Before I read this book, I was of course aware of Ernest Hemingway but not quite familiar with his work. However this book seemed like it would be an interesting read. Ernest was married four times during his life and this book is told from each of his wives point of view. Ernest was a terrible philanderer and it was difficult to ever feel sympathy for him. His character was seemingly not entirely plasant in my opinion, he came across as basically a bit of a lush and quite arrogant. I'm sure no one doubted his genius but it came atatched to a troubled man.
But despite this, Ernest managed to be married 4 times and these women were apparantly devoted to him no matter what. They accepted his cheating as part of him just being Ernest Hemingway and apparantly no matter how much it upset them - it was the price to pay for being Mrs Hemingway.
The interesting thing is that the four wives are all quite different in character from each other. Hadley was demure, Fife was glamourous, Martha was adventurous and brave and Mary, well she was a loyal wife to the end.
It's hard to know what to feel about this bunch of women, all interconnected with one common denominator - Ernest Hemingway and told from their eyes. But despite Ernest's flaws as a person the fact is that they all stuck by him until he moved on to the next wife.
It was an interesting book, I'll admit that part of the way through I wasn't sure if I was enjoying it but pretty soon I found myself intrigued by each woman's story and what made them tick. The book jumped around a little from different times and years in each of the wives life which at times made it hard to follow and I found myself flicking back chapters to see where I was but overall it was an enjoyable read. I'm not quite how much of this story is accurate, obviously these are real life people...but of course i'm sure much of the scenes are fictionalised. The author sourced the material from various memoirs and papers to get a sense of historical accuracy.
So for a not quite non fiction book I'd recommend it as a good read that you can dip in and out of easily.
No comments:
Post a Comment