Themes of Ernest Hemingway’s Novels
Few people have had the chance to experience what Ernest Hemingway did. His life was far from boring. Ernest Hemingway was born on July 21, 1899, in Oak Park, Illinois, and became one of the twentieth-centuries best writers. During his lifetime, he saw five wars, survived four car accidents and two plane crashes, won the Nobel Prize and a Pulitzer Prize. He was married four times and had three sons. In addition, Hemingway wrote six novels and became a great writer. Many critics have said that, “Half of the 20th century writers have tried to imitate Hemingway’s style, and the other half have tried not to”(Oliver 141). However, as Hemingway aged he was constantly bothered by mental and physical ailments. He died of self-inflicted gunshot wounds in Ketchum, Idaho, on July 2, 1961. His works, nevertheless, lived on. My purpose in this report is to discuss the major themes of Ernest Hemingway’s novels.
The first novel Hemingway wrote was The Sun Also Rises, in 1926. Critics said that the book did well for his first novel, and they described it as, “A satirical picture of the dissolute life of the Lost Generation in postwar Europe”(Hays 54.) The Sun Also Rises depicts life in

Earnest Hemingway’s final novel was The Old Man in the Sea, which he wrote in 1950. The main character, Santiago is an old, lonely, unhappy man, which may have depicted Hemingway in his old age. Santiago travels out farther than he should, but he does catch an enormous marlin. Unfortunately, a shark eats the fish before he can get it back to shore.

Ernest Hemingway’s fifth novel, Across the River and Into the Trees, written in 1950, is, “Generally considered to be one of his least successful. Early reviewers response seems more favorable”(Oliver 2). In the novel, the main character, Richard Cantwell, is a United States Army Officer who dies of a heart attack. Before his death, Richard is on a duck-hunting trip, and this is where the novel is set. Hemingway shows that the duck-hunting trip is how Richard sees his life: not as life but as awaiting death. Hemingway writes of Cantwell’s World War II experience, which may have been similar to his own. The major theme of Across the River and Into the Trees is death and that death is inevitable. This novel was probably Hemingway’s least known.

The main theme of this novel is war disrupts life and that time period is a lost generation. The Sun Also Rises is “Probably Hemingway’s best-known novel, certainly the one on which much of his reputation stands”(Oliver 315.)

In 1937, Ernest Hemingway wrote his third novel, To Have and Have Not. This work is about the effects of the depression on the people of Key West, Florida. The “Haves” are the rich tourist who pays little attention to