs, I don't often stop in the middle of reading to 'research' other titles, but The Paris Wife made me, and I'm so glad I did. I enjoyed the short story so much, and The Sun Also Rises, which is only embellished by knowing the background of them both. I'm glad my enthusiasm came through.
ReplyDeleteSam, it's been thirty years since I last read Hemingway, and I was not taken with him at all. How can a seventeen year old girl from the Midwest relate to a story set in WWII with guns and killing and despair, let alone love affairs? I had no reference point! Now, however, I can truly appreciate his story, and I think it helps that Paris is a subject near and dear to my heart. I'll probably never love A Farewell To Arms though.
ReplyDeleteReviews by Lola, this book would be a good place to start to gain an appreciation of his style and life. Well, maybe one can't truly appreciate his life (what a despairing scoundrel!) but understand it a bit better.
ReplyDeleteC.B. James, perhaps his collection of short stories would suit you most at this point. Especially as you liked "My Old Man." Plus, one never has to be committed to short stories for long.
ReplyDeleteKailana, I'm with you! The Old Man and The Sea was like watching paint dry (as my father says when something's quite tedious). It just seemed to be drawn out forever, and I felt like I was baking in the sun with the guy. This is nothing like that (dull, dull, dull) book I assure you.
ReplyDeleteVishy, I'm a third of the way through The Sun Also Rises and there's no bullfighting yet. Lots of drinking in Paris with Brett and the guys, yes, but we're still not in Pamplona. I'll post my thoughts on "Sun" when I finish, glad to know you liked it so much.
ReplyDeleteJoAnn, so fun to know that you're on the same (or at least quite similar) course as I am. Aren't these just wonderful books?! I can see why you have a desire to go to Barnes and Noble for more just as I did. To heck with going to the library and being number 2,000 on the wait list. :)
ReplyDeleteArti, would I be spoiling it to say that Bumby married a strong young woman and seems apparently unmarred? As unmarred as anyone could be from divorce, anyway, which of course always causes its own amount of pain. I'm not surprised you're #200-something; the same is true of the popular books at our library.
ReplyDeleteThere should be no reason at all why you can't join in on Paris In July II; I suspect the girls just haven't added you in the list of participants yet. I know it took awhile for me to find my own name because they were sorting it all out. Shall I email them that you wish to join in? If your name doesn't appear soon, I will. xo
Oh thanks, my friend!
ReplyDeleteAnd... glad to hear that Bumby turned out fine. I've enjoyed the chapter about the conversation bet. Hemingway and Bumby over Fitzgerald. Very endearing I think... A Moveable Feast could be adapted into film. Yes, somebody should do that... not as a fantasy but a real-life drama.
I kind of loath Hemingsway's works :D A Moveable Feast is the only exception :)
ReplyDeleteThis has been on my list for a while now. I am planning a very short trip to Singapore and am taking my "list notebook" which is of course with hundreds of books I want to read! This is one of the buys!
ReplyDeleteI absolutely loved this book as well. I had to keep reminding myself that it was a novel, and not an autobiography! I am not a Hemingway lover, but this book did make me want to read A Moveable Feast.
ReplyDeleteI've been hearing a great deal about this book - my friend's History Book Club was reading it. Sounds like a must read.
ReplyDeleteThe Paris Wife has been a super popular book at work, Bellezza. I hope to get a copy soon, although I have to confess that I'm not much of a Hemmingway fan. I read The Sun Also Rises in high school. Belch. But, of course, 30 years can make a huge difference, no?
ReplyDeleteHope you aren't melting too much. We hit 103 yesterday. That's too hot for even me!
Having read For Whom the Bell Tolls in high school, I swore off Hemingway. But recently, when looking for something about Paris for a possible vacation there, I considered reading A Movable Feast. Then I saw the movie Midnight in Paris. My favorite character in the movie by far was Hemingway, followed closely by Gertrude Stein and the Fitzgeralds. The movie really piqued my interest in Hemingway and that whole crowd. Maybe I will just have to read A Moveable Feast and The Paris Wife. Have you seen Midnight in Paris?
ReplyDeleteI'm still waiting for my copy from the library but it's not materialising. I may just have to buy myself a copy before my next trip to Paris in September. I've also got The Sun Also Rises which I think I may read next just because of this post!
ReplyDeleteArti, yes...but then, who would play Hemingway? There's not an actor handsome enough, or rugged enough, to depict him properly! ;)
ReplyDeleteBina, I know what you mean. I kinda loathed his work until this year, too. If you try him again, try this one because it's the work that had me finally appreciating his immense skill.
ReplyDeleteMsytica, I can't wait to see the books you'll come home with! Perhaps you'll need an extra suitcase?
ReplyDeleteCol, A Moveable Feast is so short you could have it read in an afternoon, or less. On the other hand, I took longer because I wanted to savor every word. It's soooo good.
ReplyDeleteMidlife Jobhunter, it does seem to be everywhere one looks this summer! I'm going to recommend it to one of my book clubs, but probably they've read it by now. ;)
ReplyDeleteLes, thirty years can make all the difference! At least they did for me; I never appreciated either Hemingway or Fitzgerald in high school. In fact, the only book I liked in my Contemporary Fiction class was by J. D. Salinger. But, I think his rebellious hero Caulfield appealed to everyone in that era!
ReplyDeleteThe heat is bad here, the humidity is worse. I didn't go out much last week at all; this is definitely a January kind of girl!
Sakura, one can live and die in hope waiting for a book from the library. They seem to have a plethora of Nora Roberts and none of the good stuff. I hope you can find a copy soon! Maybe they'll have The Sun Also Rises?
ReplyDeleteWhat a wonderful post, Meredith...absolutely riveting. "THE PARIS WIFE" will be my next read and perhaps some Hemingway...thank-you for your post
ReplyDeleteI first read The Sun Also Rises in high school and found it quite sad; I'm thinking of rereading it as I just finished Testament of Youth, a memoir of a VAD during WWI, and I read somewhere that Brett was a VAD during WWI. Essentially I am just on a WWI kick! I also plan on revisiting a Farewell to Arms....let the Hemingway mania ensue!
ReplyDeleteMadeleine, I think you'll especially like the French influence in these books; it makes me so lonesome for your beautiful country!
ReplyDeleteRead The Book, it had been so long since I read The Sun Also Rises, if ever; I only remember A Farewell to Arms which had no point of reference to me as a high school student. Now I find it wonderfully thrilling, as I hope you do, too.
ReplyDeleteI have this one in my TBR stack. Your review is fantastic. It sounds even better than I originally thought it would be.
ReplyDelete2 Kids and Tired Books