Biography

Ernest Hemingway was one of the most influential writers of all time and he will not soon be forgotten for his contributions to literature.  Hemingway was born on July 21, 1899 in Oak Park, Illinois and he died July 2, 1961 in Ketchum, Idaho.  He had a pretty normal beginning to his life he was raised conservative and spent summers on Walloon Lake in Michigan.  He went to a public high school where he worked on the school paper called the Trapeze.  He decided not to pursue a college education instead he took a job reporting for the Kansas City Star.  Hemingway desperately wanted to join the fight during World War I, but was not accepted due to his poor vision.  He was however, able to get close to the action by volunteering as an ambulance driver in December of 1917.  Shortly after his entry into the war Hemingway was badly wounded and was forced to leave the conflict and recover at a hospital in Milan.  This is where he met Agnes von Kurowsky and a wonderful romance had been sparked.  A Farewell To Arms was his literary depiction of this ordeal.  As with any war he was left scarred and upon returning home he realized ho difficult it would be to lead a normal life.  His family could not possibly understand the psychological turmoil he was forced to suffer through.  He worked many odd jobs and continued to write throughout this time.

Hemingway was married four times and was the father of three sons during his life.  His literary style was refreshing and completely different from others of his time.  He wrote in statements and short uttering’s which left much to the imagination. He did not believe in exaggeration or elaboration to make his point therefore anything unneeded was eliminated.  War in general was his primary inspiration, that and nature.  He seemed captivated almost by the complexity of war and it is evident in so many of his works.  He was a troubled man and even though he was a legend of his time he suffered such strife in his person life.  He traveled much throughout his life and covered several wars as a reporter.  His travels were put into his fiction and he developed characters that embodied his own values and perspective of live.

Hemingway wrote much throughout his lifetime and had too many short stories and novels to list.  Some of his best known publishing’s are In Our Time, The Sun Also Rises, A Farewell to Arms, For Whom the Bell Tolls, The Old Man and the Sea, and so many others.  He won the Pulitzer Prize in 1953 for The Old Man and the Sea and was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1954.  He died a decorated war hero and a literary genius that paved the way for many great authors.  Hemingway was a brilliant and troubled soul whom we should all hope to emulate in some way.  In the end his mental state was beyond repair and he took his own life by shooting himself in the head with a shotgun.  Tragic as his death was, comfort can be found throughout his writings and we can rest assured that he died a great man and a hero. 

Sources:

http://www.biography.com/people/ernest-hemingway

http://www.lostgeneration.com/