Ernest Hemingway: A New Life by James M. Hutchisson

Abstract

Reviewed by: Ernest Hemingway: A New Life by James M. Hutchisson Scott D. Yarbrough Ernest Hemingway: A New Life. James M. Hutchisson. Penn State UP, 2016. 320 pp. Cloth $37.95. As Kirk Curnutt noted in the Spring 2017 issue of The Hemingway Review, there's no shortage of Hemingway biographies. From the epic and magisterial (Baker's Ernest Hemingway: A Life Story, 1969, and of course Reynolds's five volume biography), to the focused (Hendrickson's Hemingway's Boat, 2012, Blume's Everybody Behaves Badly, 2016), to the brief (Kale's Ernest Hemingway for the Critical Lives series of Reaktion Books, 2016), life stories and biographical studies of the twentieth century's most famous author continue to populate the field like dandelions. The first question asked of any new biography, then, in this rich landscape of competing and at times contradictory books, is: What does any particular work bring to the table? Why should the cash—and time-strapped—aficionado or scholar invest money and energy in yet another in this recent succession of Hemingway biographies? James M. Hutchisson, who has written biographies of Edgar Allan Poe, Dubose Heyward, and Sinclair Lewis, is one of the latest entries to the field. His book, Ernest Hemingway: A New Life, works to separate itself from the recent abundance of biographical choices in a number of different ways. First and foremost, he structures most of the major chapters around the time periods of significant works produced by Hemingway with a particular focus on how each "major novel gestated in Hemingway's consciousness and was brought to [End Page 119] fruition during a relationship—whether sexual or not—with a woman" (3). Although Hutchisson isn't the first to make this observation, the book's structure successfully forefronts this relationship between Hemingway's works and the objects of his affection. Many of the chapter titles reflect this focus: "Italy and Agnes von Kurowsky," "Michigan, Chicago, and Hadley," "Pauline, Key West, and A Farewell to Arms," "Jane Mason in Africa," and so on. In many cases (such as in his chapters on A Farewell to Arms and For Whom the Bell Tolls), this approach pays dividends, offering insights into Hemingway's creative process. At other times (especially in the depiction of Hemingway's later years with Mary), the structure feels a bit forced. As the author of a well-received biography on Poe, Hutchisson knows a bit about authors whose legends tend to overtake their lives. He writes that Hemingway tried to use his writing to "reconcile the contradictory elements within himself" and that as a biographer he "tend[s] to see Hemingway more sympathetically than many earlier writers have" (2). Taken as a whole, I'm not convinced that Hutchisson's study is any more sympathetic than works by other biographers who strive more or less to remain objective in their examination of Hemingway, but Hutchisson does thoroughly consider Hemingway's depression and medical difficulties, and convincingly points out how many of Hemingway's mood and personality swings can be traced to various medicines and treatments. He notes, for example, that Hemingway's hypertension medicine, Reserpine, "was later shown to have significant depressive effects." Additionally, Hemingway's physician in Cuba had him on a "daily cocktail of Wychol, Ritalin, Serpasil, Equanil, and Seconal—in addition to the Reserpine." One of Hemingway's later Mayo Clinic doctors noted Ritalin and Serpasil exacerbated Hemingway's depression (242). I would be interested in Hutchisson's opinion of Andrew Farah's recently published Hemingway's Brain (U South Carolina P, 2017). Hutchisson takes issue with the notion that Hemingway had a distant or problematic relationship with his mother, citing how the writer continued to send her money, support her, and write loving letters to her, even as he groused about her to others. Hutchisson theorizes that perhaps Hemingway's need to distance himself from Grace Hemingway is a result of her possibly platonic, possibly homosexual relationship with housekeeper and "mother's helper" Ruth Arnold, and the famous writer's need to "protect his masculine image against revelations his mother may have been 'different' in any way." Hutchisson does tend to draw conclusions which are somewhat tenuous throughout...