The Snows of Kilimanjaro / Up in Michigan / On the Quai at Smyrna / Indian Camp / The Doctor and the Doctor's Wife ...

by Ernest Hemingway

Genres: Short Stories, Classics

About the author

Ernest Miller Hemingway was an American novelist, short-story writer and journalist. Best known for an economical, understated style that significantly influenced later 20th-century writers, he is often romanticized for his adventurous lifestyle, and outspoken and blunt public image. Most of Hemingway's works were published between the mid-1920s and mid-1950s, including seven novels, six short-story collections and two non-fiction works. His writings have become classics of American literature; he was awarded the 1954 Nobel Prize in Literature, while three of his novels, four short-story collections and three nonfiction works were published posthumously.
Hemingway was raised in Oak Park, Illinois. After high school, he spent six months as a cub reporter for The Kansas City Star before enlisting in the Red Cross. He served as an ambulance driver on the Italian Front in World War I and was seriously wounded in 1918. His wartime experiences formed the basis for his 1929 novel A Farewell to Arms. He married Hadley Richardson in 1921, the first of four wives. They moved to Paris where he worked as a foreign correspondent for the Toronto Star and fell under the influence of the modernist writers and artists of the 1920s' "Lost Generation" expatriate community. His debut novel The Sun Also Rises was published in 1926.
He divorced Richardson in 1927 and married Pauline Pfeiffer. They divorced after he returned from the Spanish Civil War, where he had worked as a journalist and which formed the basis for his 1940 novel For Whom the Bell Tolls. Martha Gellhorn became his third wife in 1940. He and Gellhorn separated after he met Mary Welsh Hemingway in London during World War II. Hemingway was present with Allied troops as a journalist at the Normandy landings and the liberation of Paris. He maintained permanent residences in Key West, Florida, in the 1930s and in Cuba in the 1940s and 1950s. On a 1954 trip to Africa, he was seriously injured in two plane accidents on successive days, leaving him in pain and ill health for much of the rest of his life. In 1959, he bought a house in Ketchum, Idaho, where, on July 2, 1961 (a couple weeks before his 62nd birthday), he killed himself using one of his shotguns.

Reviews

[Julia]

Jockeys! Bullfighters! Boxers! Soldiers!
This collection of Hemingway's writings includes some of his earlier stories, among them the Snows on Kilimanjaro and the Nick-Adams-Stories. Most of them revolve around themes and experience which are traditionally seen as 'male' - fatherhood, going to war, fighting in boxing-matches and against bulls. Almost all of them contain a shocking or existential moment of the characters life but Hemingway withholds from letting the reader get a close insight into the emotional impact it has on them. The absence of the characters thoughts and feelings creates an impression of distance and I sometimes felt an obligation to go through the emotions that they were lacking. This made me uncomfortable, even angry at times.
There were, however, moments which served as a counter weight to the characters fatalism and to the the intense depictions of violence, war and death. Hemingway's stories containted some vivid descriptions of nature. The stories about being outdoors, like the two-hearted river, made me want to go on a hike and look at fish:

The river was there, it swirled against the log piles of the bridge. Nick looked down into the clear, brown water, coloured from the pebbly bottom, and watched the trout keeping themselves steady in the current with wavering pins. As he watched them they changed their positions by quick angles, only to hold steady in the fast water again. Nick watched them a long time.

Hemingway's stories are thus full of contrast: sudden death and brutality on the one hand, moments of peace and tranquility on the other. This contrast is also mirrored in thw contrast between being with others and being alone. The interactions between poeple in the stories are almost always akward and tense while characters on their own are more pleasant to be around. Hemingway's economical style both enhances the brutality of humans and the beauty of nature, to stomache him, it takes a good mixture of both.

[KateK · Rating 3 out of 5]

some stories were interesting, however after reading some stories I also had to search up the analysis of the stories online, after reading the analysis they usually made more sense. This is the first book where I read short stories, and I think I am not a big fan of it. Because, sometimes I would like a story but then that story would end too fast for me. He has a different writing style and symbolizes a lot of stuff during his writing which is hard to understand from the first read.
So, my recommendation if you do not understand the point of the story check out it's analysis online :)

[Kohki Tanizaki · Rating 3 out of 5]

It becomes a bit dull after a while. Some stories are interesting and immerses you in atmosphere of Hemingway but some stories feels more personal to Hemingway than it having relevance to me. Maybe I'm just became less entertained by his style after a while but I liked the first couple of stories the best and it slowly become repetitive somehow. I'd recommend it as a book you peak at from time to time.

[Kika23 · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not my favorite Hemingway. Still, I really loved the story that gives the book its title. The rest felt a bit strange, and I ended up reading the stories now and then, whenever I remembered the book was still on my nightstand — it stayed there for quite a while. Yet, it’s a good book that demands a bit from the reader. One day I’m sure I’ll read it again.”

[paula · Rating 2 out of 5]

disappointing

[Laura · Rating 1 out of 5]

The first story I liked, the rest I got bored. I don’t think I’m the target audience :/

[Safa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Even though I read some bad critics about how much Hemingway is so "macho" in these short stories, I like it, I think every man should read it. You may find a part of yourself or somebody you know in one of Ernest's characters.