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Summary: The Little Battles in a World War
Review: Ernest Hemingway's Farewell to Arms is a good book that offers a worthy love story that takes place in central Europe during World War I. The main character, Frederic Henry, whom is an American fighting for the Italian Army, tells the novel. At the beginning of the book Frederic falls in love with a young nurse, Catherine Barkley. Throughout the book the two fall deeply in love and begin to meet often. As their affection for each other increases the intensity of the war also increases. Foreshadowing throughout the book leads the reader into a dramatic ending. Even thought the book offered a developed plot and descriptive characters it was hard to follow the enhanced theme. The use of Italian during the book adds for a more confusing story, but attaches deeper character in the story line. Although the novel was nice it had was a drawn out love story that did not interest me totally. If you are looking for a all out war story this is a decent book but it is geared more toward the person in line for a dramatic tragedy.
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Summary: Book Critique - A Farewell to Arms
Review: The novel, A Farewell to Arms, was a captivating story that comprised all the key elements required in a story about love and war. The author, Ernest Hemingway, exploited many of his own experiences from World War I, and essentially based the whole novel on this familiarity. The novel's protagonist was Frederic Henry, a young American ambulance driver, who served the Italian army. The setting was the time of World War I and the Italians, allied with the British, the French, and the Americans, were fighting the war against Germany and Austria-Hungary. In the novel, Henry, who speaks Italian and English adequately, is a part of the Italian Red Cross. Even in the beginning of the novel, Henry feels detached from the war because he does not believe it has anything to do with him. Circumstances change, however, and Henry is hit in the leg by a trench mortar shell. Henry is immediately sent to an American hospital in Milan where he reunites with Catherine Barkley, an English nurse, and they fall deeply in love. Catherine becomes pregnant and soon Henry returns back to an unusually chaotic Italian front. The Italian army captures Henry and two other drivers in this uproar, but Henry makes a run for it and reunites with Catherine in Stresa. They move to Switzerland to avoid arrest from the Italians, but they enter even more trouble and tragedy when Catherine is to give birth to their child. It is clearly identifiable that Ernest Hemingway has created a masterpiece. I believed this book was an astounding novel that included the entire essence of what a novel should resemble. This novel contained solitude, love, war, happiness, and tragedy. Having been drawn largely from Hemingway's personal experiences as an American ambulance driver for Italy, this novel contained many accurate descriptions to the setting, his injury, and the atmosphere of the novel. These descriptions in the novel allowed myself to be drawn into the story and made me feel as though I was a part of Henry's life. Hemingway's comfortable style of writing also helped to reveal the sincere atmosphere that Catherine and Henry created when they were alone together. Their love was absolutely genuine and veritable. This was evident in the way they spoke to each other. At one instance in the novel, Catherine said, "What good would it do to marry now? We're really married. I couldn't be any more married. There isn't any me. I'm you. Don't make up a separate me."(p. 107). Conversations similar to this allowed myself to understand how much they loved each other and what Henry was going through. They also showed me how strongly two individuals could love each other. The last scene of the novel was also very touching. The tragedy of Catherine dying while giving birth to her child was sad enough, but the inclusion of the scene where Henry tries to bid farewell made the novel even more depressing. In the novel, Catherine dies due to an unsuccessful Caesarian section and Henry is not by her side when she dies. He walks into the room and tries to say goodbye to his love, but cannot because he feels like he is saying goodbye to a statue. He leaves the hospital to walk back to his hotel in the rain. This scene was ingenious. It was very heartrending and displayed the significance of Catherine to Henry. These strengths made the novel an enjoyable story to read. I believed that there were not that many weaknesses to this novel. However, if I were to change one element in the story, I would have added more action. It seemed as though the war only affected Henry twice throughout the entire novel. These two occasions were when he got hit in the leg and when the battle police captured him. It seemed like the war was of no importance in the novel, and this may have been done purposely due to the title of the book. However, I feel that the book may have been even more exciting if Henry happened to get into more trouble with the war. This type of excitement could have balanced out the segments containing war and love evenly so that the reader could enjoy descriptions of both components. Other than that, I believe this novel was truly flawless in its context. I believe this novel can have a variety of people for its audience. This book is for anyone who wishes to read a good book. I recommend this novel to teachers, students, parents, and basically everyone. I believe no one should miss out on the opportunity to read the love story of Henry and Catherine. The seriousness of their relationship followed by their tragedy clearly maps out an interesting love story that may bring tears to some readers. This novel shows readers that love can heal pains from wars, but that it will never change the merciless cruelty of life. It truly is a masterpiece of a novel!
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Summary: Love is stillborn
Review: I cannot even begin to describe the feelings and emotions that filled me after reading A Farwell To Arms. Ernest Hemingway is my favourite author, and this was, I believe his best novel ever. The symbolism and forshadowing used at unbelieveable. I believe that what Hemingway was trying to portray, was the inevidable fact that Love is stillborn. War is stillborn. No matter what you do, and after all the fighting and suffering, in the end, it is dead. You are dead. I recommend this book to anyone who loves to read about war, because this book is detailed. I think the fact that Hemingway lived this life, makes it that much better. He knows.
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Summary: a feminine viewpoint
Review: An obvious jagged line of disagreement pervaded my AP Liturature class after reading this book: the boys seemed to love it, and the girls hate it. For one thing, Hemingway writes action. No sentiment, no pity, no abstract ideas, no emotion allowed, only the brutal physical truth of war and of love. The storyline revolves around the (naturally) physical relationship between an American ambulance driver Frederick Henry and the British nurse Catherine. The book showed a horribly dark side to love and life that I had never considered before, but I'm afraid that Hemmingway's laconic style, along with his assumption that the reader knew exactly what the author ment, bothered me. 30% of the book is dialogue, and the dialouge is mostly monosylables. Thumbs up to subject, thumbs down to style. I'll stick to Fitzgerald.
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Summary: Yuck!
Review: Hemingway should have stuck to journalism. his novels read like depressing grocery lists. Why did the chicken cross the road? According to Hemingway "To die. In the rain." Yuck!
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Summary: Beautiful
Review: I think everybody should read this book. I'm 15 and it was the most amazing book i've ever read. The story of love between Frederick Henry and Catherine Barkley was a lovely thing to witness. The story of war was equally heartbreaking. Although at some points I had to force myself to pick it up and read, I was never disappointed. When I read the last sentence, I started to cry, not because it was sad, but because I was amazed by it's beauty. You will not be disappointed by this book!
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Summary: THE novel of the twentieth century? Plus - a warning...
Review: Seven decades after the intial publication, A Farewell to Arms now seems to be the Hemingway novel that gets the most attention and many readers new to Hemingway are probably drawn to it for their initial exposure to the author. Normally, starting off with a writer's best book might be a good approach, but not in this case. A Farewell to Arms, while Hemingway's greatest work, also offers the uninitiated reader the greatest challenge. This is as terse as it gets, and if you're not familiar with Hemingway's style, you may find yourself wondering what all the fuss is about. Worse, you may become one of those millions of intelligent, well-read people who think he is a horrible joke. Start with a few of the short stories. Read some of the criticism (positive and negative). Do a little research on WWI (if you feel you need to). Then go for The Sun Also Rises. At that point, you will be hooked, or you will write the guy off forever. If you find yourself in the former category, you will really appreciate the opportunity to read this incredible book.
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Summary: SMELLY SOCKS
Review: I'd rather read tea leaves than ever read this book again. It's like smelly socks, sweat, and beer-stained undershirts: men stuff. A pre-schooler could entertain and enlighten me more than this goof Hemingway. Bitter men will enjoy it. All that misogyny is right up their alley; and as an added bonus, Hemingway rarely uses big, complex words or sentences, the easier for troglodytes to understand him.
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Summary: Readable but not astonishing
Review: I consider this book a must to every well educated, intelligent person, however, you have to push yourself towards it. Considering Hemingway an author who isn't easy to read, this is his standard. The description of war is better than the description of love between the two.At many points it seemed too shallow and you have to use all your imagination to be able to picture it.
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Summary: My first Hemingway
Review: This was the first book I've ever read by Mr. Hemingway and overall.... I enjoyed it! I must pause because I've always heard mixed reviews about books written by Hemingway. Some people feel his work has no real plot, or is dated to the particular time period he writes about. I found this book developed the characters well... as long as you can through all of Hemingway's "I love you more" "no, no, no I love you more" "no you don't ... do you? Tell me how much you love me" "will you love me forever?" Once you're through all that I feel you'll have a good time with it ... besides if you don't, at least it looks good on your bookshelf. People will think you're well read.
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