36 I CHRONICLESnHemingway and the Biographical Heresynby Thomas P. McDonnelln”Vilify! Vilify! Some of it will always stick. “n—BeaumarchaisnHemingway by Kenneth S. Lynn,nNew York: Simon and Schuster;n$24.95.nWhen I learned some time agonthat the critic Kenneth S. Lynnnwas bringing out a book on the latenErnest Hemingway, hard on the heelsnof the large biographical study by JeffreynMyers, I anticipated a reasonablyncogent analysis of the stories, the severalnnovels, and the most important ofnthe nonfiction as well. Instead, whatnwe now have on hand is more of thensame — the gossipers and the neo-nFreudian biographers pecking away atna life that was already shattered longnbefore the man, in a moment ofnagony, became his own executioner.nWith that one shot, the myth of thenpublic persona of Ernest Hemingwaynshould have been put to rest forever.nBut it hasn’t been put to rest at all. Itnwas of course Hemingway himself whonwas largely responsible for the creationnof the myth of the author as undisputednmacho in American letters, just asnthe poet Robert Frost had early passednhimself off as our resident bucolicnpoet. We know that Hemingway had anbitch of a mom in Grace Hall, whondressed him in his sister’s clothes andncalled him her “summer girl,” butnhow does this bear upon the writer’sngreat achievement itself? Hemingwaynis our only major writer who, after hisnfirst two or three books, has beennsavaged for not producing a masterpiecenevery time. This is the ploy ofnthe cream-puff critics who think thatnwriting is like a good commercialnflour—guaranteed to bake a perfectncake every time.nI mean insufferable little snobs likenWilfrid Sheed and a whole clutch ofnother mean-spirited nitpickers, not tonmention the big snobs themselves, ofncourse—those biographers of Hemingwaynwho would presume to bludg-nThomas McDonnell is a free-lancenwriter living near Boston.neon him down to size with overstuffednbooks. I think that we have had overmuchnof judging the man instead ofnthe works. There are infinite numbersnof characteristics that we can serve upnin order to make Hemingway looknbad—but why should anyone want tondo this, unless there are types amongnus who had long ago sharpened theirnclaws for just such a job?nThe fact is that Hemingway, despitenthe hairy chest and he-man facade,nwas what we should now call vulnerable.nHe was vengeful, a falsifier, anwomanizer, a poseur, and accidentpronento a disturbing degree. But henwas also a good companion, in manynways heroic and selfless, someone toncount on when the going got tough.nThough admittedly difficult, he wasnhimself often abandoned by othersnwhen he most needed their help. Hennnhad that instinctive curiosity which thenyoung writer must have, and he wasnamong the first of the postwar Americansnto recognize the relationship ofnmodern art to the formation of a newnprose style. In the current biographicalnassault, Hemingway has not been gauged,nhe has been gouged.nThe gouging has been particularlynnoticeable when focused on the twonHemingway books that the critics seemnmost disposed to attack: one at possiblynthe low-point of his career, in Acrossnthe River and Into the Trees (1950),nand the other at a brief but recoverablenhigh-point in The Old Man and thenSea (1952), each amazingly enclosednwithin a two-year period of publication.nOn the first of these titles, thenvultures would descend at once. Thencuriously hesitant Wilfrid Sheed,nhowever, waited unhl 1977 to announcento the world that Hemingwaynhad “made a complete ass of himself”nin Across the River. As for the latest bignbiographical assessments of the matter,n
January 1975July 26, 2022By The Archive
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