First published 1976
Michael Reynolds investigates the creation of Ernest Hemingway's celebrated World War I novel A Farewell to Arms. Reynolds traces how Hemingway transformed his personal experiences as an ambulance driver on the Italian front into fiction. The author examines Hemingway's wartime service, his wounding near Fossalta, and his romance with nurse Agnes von Kurowsky. Reynolds shows how these biographical elements became the foundation for Frederic Henry's story and his love affair with Catherine Barkley. The book reveals Hemingway's writing process and his struggle to capture the reality of war and loss. Reynolds demonstrates how the young author converted trauma and memory into literature that would define his career.
Genres: historical-fiction, 20th-century, biography-memoir, military-history, academic, american-history
Vibes: intimate, suspenseful, thought-provoking
Tropes: based-on-true-story, trauma-and-memory
Setting: Italy, Fossalta
Period: World War I
326 pages · Hardcover · Princeton University Press