I love Ernest Hemingway. That’s probably something you should know about me. I love his writing so much that I’ve been savoring it, because I never want to run out of new things to read. First I read A Farewell To Arms – to this day one of my favorite novels of all time. Then The Sun Also Rises. Loved it. I’ve reread these two novels many times. Then I read The Old Man and the Sea. I didn’t like it as much as the other two, but still a beautiful tale. And that’s it. That’s all I’ve allowed myself to read for ten years. It’s ridiculous. And it stops…well, soon. But first, I picked up this book: a fictional account of the beginnings and endings of all four of Mr. Hemingway’s marriages.
Mrs. Hemingway is written in four parts (around 80 pages each), through the perspective of each of his wives: Hadley (my favorite), Pauline (nickname:Fife, as in Pfeiffer, her last name), Martha, and Mary. Before reading this book, I was only familiar with details from his marriage to Hadley and the transition into Pauline, so I did learn quite a bit reading this book.
Each section jumps back and forth from the beginning of each relationship to the end, and many times they overlap one another (Hemingway was never known for his fidelity 😕). It had to be tough for the author to decide what vignettes to include for each wife that showed the exciting journey of falling in love, and also the disintegrating of the relationships in an 80 page limit, but I feel she did a great job capturing the right moments.
Framed around the beginnings and ending of relationships, it is obviously a very emotional book. Hadley was his first love, who he met when he was 21. They had a son together (Bumby) and lived for most of their marriage in Paris. It was there Hadley and Ernest became acquainted with Pauline Pfeiffer and her sister. Pauline became fast friends with the pair, and slowly fell in love with Ernest. The affair went on awhile with Ernest still married to Hadley, but finally they divorced and he married Pauline. They lived happily together for many years, mostly in the Florida keys, and had two sons. Ernest went back to working as a war correspondent during this period. He met his next wife, Martha Gellhorn, near his home in Florida and convinced her to become a fellow war correspondent (as she was also a writer). In Spain they began their love affair, and Pauline was pissed when she found out. She is the only of his wives to really hold lasting spite for him, or so this book would have you believe. He married Martha, and basically did the same thing to her, meeting Mary Welsh while working as a correspondent in London (Mary was also married at the time, the first ‘double’ affair), and it was Mary who was with him at the end of his life.
While this book is a fictionalized account (no one knows exactly what was said behind closed doors), it is also drawn from historical accounts, letters, and telegrams, so everything in the book is at least in the gist of what actually occurred.
Ernest Hemingway had a big life, there are no doubts about that, and I loved seeing little snipits of it through the lens of the women in his life. This is the second fictionalized book about Hemingway’s life I have read. The other was The Paris Wife, which is told from Hadley’s perspective about their life. I highly recommend it.
Overall I really enjoyed Mrs. Hemingway. It was hard to put down at times. I love reading about Hemingway’s life. He lived in a different time, that’s for sure, and it makes me wonder how he would have liked the modern world. He wouldn’t have, probably.
Soon I will be officially starting a Hemingway reading project here on my blog. If you’re interested in seeing more about his books, don’t forget to follow my blog for all the updates!
The Litertarian 
1 Comment