American Literature II

Out of the selections of Hemingway from In Our Time, I wanted to talk about the first eight ‘chapter’ vignettes.

Hemingway’s simplistic, short, and straightforward sentences in the first three vignettes, especially Chapter III, finely express the detachment, disillusionment, and strangeness of war. In fact, though not the exact same, the multiple vignettes of different scenes of war kind of remind me of Catch-22 which also utilized style to express the absurdity and despair of war. Again, particularly Chapter III avoids describing the narrator’s feelings, instead resorting to a journalistic-like notes. The juxtaposition of simple, factual statements in these kind of chapters to the horrible situation of war suggests a detached numbness as a way to deal with the trauma of war.

Chapter IV, noticeably, is something of a divergent as the narrator has something of a voice and personality. There’s a use of a lot of adjectives, in the phrases of “frightfully hot”, “absolutely perfect”, “simply priceless”, “absolutely topping”, “absolutely perfect”, “very fine”, “frightfully put out”, which makes it seem like a fun vacation instead of harsh war. It relates to the previous chapter in that both of them use a similar situation to display the different ways soldiers cope with war. The soldier in Chapter III copes by detaching himself and the soldier in Chapter IV copes by embracing the mindset of a glorious war.

Chapter V goes back to the relatively simple, straightforward sentences pertaining to horrors of war and death. Chapter VI gives named character(s) for the first time for the vignettes in Nick and Renaldi, thus removing some of  the detachment set as the usual precedent though still keeping with the simple sentences to keep a sense of detachment regardless. The feeling of disillusionment is further supported by the sense that these soldiers don’t really even know what they’re fighting for at this point. People are dying ‘for their country’ without a real reason.

The next chapter, however, goes back to nameless characters and narrator, but makes use of the stream of consciousness to really express the desperation and fear of the men in the trenches, in war. This is probably the most amount of emotion in the vignettes so far. There is no trauma being coped with numbness or detachment or glorifying right then; it’s a moment of raw feeling, though it’s only a moment, as when it’s over the soldier goes on to be emotionally withdrawn.

Chapter VIII is interesting, because it’s not clear if this is before, during, or after the war. The previous vignettes would insinuate it’s after since all the vignettes have been about soldiers, thus implying Drevitts and/or Boyle are veterans, but that’s questionable by the story having Boyle kill Hungarians because he thinks they’re “wops” — a derogatory slur for Italians. The fact that Hungary was on the opposite side of America during the war while Italy eventually joined the Allies, alongside America, is what makes this questionable. If it was about the aftermath of World War I, it would more likely have been Boyle killing Italians because he though they were Hungarian. That it is not so seems to imply that it’s about racism outside of that, with the irony being Boyle’s line of being able to tell “wops” a mile off. Perhaps the insinuation is  that the war’s not the only thing wrong, but that society and people outside of just the war are messed up too. That the reasons for disillusionment aren’t just caused by the war, but exist outside of it, too.