Abstract
This study aims at analyzing Hemingway's selected novels and short stories in order to discover their common ground in terms of the masochistic properties. The overriding questions concerning this paper will center on the multiple ways in which Hemingway's sexual fluidity contribute to the formation of the masochistic behavior in his writings and also the degree to which masochistic properties contributed to the aesthetic and literal values of his writings. This paper concentrates on the specific elements of masochism which pertain most to the texts, including symbiosis/separation dichotomy (closely related to the theme of humiliation), fetishism, pain, violence and death. The author wishes to unveil the oft-hidden submissive and feminine characteristics of the masculine characters that abound in Hemingway’s writings.
Highlights
This study aims at analyzing Hemingway’s selected novels and short stories in order to identify possible shared masochistic symptoms
The emphasis of this paper, is to find evidence in the works of Hemingway in what pertains to the latter part of the definition; encompassing the quality of dominance, submissiveness and other masochistic elements located in his writings, including symbiosis/ separation dichotomy, fetishism, pain, violence and death
The strength and velocity of Hemingway’s depiction of his male hero’s experiences of and confrontations with war in the decades that followed the two World Wars shadowed the psychological implications and gender conflicts the man had left between the lines of his stories, compelling many readers and scholars to overlook, for one thing, the gender-issue implications embedded within the characterization
Summary
This study aims at analyzing Hemingway’s selected novels and short stories in order to identify possible shared masochistic symptoms. As a strict and demanding father, he used to punish the children on various occasions and in different ways which included using a razor strop or frightening them by threatening to send them to state prison (Stanford, 19) This caused a deep-rooted feeling of vexation in young Ernest in particular so that, as biographies attest, “he had wished his father dead [many times in his childhood] and had [virtually] pointed a loaded gun at his head” (Martin, 6). As Martin notes “Grace’s inconsistency regarding gender may have been confusing and difficult for the young boy to reconcile, possibly influencing him toward overt masculine pursuits later in adult life” (6) The anger he bore toward his father, along with the inconsistencies regarding the issue of gender and identity caused by the incoherent treatment by his mother, tended to spill over throughout his adult life and career in the form of the androgynous inclinations which are in stark opposition to the mythic Machismo picture Hemingway wished to portray of himself. The overriding questions concerning this paper will revolve around the multiple ways in which Hemingway’s sexual fluidity contributes to the formation of masochistic behavior in his writings and the degree to which masochistic properties contributed to the aesthetic and literary values of his writings
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