Ernest Hemingway- a great writer

Ernest Hemingway was born into the “Lost generation” during the 1st world war, and is one of the greatest writers in Americas history. Many of those who are a part the “Lost generation” was strongly affected by the war, and some were traumatised and disillusioned. Hemingway himself participated in both the first and second world war, and travelled in Europe and Cuba. He used his experiences and personal life and wrote about them in his stories. Hemingway thought it was important to write “as true” as possible in order to be a good writer.

“A days wait” is a short Hemingway wrote about with a personal experience with his son. The setting takes place at winter time, and when the son; Schatz gets sick. He refuses to tell the father that he is sick and tries to lie and cover up to make his father believe nothing is wrong. After a while the father realises the the son is sick and takes him to the doctor. It turns out that the son misunderstood the thermometer and thought he was deadly sick, but he only had a fever. Schatz didn’t want to tell his father that he was sick. Hemingway chose to describe the setting in “A days wait” as cold, bright and frozen which gives you a feeling like it’s a negative atmosphere. Everything is not exploited in the text- he also writes “under the lines” as a technique to persuade the writer. His writing style is characterized by the many dialogs, which are direct and concise, and contain short lines. In contrast he used long sentences and a more detailed language for descriptions. Hemingway’s words were wisely chosen, and he did not use a lot adjectives or adverbs, but rather precise nouns and verbs.

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-Hannah