The+Snows+of+Kilimanjaro

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"The Snows of Kilimanjaro" is a very complex short story from the Modernism time period. It is very easy to see how one can classify this story into the Modernism time period because it has the characteristics that put it there. Hemingway was a very well known author for many reasons. The events in his life helped him become the writer that he was later in his life (Baker). Hemingway had a certain consistency in his work that he never strayed from, especially in "The Snows of Kilimanjaro" (Hemingway 1639). This consistency contains characteristics of the Modernism time period which can be related to other works of that time period as well. "The Snows of Kilimanjaro" will always be remembered as a short story if the Modernism time period. Ernest Hemingway has many aspects of his short story that relate to the Modernism time period. The story involves two people and their short time on Mount Kilimanjaro (Hemingway 1634). This relates to Modernism because the story talks about their values and beliefs which are very important to Modernism (Baker). The woman values staying alive and the man believes his fate is to die on the mountain (Hemingway 1638). This is inferred because the story says the woman went out hunting for wood in order to stay alive and the man did nothing to help him or the woman out (Hemingway 1635-1642). There is also a struggle about a life or death situation. This is also an aspect of Modernism because it talks about relative problems and conflicts that people could relate to during this time period. Hemingway started out his early career as an ambulance driver during the war (Baker). He got a different view on life during this job and it greatly affected how and what he wrote about. He was also a reporter in Europe on the war events (Baker). He learned what other people’s views on life were and had a broader view on life which he brought into the short story. He traveled to Africa with his wife during his later years which inspired him to write "The Snows of Kilimanjaro" (Baker). Many things in his life helped him to accomplish his short story. Many of his works can be related to one another because they have the same themes to one another. An example is "The Snows of Kilimanjaro" with "The Old Man and the Sea" (Hemingway Old Man and the Sea). Both of these have a gloom to them that is reflected from the type of life he led (Baker). He wrote about true feelings that people could relate to though which made his works resemble the Modernism time period. This short story also relates to the poems //"//Study of Two Pears" and "Apostrophe to Man" because they are all Modernist works. They all have the characteristics of Modernism like talking about a person’s values and beliefs (Baym 1634). They also have the theme of creativity. Each one of these are creative in their own way but they all try to get the reader to think about certain situations differently. The //Snows of Kilimanjaro// tries to get people to understand where Harry is coming from when he says he knows he is going to die rather than think he is stupid (Hemingway 1637). They all can be traced back with the same root of Modernism at the base. 'The Snows of Kilimanjaro" is a timeless short story that displays many different aspects of Modernism in it. It gets people thinking about their own life and goals as it talks about the main character’s dreams he wished he had done before he died (Hemingway 1639). Hemingway also displays his own characteristics in this story as well as the characteristics of Modernism. Many of his works have the same themes and can also be related to other works in the Modernism time period like "Study of Two Pears" and "Apostrophe to Man". This story is a very well written story that exemplifies all aspects of the Modernism writing style (Baker).

Baker, Carlos. //Hemingway: The Writer as Artist//. Fourth edition, Princeton University Press: Princeton, NJ, 1972. Web. Baym, Nina. "Ernest Hemingway." The Norton Anthology American Literature. 4th ed. Vol. 2. New York: W.W. Norton & Company Incorporated, 1979. 1633-634. Print. Hemingway, Ernest. The Old Man and the Sea. New York: Scribner, 1952. Print. Hemingway, Ernest. "The Snows of Kilimanjaro." The Norton Anthology American Literature. 4th ed. Vol. 2. New York: W.W. Norton & Company Incorporated, 1979. 1635-651. Print.

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Ernest Hemingway is the author of "The Snows of Kilimanjaro". It is an intensely confusing short story, but after disentangling all of the man’s memories from the real story taking place, it becomes obvious why it is a Modernist work. In Modernism it is common to find that there is no absolute truth, it is only relative (Lorcher). Hemingway plays on this many times in the story (Hemingway 1635-1651). The main character, Harry, also questions a lot of things about the way things are in the world which is another typical modernist characteristic (Reuben). This short story is deeply related to Hemingway’s own life as well. During the time that Hemingway wrote this, he was worrying about his productivity in writing since it slowed remarkably later in his life (Gladstein). This short story first presented one of Hemingway’s new themes of a “writer trying to preserve his talent in an atmosphere of celebrity, luxury, and leisure” (Baym 1634). This theme actually appears Hemingway’s “The Old Man and the Sea” as well. Compared to “I, Too” by Langston Hughes, and “Incident” by Countee Cullen, "The Snows of Kilimanjaro" is basically the complete opposite other than a few traits. Ernest Hemingway wrote "The Snows of Kilimanjaro" during the Modernist period, and along with using Modernist characteristics, he used many details of his life.

To Hemingway, “World War I destroyed the illusion that acting virtuously brought about good” (Lorcher). This clearly shows through this work. ““You can’t die if you don’t give up.” “Where did you read that? You’re such a bloody fool”” (Hemingway 1636). This quote clearly shows that Hemingway’s character believes that there is no eluding death if it is meant to happen. Another Modernist point of view that Hemingway has is there not being an absolute truth for Harry as “It was not so much that he lied as that there was no truth to tell” (Hemingway 1640). Modernists also tended to break from form and tradition quite a bit (Reuben). Hemingway does this by using a number of flashbacks, which are at first confusing, but easily distinguished from the rest of the story due to italicized paragraphs (Hemingway 1635-1651).

"The Snows of Kilimanjaro" was certainly influenced by Hemingway’s life. Throughout the story, Harry talks about never getting to write the stories he wanted to and he gets very anxious to write as much as possible before he dies (Hemingway 1644). During this time period Hemingway was “anxious about the slowing of his writing productivity” (Gladstein) so certainly some of this rubbed off on the character of Harry. There are many ways in which Harry is like Hemingway himself. Hemingway was injured on a trip to Africa as well (Baym1635). it was due to a plane crash, and he did not die, but he never was fully healthy mentally after that (Baym 1635). Another was that his life is reflected through this story is the way he felt about the people he was beginning to associate with. He was not sure how he felt about all the crowds of wealthy famous people that his wife’s fame and money brought him, and thus put it into the story (Gladstein). In "The Snows of Kilimanjaro" Harry talks about how he was planning on writing about the rich and famous since he would have actually known more about them than other writers did, but he never did; he left his talent for comfort (Hemingway 1641).

A common theme between "The Snows of Kilimanjaro" and “The Old Man and the Sea” is that the main characters tried to keep their wits about them as they were tried by life (Hemingway "The Snows of Kilimanjaro" and ”The Old Man and the Sea”). It is, however, a bit difficult to find similarities between this short story and “Incident” by Countee Cullen and “I, Too” by Langston Hughes. Both Countee Cullen’s and Langston Hughes’s poems are about civil rights and mainly written for the Harlem Renaissance. Hemingway wrote more for the general public than the other two authors and used more of a symbolic message than the other two. Hemingway used Mount Kilimanjaro as a symbol of a journey not taken (Gladstein). The three poems are not really comparable to each other seeing as they are two completely different ends of the spectrum.

In conclusion, Hemingway is a completely different style author than other modernist poets such as Countee Cullen and Langston Hughes. Hemingway was a much more symbolic writer than the other two. In his short story "The Snows of Kilimanjaro", Hemingway shows modernism through using ideas such as relative truth, breaking from traditional form, and the distrust that acting honorably bring about good. He also mirrored his life in many ways in this novel, especially that he was anxious about his writing productivity being low. Altogether, Ernest Hemingway was a Modernist writer influenced by things around him and his own life.

Baym, Nina. "Ernest Hemingway." //The Norton Anthology American Literature//. 4th ed. Vol. 2. New York: W.W. Norton & Company Incorporated, 1979. 1633-634. Print. Cullen, Countee. "Incident by Countée Cullen." //PoemHunter.Com - Thousands of Poems and Poets.. Poetry Search Engine//. Web. 03 May 2010. . Gladstein, Mimi R. "Bloom's Literary Reference Online." //Facts On File Online Databases//. Web. 04 May 2010. . Hemingway, Ernest. //The Old Man and the Sea//. New York: Scribner, 1952. Print. Hemingway, Ernest. "The Snows of Kilimanjaro." //The Norton Anthology American Literature//. 4th ed. Vol. 2. New York: W.W. Norton & Company Incorporated, 1979. 1635-651. Print. Hughes, Langston. "I, Too by Langston Hughes." //PoemHunter.Com - Thousands of Poems and Poets.. Poetry Search Engine//. Web. 04 May 2010. . Lorcher, Trent. "Modernism in Literature: What Is Modernism?" //Find Health, Education, Science & Technology Articles, Reviews, How-To and Tech Tips At Bright Hub - Apply To Be A Writer Today!// Web. 04 May 2010. . Reuben, Paul P. "PAL: Early Twentieth Century: A Brief Introduction." //California State University Stanislaus | Home//. Web. 04 May 2010. .

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