Fadiman, Clifton. "A Fine American Novel." In Monteiro, George, ed.  Critical
        Essays on Ernest Hemingway's A Farewell to Arms.  New York: G.K. Hall
        & Co., 1994:81-83.

        Fadiman summarizes critical views that a modern[ist] novel can't show a "simple love affair," "male friendship," "true tragedy," nor be a "primitive novel."  Yet Hemingway's A Farewell to Arms does all four in "a remarkably beautiful book."

        Though Catherine and Frederic's love story is "gripping, almost heartbreaking," it shows Hemingway's use of understatement.  Though Frederic's friendship with Rinaldi could easily have been presented lamely, it is instead "comradeship--nordically reticent Henry . . . [and] blasphemously, ironically effusive . . . Rinaldi--was one of the few things that mitigated the horror and stupidity of war."

        Fadiman praises the "non-intellectual" novel, driven by emotion and narrative rather than ideas by "one of the best craftsmen alive,"  unlike the more self-conscious works of Sherwood Anderson, for example.  Seeing the irony of Frederic's simplistic characterization of "good" frescoes as ones that are peeling, Fadiman hears a slam at the more genteel protagonists of earlier novels.

    So Fadiman sees three inter-twining motifs in the story--love, comradeship, and the sickening war--and suggests the book should win a Pulitzer Prize. 

Copyright and Permission: This web on Ernest Hemingway's early novel was begun under a small grant from the VCCS, which holds copyright.  © 2001 by the Virginia Community College System.  This web was made by Dr. Eric Hibbison, Professor of English and Chief Chair, VCCS Regional Centers for Teaching Excellence (1998-2002). Materials in this web may be used free for educational purposes, but this web should not be behind a portal for which users must pay a fee without written permission from the VCCS.  If you're an educator using this web, please inform ehibbison@jsr.vccs.edu, especially if you'd like contact with other educators who are using this web.