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Living in Paris
After Ernest Miller Hemingway returned to the United States in February1919, he was celebrated as a hero. But after receiving the divorce-letter from Agnes von Kurowsky, he got deeply depressed. He started to quarrel with his mother. He moved to friends in Toronto and worked for the "Toronto Star" and then for the "Cooperative Commonwealth" in Chicago. Meanwhile he started to write his short stories.
In Chicago he fell in love with Hadley Richardson. She was eight years older than he and she was a passionate piano player.
After a couple of months they got married on September 3rd, 1921 in a small church in Horton Bay in Michigan. He was 22 years and she 30 years old. Two months later they moved to France, hoping that the cultural climate would be more open minded there. The author Sherwood Andersoon had persuaded them to leave the U.S. and had given them letters of recommendation to Gertrude Stein, James Joyce and Sylvia Beach.
They arrived in Paris on December 21st, 1921, three months after their wedding. They lived in a small flat, during the days he sat in a small cafe to work or to discuss news. He was an employee for European news of the Toronto Star. They had enough money to spend their holidays at the Riviera. They spend some winters in Vorarlberg to go skiing until 1924, because it was so cheap. They lived in Hotel Taube in Schruns, drank beer, went skiing and Ernest wrote the most difficult parts of his books.
In August 1923 the couple lived in Toronto for a short time to have their child "Bumby" be born there, but they returned after four months to Paris. The full name of this child was John Hadley Nicanor Hemingway. One of his godparents was Gertrude Stein.
Back in Paris they moved into a better quarter close to Gertrude Stein's salon and got in contact with many important artists. Hemingway hoped to have his "Short Stories" published, but found no editor. Young poets usually gained some reputation by publishing their pieces in one of the small newspapers. There were some in Paris: The "Little Review", "Transatlantic Review" or "This Quarter". They worked on a little budget and could afford hardly any wages, but they helped to get known. Before being popular enough to be published, Ernest wrote a lot of stories for these small newspapers.
As a reporter for the "Toronto Star" he travelled through the whole of Europe. He wrote articles from Genua, an interview with Benito Mussolini in Mailand, about the Greek-Turkish war from Istanbul or about a peace conference in Lausanne. We get the impression that he describes the experiences there not only in his articles but also in his books.
In January 1927 Hadley and Ernest divorced because he fell in love with Pauline Pfeiffer, his wife's best friend.
Friends and supporters
Sherwood Anderson: Anderson had persuaded the Hemingways to leave the United States and to move to Paris. He had given them letters of recommendation to his friends in the cultural world. There Hemingway was sometimes compared to Sherwood Anderson's style and so he once wrote a parody on one of his friend's pieces. He later tried to excuse this by saying that he had wanted to improve his friend's style. Anyway, Anderson was very angry at Ernest.
Josephine Baker: She was a well known dancer in the night clubs. One evening Hemingway saw her in a club without knowing her and he asked her for a dance. They danced for the whole evening and only in the end he learned her name.
Gertrude Stein: She also came from the United States and she gave advice to many young poets and painters. She supported Picasso right from the beginning and also gave some useful advice to Hemingway. Her house was frequented by all the cultural society of Paris. He even used to visit her when he was better known than she had ever been.
Sylvia Beach: She had come to Europe as a member of Red Cross as Hemingway did, but she didn't return. She founded a meeting point for artist and a book shop called "Shakespeare and Company". She helped young poets in publishing their pieces and in paying their bills and she was a good friend of Ernest Hemingway's.
Ezra Pound: He was a Professor for romanistic languages and he was a supporter of young poets. He helped James Joyce to become famous and also Ernest Hemingway. Pound had some of Hemingway's texts printed and he found a job for Ernest as a reporter for the "Transatlantic Review". Pound later moved to Italy and worked for the radio there, but in pronouncing slogans against America and against Jews, he lost his good reputation.
James Joyce: He was born in Dublin, came to Paris, returned to Dublin and married Nora Barnacle. Then he got a job as an English teacher in Triest. Then he came back to Paris and met Ernest in Sylvia Beach's bookshop. They became good friends and shared the hobby of drinking. Hemingway helped him in publishing his book "Ulysses".
Wyndham Lewis: He came to Paris as a friend of Ezra Pound's, but in opposite to his teacher he couldn't stand Ernest Hemingway. They criticised each other, both wanting to gain attention of the publishers.
Ford Madox Ford: He was the editor of a newspaper and employed Hemingway. He even allowed Ernest to take care of the paper while he was away. When Hemingway published mean critics and a boring story, nobody wanted to buy it any more, so the newspaper had to close down.
Robert McAlmon: He owned a small publishing house and was wealthy enough to publish new authors. So he was the first to print a book by Ernest Hemingway, "Three Stories and Ten Poems" and he was the first important critic to praise Hemingway.
F. Scott Fitzgerald: They didn't really like each other, but they had a common interest in litterature. Fitzgerald didn't hold one liquor well and Hemingway disliked his face. They shared some friends and met sometimes, but were the complete opposite to each other. One was rich, but not very disciplined in working, the other was poor, but a hard worker. Scott Fitzgerald recommended Hemingway at Scribner's publishing house and they took over "The sun also rises" in 1926.
Gerald and Sarah Murphy
They were a very rich couple with a lot of important friends and also supporters of modern art. They knew Scott Fitzgerald and Ernest Hemingway and together they went skiing or visited the Riviera. They introduced Hemingway in bullfighting and from that time on he went to Spain every year, where he also met his second wife Pauline Pfeiffer. He learned the bullfight slang and soon became well known in the Spanish population. The books "The sun also rises" and "In our time" reflect on these journeys.
In the cafes he got to know some famous artists like Joan Miró, Pablo Picasso, Matisse, Braque or Claude Monet and he was fascinated by modern art. He even bought a picture of Joan Miró, "The farm", and gave it as a gift to his wife Hadley.
The sun also rises
The book is about the U.S. Journalist Jake Barnes, who was wounded in the war and became impotent. He frequently meets with some friends in Paris to find out how to live without problems, but he falls in love with the English Lady Ashley. They stay together although he cannot satisfy her sexual demands.
Robert John is another character in the book, another American to live in Paris. But he has never been accepted by local society. The three of them travel together to Spain to see some bullfighting. After getting to know the torero Romero, Lady Ashley stops her affair with John and he returns to Paris in madness. She also leaves the torero soon to prevent him from being spoiled by her. In the end she and Jake come together again.
Death in the afternoon
This book was printed in 1932. The story takes place in Spain and describes the way a bullfight works, the functions of the single participants, of the torero, the matador, the picadero or the banderillos. To Hemingway bullfighting is more a sport than a show, a game with death. For him a torero is a "real" man when he keeps completely cool although he plays with his life.
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