Ernest Hemingway: A Reconsideration

by Philip Young

The original edition of this widely praised critical study was described as "the best book on Hemingway," and its importance was substantially enhanced when Philip Young added an absorbing account of his difficult exchange with Hemingway during the book's preparation and a summary of Hemingway's final years. Now available in a paperback edition, this book explores the relationship between Hemingway the man and Hemingway the author, offering perspectives that remain fresh and insightful.

Genres: Biography

308 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1952

About the author

Philip Young is considered to be the first serious Ernest Hemingway scholar; indeed his scholarship brought him into conflict with Hemingway himself. In his 1948 biography of Hemingway, written for his doctoral dissertation, Young argued that Hemingway’s writing was strongly affected by an injury Hemingway received in 1918, while serving in World War I. Hemingway strongly objected to this theory, quoting him as saying, “How would you like it if someone said that everything you’d done in your life was because of some trauma?” Hemingway fought to have the publication of Young’s biography stopped, but after exchanging correspondence with Young, Hemingway agreed to let the book be published.

Young was a Harvard graduate, Fulbright Scholar and a fellow of the Institute for the Arts and Humanistic Studies. He taught at New York University and Kansas State University before joining the Penn State faculty in 1959. He was named Evan Pugh Professor of English at Penn State in 1981. He remained a professor of American literature at the Pennsylvania State University until his death in 1991 at the age of 73.

Reviews

[Velvetink · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have the hardcover 1952 edition published by G. Bell & Sons Ltd., London.

Philip Young is I believe the first critic to provide a clear understanding of the Hemingway code - hero. The hero is not as some may think the public figure hero the bullfighter, or the champion boxer or even the commanding soldier . The hero is like Hemingway himself and like Jake Barnes and in a way Nick Adams the one who has been wounded in the war and who must somehow " be stronger at the broken places". The public hero in his ' grace under pressure ' may give an example. But the code hero the true Hemingway hero has to imitate in silence without complaint, without big words, without heroic proclamation of himself those simple right actions which answer the situation. This is in accord with the famous Hemingway passage when he speaks about the inability after the War to use words like ' sacred ' and ' patriotic' , the big words. The code hero instead wounded, numbed must act in a kind of clean and efficient almost ritual way in restoring himself and the world. Simple action with a minimum of words. Action which is repeated almost like a ritual. Action which has something of the quality of the famous Heminway style with its hypnotic Biblical simplicity and its conjunctive connections. The rhythmic ' and ' and ' and' of Hemingway's prose conveys too the mirror of this kind of redemptive action.
An excellent work for better understanding the whole structure and basic meaning of the Hemingway word and act.

[Peter Moreira · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've heard about Philip Young's work for decades, but this book has been out of print for even longer so I've ever read it until now. What a great book! Written year's before Carlos Baker's biography of Hemingway, it provides one of the first outlines of his life and an early study of his works. These include an entire chapter on the relationship between Huckleberry Finn and the Hemingway heroes. Young gets a bit carried away with Freudian interpretations of Hemingway, but all n all this is a foundational work in the Hemingway canon.

[Jennifer Guerra · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book, even if has been widely surpassed by more recent Hemingway's reviews, is still a critical classic and offers many valid points on Hemingway's poetics. Moreover, the writing skills of Philip Young are undeniable and make this book a truly pleasant thing to read for every Hemingway's junkie.

[Jeff Keehr · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read this in preparation for a class I took at Penn State which was taught by Phil Young. Young was a very fine writer and his ideas were bold and credible. It was interesting to read about Young's early years as a Hemingway scholar in Carlos Baker's Hemingway biography that I finally got around to reading this past winter.