Hemingway: Eight Decades of Criticism

by Linda Wagner-Martin (Editor)

Hemingway: Eight Decades of Criticism is part of a collection of essays edited by Linda Wagner-Martin, in this series that has become an essential guide to the best contemporary criticism regarding the work (and life) of Ernest Hemingway.
     Several of the essays discuss Hemingway's life, including the first, which focuses on his own wounding in World War I. Other contributors examine "wounding" of many kinds―guilt, disability, loss, and mourning―in his works. Another section collects essays that pursue arguments centered on issues of gender. Most are written by scholars whose work has not appeared in previous collections. Throughout this collection, studies of familiar texts appear in tandem with fresh research, including essays that have become "instant" classics during the last decade and essays that focus new attention on The Old Man and the Sea . Anyone who is seriously interested in Hemingway's work will find this collection to be essential reading.

581 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1973

About the author

Linda Wagner-Martin is the Frank Borden Hanes Professor of English and Comparative Literature Emerita at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill. Over a teaching career spanning 53 years, she taught at Wayne State University, Michigan State University, and UNC, while authoring and editing more than 55 books. Her work includes biographies of major literary figures such as Sylvia Plath, Ernest Hemingway, Toni Morrison, and Maya Angelou, along with studies like A History of American Literature from 1950 to the Present and The Routledge Introduction to American Postmodernism. After retiring in 2011, she continued publishing extensively. Wagner-Martin’s contributions have earned her prestigious awards, including the Guggenheim Fellowship, the Hubbell Medal for Lifetime Service to American Literature, and fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Radcliffe Institute. She holds BA, BS, MA, and PhD degrees from Bowling Green State University, where she graduated magna cum laude with majors in English and minors in American History.