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Summary: A Glimpse at a Different Hemingway
Review: I'm reading this book for the third time now and, as before, I am seeing new things in it each time. I'm not a particular fan of Hemingway's novels, mostly because of their subject matter and for the bits that I know about his personal life but A Moveable Feast is very different. It is not about bullfights or battle; there aren't any horrifying displays of machismo. This book is Hemingway before the depression, before the alcoholism, before the many women. This Hemingway is vibrant and valiant and madly in love with his wife. Knowing the tragic end to his story, this short autobiographical piece is a sad look at the talent and passion of a man who was perhaps too great for his body.
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Summary: An interesting story about writing, people and being alive..
Review: A Movable Feast is such an interesting look at life. I think the strongest part of the book was his way of extracting thoughts about life from the people he met and the little things he did. It seemed like everyone he met, he came away with a metaphor or something to life by. One of my favorite quotes from the book was after he had his meeting with the painter Pascin, "They say the seeds of what we will do are in all of us, but it always seemed to me that in those who makes jokes in life, the seeds are covered with better soil and with a higher grade of manure." I think his comments on life are what make the book so interesting and such a picture into how he felt. Another very strong point of the book were the characters. Although they were real people, he characterized them in such a way that he could say relatively little about them and they felt like such developed characters. It was especially amazing that so many famous people were in Paris at one time and it added so much to the story to learn about what they were like as people in just in passing during Hemingway's life. Many of them were just aquaintances but you came away with an understanding of them. There wasn't much of a plot so people who like big rockus plots wouldn't necessarily enjoy it, it was more of just a memoir of a specific point in time. The imagery was strong and added much to the pictures you got in your mind of Paris at that time and he used it to further his point, like how it felt being in Paris at night. His detail makes the book interesting and I enjoyed how when he had dialog it was as though the people were actually speaking, complete with curses and just obscure topics of conversation that any friends would have. It was in this way the characters came to life as well, and they were all interesting characters with vices and differences that Hemingway made sure to note to an often comic effect. Another aspect that made me really enjoy the book was it's pictures of what it is like to be a writer. I loved how he talked about his work and how certain times and places you could write so easily while others you couldn't. The book really seemed to be about what it is like to be alive and he took a very indepth and insightful approach to that which was easy because they were "very poor and very happy." I think not all people would enjoy this book because of it's longwindedness and wealth of detail that makes the story move rather slowly along with the fact that there is no fast moving plot. However it was a very enjoyable read and anyone who likes detail, interesting characters and a look at work, love and being alive.
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Summary: A feast for sure.
Review: I re-read this little masterpiece for the umpteenth time on a round tripper from Seattle to Chicago (just about the right length). It seems to be a perfect travel companion. I agree that it's helpful to be familiar with Papa and his novels to really appreciate this quite different work. The fact that Hemingway was also an astute reporter (a la Steinbeck) also heightens the wonderful readability of A Moveable Feast. We get to see the man's appetites, fears, weaknesses, and strengths as he hobnobs with the Lost Generation on a daily basis. Writing with the laser-like clarity that changed the course of fiction, he fixes in time the Paris that romantics like myself wish they could have experienced.
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Summary: A Masterpiece
Review: Of Hemingway's works, this one may contain the greatest number of memorable and lyrical lines. It was tough for me to put it down and to me it felt like I already knew the people depicted and like I was looking and listening through a parlor or bedroom window. But I first read it 25 years ago and the next generation has grown up at a greater temporal distance from H than I did. So, I suggest that it would be a good idea for someone reading this for the first time to have already read at least a couple of H's novels. (At a minimum I would read "The Sun Also Rises" and a few of the short stories before reading "A Moveable Feast"). It also might help to have at least some passing acquaintance with H's biography. Appreciation of this book will also be enhanced with some minimal knowledge of the history of the early part of the last century, alien times to many of us. (I assume that in Paris today it is no longer possible to buy milk directly from the goat from a man with a herd who brings them to your apartment every morning). However, reading the early H. novels should well acquaint one with the relevant history. This book contains my all-time favorite H sentence: "People are always the limiters of happiness, except for those very few that are as good as the spring itself." How can you not love a book with a sentence like that in it?
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Summary: fabulous
Review: I loved this book. I was fortunate enough to have had the opportunity to visit Paris several times when I lived in England, and this book brought back so many wonderful memories. Hemingway's writing is so emotional, descriptive, personal and beautiful in this book. He truly brings Paris alive. Also interesting are his passages about the other expatriates living in Paris at the time; i.e. Fitzgerald, Stein, Pound, etc. The passages allow the reader a glimpse into the personal lives of these other writers (as well as Hemingway). It allows us to see more of who they were as people, not just as writers or a name on a book jacket.
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Summary: Great
Review: This book is the first one that's made me cry at the end of it in a very long time.
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Summary: Hemingway in Paris
Review: This book was immensely entertaining because you get to hear about what certain authors were like. We see Gertrude Stein, Ezra Pound, F. Scott Fitzgerald, James Joyce, and T.S. Eliot all through the eyes of Hemingway. Hemingway's descriptions of Paris and of his writing process are often very beautifully written and fascinating. This book is a quick read, although it does not have much narrative (which is fine, but if you are expecting a plot, forget about it), and is somewhat disjointed.
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Summary: A feast of memories...
Review: These languid vignettes of Hemingway's life as a member of "the lost generation" in Paris bring us a piece of the man above and beyond the novelist. He promised himself he would write this memoir, and that the people he met in Paris would be remembered, even if only in pieces. The pieces were put together after Hemingway's suicide in the early sixties, and despite his (presumably) deteriorating emotional state when it was written, this book touches a clarity of prose and a true sense of remembrance. If you have ever aspired to write, this book will remind you of what it was like to live as a writer in a different time, when the writing was all there was.
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Summary: A perfect movement between bitter irony and personal payback
Review: When looking at Ernest Hemmingway the man, most ask the question: Where did his fiction start and his true life begin? The blurring of his personal prowess with mythical allusions in his fiction have tantalized all of us who have read his books. But here he comes forward to confess things that make him human (e.g. How did his love fade with Hadley?). In this slim volume, we are given the chance to hear Hemmingway's voice, up close and personal. A wonderful look at a world through Papa's eyes, and for those of us who love his works, the great legend continues.
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Summary: Part of my fantasy fulfilled.
Review: This is one of the two Hemingway book that I've read. The other one was The Sun Also Rises, this one is definitely more interesting and enjoyable. I think he is more descriptive and sentimental. I like the fact that he wrote this in a very nostalgic tone. A good book to read next to a fire place, or under a beautiful tree. It takes you to a place, and vicariously I lived with him when he was a young man in Paris.
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