Hemingway & The Lost Generation

Ernest, Hadley, & Bumby Hemingway

Recently I came across the book Paris Without End: The True Story of Hemingway's First Wife by Gioia Diliberto and found myself intrigued enough to check it out.  I did not know a lot about Ernest Hemingway and was curious to know more about what kind of person he was, where he came from and how he went on to write some of literature's classic works.  While the story focuses primarily on Hadley Richardson, the first woman Hemingway married, there is a lot about Ernest himself that the author gleaned from Hadley and Ernest's papers that provides additional insight into Hemingway the man.  I became immersed in their world: 1920's Paris, the colorful characters and writers whose lives they were allowed to move in and out of, the food they ate, the wine they drank, and the exotic places they visited.  Several of the people they hung out were great writers themselves, such as John Dos Passos, Ford Madox Ford, F. Scott Fitzgerald, T.S. Eliot, Joseph Conrad and Gertrude Stein.  They could go skiing in Germany, watch the bulls run in Pamplona, or take a trip to England all on mere francs a day. 

Paris Without End was a wonderful piece of history to read and it read like a novel even though it was a non-fiction title.  After reading this I went on to read A Moveable Feast since so many quotes were mentioned I had to go and read the entire book.  I then had to read The Great Gatsby since Hemingway spent so much time with Fitzgerald and gave high praise for the book.  So one book inspired me to read two others, but those will not be the last, as I have put the other authors on my list of books to read.

If you are also interested in reading about this unique time in the realm of literature or any of the authors mentioned, click on the links to place holds.

A new title that has just arrived is The Letters of Ernest Hemingway, Volume 1, 1907-1922 edited by Sandra Spanier and Robert W Trogdo

Works of fiction:

The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway

A Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and other Jazz Age Stories by F. Scott Fitzgerald

This Side of Paradise by F. Scott Fitzgerald

Nineteen Nineteen by John Dos Passos

Manhattan Transfer by John Dos Passos

The Good Soldier: A Tale of Passion by Ford Madox Ford

Complete Poems and Plays by T.S. Eliot

Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad

Other works inspired by the city of Paris:

Paris to the Past: Traveling through French History by Train by Ina Caro

Two Lives: Gertrude and Alice by Janet Malcolm

American Expatriate Writing and the Paris Moment: Modernism and Place by Donald Pizer

On the Left Bank, 1929-1933 by Wambly Bald, edited by Benjamin Franklin V

Walks in Hemingway's Paris: A Guide to Paris for the Literary Traveler by Noel Riley Fitch

Also, look for some Lost Generation themed movies in the catalog, including The Sun Also Rises, The Great Gatsby, & Midnight in Paris!  There will also be a new version of The Great Gatsby coming out in December.