Alan (the Lone Librarian rides again) Teder’s Reviews > Selected Hemingway Stories: A New Audio Collection > Status Update

24. Untitled Milan Story ** written in 1918 but not published until the Hemingway Library Edition of [The Short Stories of Ernest Hemingway] (2017). A roman à clef story featuring Hemingway’s proxy Nick Adams who is in hospital after being wounded in World War I. He is lying in his hospital bed and examining the medals he received.

23. Judgment of Manitou ** Juvenilia. This was Hemingway’s first published story, written in 1916 when he was a high school student, not published until the Hemingway Library Edition of [The Short Stories of Ernest Hemingway] (2017). Two hunters fall prey to the forces of nature and their own poor judgment.

22. The Strange Country ** not published until [The Complete…] (1987). This was an abandoned start to what later became the posthumously published novel [Islands in the Stream] (1970). It doesn’t involve sea-faring adventures but is instead about a road trip with characters named Roger & Helena who might be Hemingway & Gellhorn. The “strange country” is a euphemism for the couple’s sexual experience.

21. Great News from the Mainland ** not published until [The Complete…] (1987). There is a major windstorm in Cuba which destroys many crops and trees. The narrator phones America where his son is undergoing various injections and shock treatments at a clinic for an undefined condition. The son says he is doing fine. Again this is a possible roman à clef about Hemingway’s son Gregory.

20. I Guess Everything Reminds You of Something not published until [The Complete…] (1987). A roman à clef story about the son of a writer who is a fine shooter at the local gun club, but who also plagiarizes a story for a school project which the narrator discovers many years later. “Stevie” is a stand-in for Hemingway’s son Gregory and the story reflects on their estrangement later in life.

19. Landscape with Figures not published until [The Complete…] (1987). This was a further Spanish Civil War story along with #6-#9. Edwin Henry is with his film crew at a partially demolished house overlooking an assault scene. There is also a British & American journalist with them. The Brit is attracting enemy fire. A possible roman à clef, as the American journalist could be based on Martha Gellhorn.

18. Black Ass at the Cross Roads ** not published until [The Complete…] (1987), a further World War 2 story along with #1-#3 following a group of mixed French & American irregulars during the reconquest of France. They are set up to ambush German retreaters at a crossroads but are also robbing the dead. The “Captain” is in a “black ass” mood about it, which is Hemingway’s term for depression.

17. The Porter not published until [The Complete…] (1987) as in #16, this is part of the unfinished 1927-28 Jimmy Breen novel. While his father sleeps, Jimmy spends time with “George,” the porter on the train. NOTE: “George” is a racist all-purpose name used for train porters, which is not explained in the story. See They Call Me George: The Untold Story of The Black Train Porters (2019) a.o.

16. A Train Trip *** not published until [The Complete…] (1987), was part of an unfinished novel from 1927-28 centering on the coming of age of a boy named Jimmy Breen. In this story, Jimmy and his father are on a train bound for Chicago and later for Canada. On the train are 2 captured criminals who are handcuffed to 2 policemen. This is very much in early Hemingway style sometimes described as Lardneresque.

15. An African Story *** an excerpt from the posthumous novel [The Garden of Eden] (1986) also published in [The Complete…] (1987). The young David Bourne tells the story about the hunting of an elephant with his father and a tracker guide in Africa. This is one of the stories that the older David would be writing during the novel.