Tradition and Hemingway -- Mimetic Theory and Literary Study

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Date Posted: 04:59:41 04/27/08 Sun
Author: Shannon
Subject: Tradition and Hemingway
In reply to: Jfish 's message, "Re: Rejection of Imitation in Music" on 19:03:04 04/23/08 Wed

*Don't worry, Erin, I am not bashing Hemingway ;-)*

It is interesting to compare Eliot's ideas on tradition with those of another twentieth century writer, Earnest Hemingway.

In many ways, Hemingway is the epitome of autonomous individualism. Indeed, many critics accuse him of ripping his characters from all past and context:"They [Hemingway's characters] seem to come from nowhere, move into the now and here, depart again for nowhere after the elapsed time of the novels." Another critic describes it thus, "His characters fight out hteir battles on a lone peak of time, like an Alpine peak cut across by a cloud, so that those on the topof the mountain do not see and are indifferent to the temporal qualities of the life in the valley."

Though this is true from one perspective, it also seems that, despite his efforts to seperate himself from the world in his lifestyle, philosophy, and writing, Hemingway might just have been appropriating and extending the long American "tradition" of rugged individualism and a scorn of the past.

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Replies:

Jazz -- JPJ II, 10:06:01 04/27/08 Sun