My physical science professor showed my class a picture diagram of the three-pronged iceberg that sank the Titanic. A fellow peer of mine immediately said, “How did that small iceberg sink a huge ship?” My professor let the class debate back and forth for awhile before she zoomed out of the diagram to reveal a hulking mass of ice below the surface of the water. She then went on to explain that less than 10 percent of an iceberg rests above the water’s surface. Ernest Hemingway models his writing in the form of an iceberg. Hemingway’s style of writing, called the “Iceberg Theory,” divulges the facts essential to understanding the plot without explicitly stating the underlying structure, allowing the reader to sense the story’s details. Hemingway demonstrates the “Iceberg Theory” in his memoir Moveable Feast.
In one instance in Moveable Feast, Hemingway uses the “Iceberg Theory” to reveal a character’s disposition through symbolism. This theory prevails in Hemingway’s comparison of Scott Fitzgerald’s wife Zelda to that of a hawk. Hemingway says, “Zelda had hawk’s eyes …” (Hemingway 154). In this reference, Hemingway assists the reader in visualizing Zelda’s physical attributes and mental makeup without directly expressing her appearance or state of mind. Because hawks typically have beady black eyes, the eyes almost give the hawk a sense of emptiness or void; in the same manner, the reader can picture the gap in Zelda’s mind by visualizing the vacancy behind her eyes. After
In Ernest Hemingway’s A Moveable Feast he tells the tale of his early career and life in Paris. He tells of his meetings with famous writers, poets, and the times that they had. He spoke especially of Scott Fitzgerald, Gertrude Stein, and Ezra Pound. He did have a tendency to portray them a little bit unfairly. He was a little critical of them because of the fact that he shared so much time with them. Usually when people spend lots of time with each other they begin to be annoyed by their habits.
Ernest Miller Hemingway is known for his unique style and theories of writing, especially the iceberg theory. In the Death of the Afternoon, Hemingway says that “The dignity of movement of an ice-berg is due to only one-eighth of it being above water. A writer who omits things because he does not know them only makes hollow places in his writing.” (92) Simple words, vivid images, rich emotions and deep thoughts are the four basic elements of the iceberg theory. Talk about how these stories illustrate four elements of theory. In both short stories, Hemingway describes scenery and characters with simple words directly to give readers a vivid image. Under this sketch, readers can know characters’ emotion and get the theme through their imagination and analysis.
In two passages of Toni Morrison’s novel, Beloved, she describes a party at 124. Everyone become so full from the food that flows endlessly that they become angry at Baby Suggs extravagance. Baby Suggs thinks it was this overfullness that caused them all to not notice the coming of Schoolteacher and his sons. The narrator of one passage is Stamp Paid and he recounts to Paul D. what happened at the party – what they ate and how it made everyone feel.
A story is only as good as the way it is told. The way a writer uses his or her words to say something is just as important as what they don’t say. Charles Baxter, author of plethora of books and university teacher, writes a craft book that goes deeper than the surface of writing and deeper than the words written down. In Charles Baxter’s The Art of Subtext, he discusses how authors can use the words they do write just as much to express what they don’t write.
The words and works of an author are like a fingerprint. They are unique, distinct and enable you to identify the owner. Some writers choose to remodel techniques, while others choose to create their own. This is the case with Ernest Hemingway. I chose this author because he not only respects his audience but, trusts them to discover the true meanings of his works. Between each line and word is an emotion and purpose that transcends the dialogue. The former reporters roots have caused him to create his own style of writing now coined as “The Iceberg Theory”. This direct, minimalistic style leaves and enduring impression on the reader and has made his writing instantly recognizable. In Hemingway’s works, the dialogue brilliantly executed technique subtly exposes the reader to his theme that revel dark parts of the human psyche when it comes to war, love and humanity.
Whoever said, "War was hell," must have read Ernest Hemingway 's A Farewell to Arms. It is a decade defining controversial piece of American Literature. It was not only controversial because Hemingway was a depressed drunkard, but it was controversial because it doesn 't glorify war; it shows the brunt reality of the Great War. He provides the evidence of his depression through his writings by allowing his characters to be placed in horrid situations. He also shows his alcoholism this way, by allowing his characters to be alcoholics. For example, in A Farewell to Arms, Frederic Henry used alcohol to get over his pain, which would eventually lead to Henry 's jaundice, a lack of liver function, which is a symptom of cirrhosis of the liver,
The period between World War I and World War II was a very turbulent time in America. Ernest Hemingway most represented this period with his unrestrained lifestyle. This lifestyle brought him many successes, but it eventually destroyed him in the end. His stories are read in classrooms across America, but his semi-autobiographical writings are horrible role models for the students who read them. Hemingway’s lifestyle greatly influenced his writings in many ways.
Hemingway. The Iceberg Theory is a style of writing that brings the point across without
“Big Two Hearted River”, a semi-autobiographical short story by Ernest Hemingway, is a story about the main character, Nick, returning to Big Two Hearted River in order to recover from his inner wounds. Nick Adams goes on a journey alone in nature for a therapeutic purpose as he suffers from PTSD. However, Hemingway purposely avoided any direct discussion regarding to Nick’s mental wounds. The absence of the discussion is contributed by Hemingway’s writing style, the Iceberg principle. Hemingway focuses explicitly on what occurs on the surface without mentioning actual theme. This indicates that the theme of self-healing cannot be uncovered by simply looking at the text itself. In order to comprehend the actual theme of the story, the character development of Nick must be examined. This is possible since Nick Adams is a recurring character of Hemingway’s stories. The two preceding stories of “Big Two Hearted River”, “Now I lay me” and “A Way you’ll Never Be”, directly discusses Nick’s suffering from shell-shock and how he comforts himself by returning to Big Two Hearted river in his mind. The two short stories will be analyzed and connected to “Big Two Hearted River” in the essay first. This will provide a strong understanding of Nick’s psyche and the reason behind his return to nature. Then, “Big Two Hearted River” the short story itself will be carefully analyzed.
Symbolism, may be defined as a non-superficial representation of an idea or belief that goes beyond what is "seen." Earnest Hemingway's "A Clean Well-Lighted Place" uses symbolism to help convey the theme of Nihilism, the philosophy that there is nothing heavenly to believe in. It discusses that there is no supernatural reason or explanation of how the world is today. Three symbols: the soldier, the café, and the shadows of the leaves, found in Hemingway's short story clearly displays this Nihilistic theme.
Hemingway died July 2, 1961, at his home, as the result of self-inflicted gunshot wounds. Ernest Hemingway had a different style of writing than the other authors in his
“Hemingway’s greatness is in his short stories, which rival any other master of the form”(Bloom 1). The Old Man and the Sea is the most popular of his later works (1). The themes represented in this book are religion (Gurko 13-14), heroism (Brenner 31-32), and character symbolism (28). These themes combine to create a book that won Hemingway a Pulitzer Prize in 1953 and contributed to his Nobel Prize for literature in 1954 (3).
Ernest Hemingway and William Faulkner were two of the most influential writers of the twentieth century. While they lived during the same period, their writing styles differed drastically. This can be seen in texts such as Hemingway’s “Hills Like White Elephants” and “A Clean, Well-Lighted Place,” and Faulkner’s “Barn Burning”. Hemingway’s style puts little focus on specific character details, which makes his stories seem like they could be about any person, including the reader, while Faulkner’s style puts a lot of focus on specific character details, which makes every detail and every character seem important to the reader. Both authors have styles indirect to their points, which forces the readers to figure out information on their own and leaves the purposes of texts more open to interpretation.
In WWI nearly 37 million people died, Ernest Hemingway was not one of them. Hemingway was an ambulance driver in the Italian army until he was eventually injured by an artillery shell. Once Hemingway returned home he began writing a book based on his experiences of WWI. That book is A Farewell to Arms. In 1929 he published this book and it was met with mixed feelings and calls for it to be banned. I believe that A Farewell to Arms should not be banned because it brings to light many different viewpoints about the war as well as strong literary strategies beneficial to good writing.
You can identify Hemingway’s “Iceberg Theory” in “The Doctor and the Doctor’s Wife.” The book starts off with conflict. There is tension between him and Dick Boulton, his son Eddy, and a Billy Tabeshaw. They see logs at a lake, logs like these typically never are claimed and left there to rot. The doctor saw these logs and took upon himself to to collect the logs for use, since they might not ever be claimed by anyone.The doctor hired the Indians to come and gather up the logs. The Indian men that the Doctor has hired sees the wood and assumes that the doctor had stolen the wood. Dick confronts the doctor about the wood. “Dick even looks to see where the logs came from.” He accuses him of stealing the wood by the lake. When Dick does this, the doctor is instantly offended and mad. The doctor is infurious and demands the men to leave at one instance. The