Hardcover w/dust cover (as shown) "Hemingway's Images of the Lost Generation" minor shelf wear to dust cover, book in very good condition cleaned pages. Fast shipping...(CP-17)
I'd have given almost anything to have been in Paris at the time of Hemmingway and the other great authors and artists. This book presented a brief look into Hemmingway and Paris at an amazing time.
Conrad writes in a style similar to that of the Lost Generation, and, apparently his father was part of it, so it feels like you are in another novel from the time. The pacing an order of the book are both conducive to a leisurely stroll through Hemingway's Paris. I want to find a physical copy of the book to see the pictures (the narration are is still cohesive without them, but it would have been even more enhancing). Unfortunately, there is a section on bullfighting that was a little hard to listen to because of it's graphic description of what happens in a bull-fight. There is also a mini-lesson on the differences between French and Spanish bullfighting. I let this knowledge pass through me without much retention.
Highly recommend listening to this on a beautiful spring day like I did so you too have something beautiful to admire. The drink in hand is optional.
Brief, descriptive, and to the point. Much like Hemingway's style of writing. Many interesting anecdotes that connect the dots between people he knew in France and characters in his short stories and novels. "Hemingway's France" does exactly what its subtitle says. It conjures vivid images of the Lost Generation.
I loved A Moveable Feast by Hemingway. It was probably the most enjoyable aspect of my Paris trip research. This book does a good job in being a bit of a side by side companion to that book. It takes you into Hemingway’s Paris and that’s a fantastic place to be.
An enjoyable biography of Ernest Hemingway during his years in France, primarily when he lived there during most of the 1920s, though the book in a later section does detail his time there was a war correspondent (and irregular soldier) in World War II and a little on later visits to France. Most of the book is on him living in Paris, but time spent in other places such as Provence are also detailed.
Thematically, the author talked about how it was in the 1920s in Paris that Hemingway became Hemingway, that he went from being a Midwestern writer to a more cosmopolitan author, detailing the books he read that were influences (and even the visual artists too, as Cezanne was noted as influence on Hemingway’s writing style) and most of all the people he met that helped shape him as a writer. The most notable that influenced Hemingway were Gertrude Stein (influential American art collector, writer, and editor, famous for "Rose is a rose is a rose is a rose" and "there is no there there"), James Joyce (Irish novelist, literary critic, and poet, famous for his 1922 novel _Ulysses_ and 1939’s _Finnegans Wake_), Ezra Pound (American poet and critic), and F. Scott Fitzgerald (popularizer of the term the Jazz Age and author of 1925’s _The Great Gatsby_ and 1934’s _Tender is the Night_). The author talked about the relationships Hemingway had with these individuals, friendships and rivalries, and how they influenced his work and how Hemingway’s life experiences in France and especially in Paris could be seen in his various works, whether sent in France or not and whether general life experiences or specific fictional individuals based on people Hemingway knew.
The author talked at length about the concepts of the “Lost Generation” and modernism in terms of society, literature, art, poetry, and how they influenced Hemingway and Hemingway influenced them.
Hemingway’s significant others are detailed, most particularly Hadley Richardson (Hemingway’s first wife, married 1921-1927 and his wife through most of his life living in France) and Mary Welsh (his fourth wife, would become his widow, also a notable war correspondent during World War II).
I was surprised how active Hemingway was in World War II and had known nothing of his being at Normandy (though not landing with the troops) and the liberation of Paris nor how he lead a band of irregular soldiers in direct contradiction to the Geneva Convention on how correspondents are supposed to act.
The final section spends a lot of time detailing Hemingway's passion and knowledge of bull fighting, his role in making it internationally known, and also the differences between Spanish and French bullfighting.
didn’t know what else to put on my audible whilst walking round town today and this felt like an interesting read and it was, i think it was just too short to pull me in and made a lot of references to hemingway’s already published memoir
Once upon a time, not long after World War 1 ended, several Americans lingered and stayed on in Europe. Among them, many chose Paris as their new base because of the laissez-faire attitude of the society towards art, politics and sexuality, which was the perfect environment for creativity.
It is in the flourishing cultural scenery, the 50,000 restaurants across the city, the quality of the food. It is also the cheap exchange rate in relative to US Dollar, and perhaps most crucially, it is in the availability of alcohol while Prohibition was still ongoing back in the US.
It is no wonder that the unofficial title of cultural capital of Europe moved from Vienna to Paris, and that so many talented artists and writers reside there during the 1920s, from Pablo Picasso, to F. Scott Fitzgerald, Henry Miller, Gertrude Stein, Ezra Pound, James Joyce, and of course the main focus of the book, Ernest Hemingway.
This is a short book about that time Hemingway lived in Paris. It tells the tale of the growth that he experienced in the vibrant city, his daily habits, the influences that shaped him, the books he read, and the cafes where he spent his time writing on.
And of course it also tells the drama that he brings into the expat social circle, a group of people filled with jealousy and wounded pride as well as comradery, which was so dramatic that it would later became the inspiration for his novel "Sun Also Rises."
Yes, it is fitting that Hemingway's larger-than-life character was shaped and molded in this kind of environment, a place full with extravagances. And that the experiences that he gets from this era in Paris will forever be imprinted in his behaviour until old age. Or As the author Winston Conrad remarks, it is where Hemingway became Hemingway.
Nice short description of one of my favorite fiction author's most formative environment -- France. While he spent more time in Key West (I love his house there...especially the cats) and Cuba, and is from the Midwest, he spent ~5 years in France, and the experiences in France, described here, massively influenced most of his writing. 1920s Paris must have been a truly amazing place, the artistic equivalent of 1998-2000 San Francisco for tech or 1943-1945 Los Alamos for physics.
I somehow didn't know much about Hemingway's WW2 exploits -- he's much more known for the Spanish Civil War, but apparently blurred the lines between journalist and quasi-combatant during WW2, sort of liaison between resistance and US forces with some OSS authorization after the fact); will read more.
you can zone out so hard to this it’s like reaching the 28th and half Buddhist precept of Tapuppenhowershita. like a very long watchmojo of “Top 50 True to At Least Hearsay Moments That Will Make You Say ‘Damn That Sure is Something That Perhaps Pertains to Hemingway in France!’” masquerading as a very short book. i ain’t complaining, not everyone’s meditation path is one and the same. anyway, remember that time Fitzgerald got Hemingway to check out if his dick size was adequate? defs in the top 5.
A very quick read, but certainly worth the trip into the past and that era of Paris in the 1920s. I feel like this would have been my era, had I been alive then. There is plenty of referential stories about the other artists and literati that Hemingway kept company in those days.
We're planning a trip to Paris within the next two years and knowing that some of the cafes and restaurants and salons that Hemingway favored are still there, will make a stroll along the Left Bank even more satisfying.
This was a nice little book about the life of Hemingway during his time in France which gave good descriptions of when and how Hemingway wrote. Imagine being there during that time, being in a cafe and seeing him work! Reason for 3 stars is because it did seem to wander off course a little during towards the end.
A very short book about a large portion of literary history.
Now this book won’t give you all the facts and won’t tell you all the stories about either Hemingway or the lost generation, but as someone who read many longer books about these two subjects, this book came as an extra dose.
I tend to like anything about Hemingway and Paris. A bunch of behind the scene stories, that make it seem like you were right there watching this go on. Most of this a true Hemingway lover already knows. But was good to hear it from another source...
Filled with wonderful photographs, and also very (and surprisingly) well written. A wonderful supplement to The Sun Also Rises and A Moveable Feast (in so far as I remember it, as it has been some time). Brings that Paris to life.
Provides historical context of Hemingway’s love for France and how it shaped his works and philosophy. Stokes the imagination of what Paris was like during the 1920s.
Even thought I'm certain that this book can't truly be appreciated without the pictures, it was still an interesting look at a writer's life by looking at where he was and whom he was with and how much of those inspiring circumstances made it's was into his writing one way or another.
I'm not a huge Hemmingway fan, but found this little window into the life and times of the artist's Paris, very interesting, as I have seen glimpses while learning about other artists who haunted these parts at that time. Fascinating movement.
Also, how was I this many years old before I pieced together that they were largely avoiding being in the US during the prohibition years?
2/20/24 I found a print copy through Inter-Library Loan and it is much better in print. It would have been lovely to re-read, but I just looked at most of the pictures and read captions.
Paris left bank of Seine Jardin du Luxembourg area, of bistros and cafes 50K, city of lights, one dollar for 50 francs, self-realization beyond limits, compare life to art, 3 wives, one-upped by 2nd wife reporting ww2, war correspondent turned amateur soldier, Bronze Star for bravery, suicide in 61. no two people ever read same book same France, 20’s, cub reporter for KC Star, Joyce greatest writer, Americans wanted ice, national past time watching people, artist suicides, Hurst and yellow journalism, self-realization and go beyond, converted to Catholicism, married 4+.
Interesting but short overview of Hemingway's years in France, Conrad touches on the interpersonal relationships with other artists of his era. This could have been a couple of chapters out of a larger, more comprehensive review of the era. For someone looking for a short introduction to or high level review of Hemingway's life in Paris.