Hemingway’s Side

A Moveable Feast, Ernest Hemingway

I suppose I read this and The Paris Wife the wrong way round, and am consequently a bit biased in my opinion that Ernest Hemingway was a bit of a bastard and Hadley Richardson was hard done by. HOWEVER, it was interesting to see how much Paula McLain had used this book in reference to her fictional version of the Hemingways’ life in Paris.

That book struck a chord with me and I’ve been dying to read one of his novels ever since. My verdict: despite the man, I love his writing. Its sparse, utilitarian feel means no word is unnecessary. So very readable; the anecdotes about some of my favourite writers of late (F. Scott Fitzgerald and Ford Madox Ford) made this a real treasure. How cliched, but Paris in the twenties as a writer sounds like a time never to be recaptured.

As a side note, the edition I got is the restored edition which was published earlier this month. It has been updated to include some of Hemingway’s drafts and sketches that didn’t make the final original text. I’d recommend getting an edition with these extras in because you see how considered and evaluated Hemingway’s writing is, and how much effort must have gone into every last sentence.

Hemingway is a Dude. Examples.

“If you are lucky enough to have lived in Paris as a young man, then wherever you go for the rest of your life, it stays with you, for Paris is a moveable feast.”

“The bulldozing of three people’s hearts to destroy one happiness and build another and the love and the good work and all that came out of it is not part of this book. I wrote it and left it out.”

“I held my hand against the silky weight and bluntness against her neck and said something secret and she said, “Afterwards.”
“You,” I said. “You.”

“This book contains material from the remises of my memory and of my heart. Even if the one has been tampered with and the other does not exist.”