A Moveable Feast - Ernest Hemingway

Poor but happy in the City of Light

A MOVEABLE FEAST is an autobiographical account by Ernest Hemingway of his time as a struggling young writer spent in Paris and (briefly) Schruns (Austria) with his (first) wife, Hadley, during the period 1921-26. Ernest began writing the book in 1957, and it was edited and published after the author's death by his (fourth) wife, Mary.

I've decided that to appreciate this volume the reader must be one or more of the following:

1. An Ernest Hemingway fan.

2. An F. Scott Fitzgerald fan.

3. Familiar with, and interested in, any of the following literary figures: Gertrude Stein, Sylvia Beach, James Joyce, Ezra Pound, Ford Madox Ford.

4. Self-reliant enough to be footloose and fancy free in a foreign city, particularly Paris.

Much of A MOVEABLE FEAST seems rather aimless as Hemingway rattles about his quarter of the French capital, occasionally writing, and often visiting or chatting with other members of the American expatriate community in post-war Paris known as the "Lost Generation". I guess one had to be there to understand why they were "lost".

In the best and longest chapter, "Scott Fitzgerald", Ernest relates a journey he and Scott took to Lyon to recover an automobile the latter had left there - a trip that would have tried the patience of Job and portrays Fitzgerald, though not maliciously on Hemingway's part, as a hypochondriacal alcoholic. On being asked by Hadley if the trip had taught him anything, Ernest replies with what is perhaps the book's most perceptive snippet of wisdom:

"Never go on trips with anyone you do not love."

Notwithstanding the occasional and mild entertainment value of A MOVEABLE FEAST, there was nothing about it that compels me to read anything else by its author. Is Hemingway overrated, or is it just me? Most likely the latter. And, as far as sampling Fitzgerald is concerned, I saw the 1974 film adaptation of THE GREAT GATSBY when it was first released and was, as I recall, bored silly, though my date thought Redford to die for.

I'm awarding four stars solely on the basis of Hemingway's statement expressed early on:

"Going down the stairs when I had worked well ... was a wonderful feeling and I was free then to walk anywhere in Paris." I've tasted that freedom myself in many of the world's great cities, and it's been one of the great and too infrequent joys of my life. Hemingway's memory of his freedom at that time and place is the narrative's central support and well worth the telling.

Paris avec extra Fromage

Evoking in writing the spirit of Paris in the 1920s, like Soho of the 1950s, it is always going to be difficult (as a knowing 21st century reader) not to see cliches in the landscape or become weary of the numerous chance encounters with literary icons. Hemingway manages to capture a Paris that we would all like to believe once existed.

However, a word of warning. Some of the dialogue is so cheesy as to jar heavily with our modern sensibilities. If you can stomach this excerpt from the 'Shakespeare and Company' chapter, there is much to enjoy in this book.

"We'll come home and eat here and have a lovely meal and drink Beaune from the co-operative you can see right out of the window there with the price of the Beaune in the window. And afterwards we'll read and then go to bed and make love"
"And never love anyone else but each other"
"No. Never."

Thank goodness for postmodernism.

master piece

as soon as i started reading this book i feel in love with the writting and words he used... it was so romanticly how he spoke about paris and his friends and family.
i hope reading it a second time will take me to the same beautiful paris.

One of the lucky ones

By the end of his life, Hemingway and his narratives had become so intertwined in so many ways that it was often impossible to know where the fiction ended and the real life began. Hemingway was a master at incorporating elements of his own life and experience into his fiction, and acting out elements of his stories in his own life, that by the time of this text, 'A Moveable Feast', written near the end of his life (and published posthumously) the boundary between fact and fiction was a very permeable boundary.

Of course, for Hemingway, truth was about as fascinating as fiction could ever be. With this particular text, the reader learns much about Hemingway and the particular time of the artists and post-World War I community in Paris. The inscription shows the influence that this time and experience had on Hemingway:

'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.'

Hemingway wrote this to a friend in 1950, several years before working on this text. Of course, the Moveable Feast that was Paris for Hemingway was not simply Paris, but a particular Paris - the Paris of Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas, of Ford Madox Ford and Ezra Pound, of F. Scott Fitzgerald and Zelda. Hemingway has a no-holds-barred sense of writing, both for those he liked and those he didn't. His description of Zelda, for example, in both physical and personality aspects, is a rather scathing critique - F. Scott Fitzgerald and Hemingway were competitive friends, but Zelda Fitzgerald and Hemingway were rivals in many more ways. Hemingway's recollections of his wife, Hadley, are equally intimate, often romantic while remaining realistic.

The Paris that was the post-war-to-end-all-wars bastion of moderns and artistry is no longer present, yet still remains an iconic paradise of sorts given the work that was produced from this hot-house of talent, reaching half a century later into the work of Hemingway for one last, grand proclamation.

This is an important book, to be read by those who appreciate Hemingway, American authors, international influences in literature, and culture. Published after his death, this was perhaps Hemingway's way of having the final word in many then-unfinished conversations.

Excellent

Very, very good. Deceptively simple writing that draws you in.