Which book should be my first Hemingway

[Pablo]

I didn´t think much of The Old Man and the Sea when I read it, and I really disliked Farewell to Arms. I had decided to abandon Hemingway but my boss recommended me For Whom the Bell Tolls , which I still have to read.

[bill_mchale]

A recently read a Farewell to Arms, and it is a good read, though I felt Hemingway's prose style left me distinctly detached from the characters.

--
Bill

[Vector]

Originally Posted by SHOECHICK

One of my 2010 reading goals is to read my first Hemingway. Which one would you suggest - thank you!!

That would depend on how much Hemingway you want to read and why. The four most important books are The Sun Also Rises, A Farewell to Arms, For Whom the Bell Tolls and The Old Man and the Sea.

If you are only going to read one and you are giving yourself a survey course in the American novel in the 20th century, I would recommend The Sun Also Rises as being most representative and influential. It's about anglophones in Paris in the 1920's, and has a Grail/Fisher King motif. If you just want an enjoyable read, The Old Man and the Sea is a good choice.

A Farewell to Arms is a love/war story in World War I. For Whom the Bell Tolls involves the Spanish Civil War. It features an attempt to simulate Castillian speech patterns in English which you may find off-putting. It's the one out of the four you could best afford to skip.

Also, as some have suggested, Hemingway was an accomplished short story writer as well as a novelist.

[Vector]

Originally Posted by rhadin

TOMS is really a novelette and written near the end of his life, although he did win a Nobel Prize for it. It is/was required reading in school primarily because it won the Nobel Prize, not because it was an outstanding example of his writing.

Sparrow is right about the Nobel Prize. The reason The Old Man and the Sea is the Hemingway most often assigned in school is that it is short. Similarly for Silas Marner, Ethan Frome and the Crying of Lot 49.

[Teddman]

I think "To Have and Have Not" is a great one, it's not too long either. Try renting the movie and then reading the book... The contrast is striking; the Bogart/Bacall version is nothing like Hemingway's at all, it's like the difference between a Saturday morning cartoon and an Oliver Stone movie. But I like both of them for what they are.

THAHN is very underrated for Hemingway, it's a brutal portrait of Key West smugglers with great local detail.

[jwjody]

The Old Man and the Sea is an easy read. The Sun Also Rises was much better in my opinion though.

If you want to read one of his short stories, The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber was excellent.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by SHOECHICK

One of my 2010 reading goals is to read my first Hemingway. Which one would you suggest - thank you!!

I suggest Finding My Balance by Mariel Hemingway.

Mariel Hemingway details a turbulent life that includes a neglectful father, an angry mother, a mentally ill sister, another sister who died young as a probable suicide, and the near-death of her husband. And a successful acting career as well.

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

I suggest Finding My Balance by Mariel Hemingway.

At least the suggestion matches your avatar.

[jkirby]

Frankly, I recommend Hemingway's short stories over his novels. I'd consider the Old Man and the Sea a long short story, and highly recommend it. I am currently reading For Whom the Bell Tolls because I thought it was interesting that both John McCain and Barack Obama selected Robert Jordan (protagonist) as their favorite character. I'm enjoying it but would recommend many of his short stories over it.

[Ron46]

With all this talk about Red and Blue states in this country, where it seems that never the two shall meet, For Whom the Bell Tolls can scare you. In the Spanish Civil War, the middle/ business class, even in smaller villages tended to sympathize with the Fascists (not the bad word it became after WWII), and the peasants with the Republicans. There is a very long scene where Republican guerillas come into a town, gather up all the business people along with the town priest, make them individually run the gauntlet between columns of fellow citizens with clubs, then throw them over a cliff into the sea. It is the most chilling account I have ever read in literature and one you will always remember when political tensions in this country get so high that you sometimes hear journalists allude to civil war.

A good novel like this can present truth far more effectively than journalistic pieces. I have read a few very good long histories of the Spanish Civil War, and they do not come close to Hemingway's accounts in this novel.

[ddave]

I started Hemingway (many years ago) with Old Man and the Sea which I thoroughly enjoyed. I had forgotten about For Whom the Bell Tolls, but after reading the comments here I'll be adding it to my near term list. A good book to keep with me for those precious moments when I can read something for personal satisfaction.

Dave