“Pure Literature Is Today Doomed”: Hemingway’s Modernism and the transatlantic review

Abstract

Hemingway’s editorial role in Ford Madox Ford’s second modernist little magazine project, the transatlantic review, is overlooked both in critical scholarship and within the scope of his biography. The editorials he published in the review reveal Hemingway’s assessment of the modernist movement as it developed around him and his devotion to the idea of “pure literature” that stems from authentic inspiration rather than contrived experimentalism. This article offers an analysis of four such editorials and how they, along with his leadership over the July and August issues of the magazine, provide insight into Hemingway’s development as a modernist figure and the brand of modernism he would promote throughout his career.