ERNEST
HEMINGWAY
HIS
EARLY LIFE
ERNEST HEMINGWAY was one of
the great American writers of the twentieth century. He was born on 21 July 1899, in Oak Park, Illinois,
the second of six children. His family was strict and very religious. His
father taught his children a love of nature and the outdoor life. Ernest caught
his first fish at the age of three, and was given a shotgun for his twelfth
birthday. His mother taught him a love of music and art. At school, he was good
at English and wrote for the school newspaper. He graduated in 1917, but he
didn't go to college. He went to Kansas
City and worked as a journalist for the Star
newspaper. He learned a lot, but left after only six months to go to war.
HEMINGWAY AND WAR
Hemingway was fascinated by
war. He had wanted to become a soldier, but couldn't because he had poor
eyesight. Instead, in the First World War, he became an ambulance driver and
was sent to Italy,
where he was wounded in 1918. After the war, he went to live in Paris, where he was
encouraged in his work by the American writer Gertrude Stein. In the 1930s, he
became a war correspondent in the Spanish Civil War and World War II. Many of
his books were about war. His most successful book, For Whom the Bell Tolls,
was written in 1940 and is about the Spanish Civil War. Another novel, A
Farewell to Arms, is about the futility of war.
HIS PERSONAL
LIFE
Hemingway's success in writing
was not mirrored by similar success in his personal life. He married four
times. His first wife divorced him in 1927. He immediately married again and
moved to Key West, Florida, where he enjoyed hunting, fishing,
and drinking, but he also suffered from depression. This wasn't helped when, in
1928, his father committed suicide. Hemingway's health was not good and he had
many accidents. Two more marriages failed and he began to drink heavily. In
1954, he survived two plane crashes. In October of the same year he was awarded
the Nobel Prize for literature, but he was too ill to receive it in person.
HIS FINAL YEARS
His final years were taken up with health problems and alcohol. He began
to lose his memory and he couldn't write any more. On Sunday, 2 July 1961, Belt
Toes Hemingway killed himself with a shotgun, just as his father had done before
him.