Title
No Explanations: Hemingway on the Making of Decisions
Document Type
Article
Annotation
Throughout his literary career, Ernest Hemingway shows characters making fateful decisions. But, at the same time, he is careful not to imply or account for how these decisions come about. His narrators and protagonists-Frederic Henry, Jake Barnes, Robert Jordan, and others-make life-defining choices but do not realize how momentous these are until much later. About the process (if there is one) by which they make the decisions that determine the course of their lives, Hemingway is silent. For their, and, by implication, our own decisions, there is, in Hemingway's view, no explanation.
Published in
Hemingway Review
Volume
41
Issue
2
Date
Spring 2022
Pages
49-74
COinS
Citation
Cain, William E. "No Explanations: Hemingway on the Making of Decisions." Hemingway Review 41, no. 2 (Spring 2022): 49-74.