{"id":1129,"date":"2013-12-17T15:15:37","date_gmt":"2013-12-17T15:15:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/2013\/12\/17\/annotation-tuesday-lillian-ross-and-ernest-hemingway\/"},"modified":"2024-03-04T19:20:08","modified_gmt":"2024-03-04T19:20:08","slug":"annotation-tuesday-lillian-ross-and-ernest-hemingway","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/niemanstoryboard.org\/2013\/12\/17\/annotation-tuesday-lillian-ross-and-ernest-hemingway\/","title":{"rendered":"Annotation Tuesday! Lillian Ross and Ernest Hemingway"},"content":{"rendered":" \n
\n
\n It\u2019s easy, now, to see Lillian Ross\u2019s 1950 New Yorker <\/i>Profile of Ernest Hemingway for what it is: a masterpiece. But 63 years ago, this wasn\u2019t so obvious. Ross, as one Hemingway biographer put it, was seen by her critics as \u201ca journalistic Delilah<\/a>\u201d who had written a \u201chatchet job<\/a>.\u201d In truth, her sin was to show the great writer \u2014 at the time, her friend of three years \u2014 as he was: a bawdy, brilliant man who grunted a lot; who called his pal, Marlene Dietrich, \u201cThe Kraut;\u201d who wasn\u2019t afraid to partake in the richness of life, which meant booze and caviar; and who had no qualms about placing himself within the pantheon of writers, living and dead. \u201cI\u2019ve fought two draws with Mr. Stendhal,\u201d he told Ross, \u201cand I think I had an edge in the last one.\u201d

Even in a magazine known for the Profile \u2014\u00a0the magazine that, in fact, has been credited with creating the concept, as an art form \u2014\u00a0this one stood out. Editors included it in Life Stories<\/a><\/i>, an anthology of New Yorker <\/i>profiles; Ben Yagoda and Kevin Kerrane included an excerpt in their book The Art of Fact: A Historical Anthology of Literary Journalism<\/a><\/i>; and teachers of narrative consider it a class staple. The profile functions equally as narrative because Ross followed Hemingway during a short visit to New York \u2014\u00a0the action unfolds in the author\u2019s hotel suite, and at Abercrombie & Fitch, and at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Hemingway loved the profile, and he and Ross remained friends until his death, in 1961. \u201cMy admiration of Hemingway’s writing grows increasingly with the years,\u201d she told me recently, in an email. \u201cI not only liked him, but I respected his independence and courage to be exactly the way I portrayed him.\u201d She is still living in New York, and still \u2014 after more than 500 pieces \u2014 contributing to the New Yorker<\/i>. In 2009, she talked about the piece, and Hemingway, and writing, with her editor, Susan Morrison, at the John F. Kennedy Library in Boston:

Ross graciously agreed to annotate the piece, just as Gay Talese annotated \u201cFrank Sinatra Has a Cold<\/a>,\u201d the most recent installment in the\u00a0Annotation Tuesday!<\/a> series. Ross’s insights add to what’s known about that story and its time, and they allow Storyboard to offer \u201cHow Do You Like It Now, Gentlemen?\u201d in full. My questions are in blue<\/span>, Ross’ answers in red<\/span>.

\u201cHow Do You Like It Now, Gentlemen?\u201d
<\/b>By Lillian Ross
The New Yorker<\/em>
May 13, 1950

Ernest Hemingway, who may well be the greatest living American writer, rarely comes to New York. He spends most of his time on a farm, the Finca Vigia, nine miles outside Havana, with his wife, a domestic staff of nine, fifty-two cats, sixteen dogs, a couple of hundred pigeons, and three cows. When he does come to New York, it is only because he has to pass through it on his way somewhere. Not long ago, on his way to Europe, he stopped in New York for a few days. I had written to him asking if I might see him when he came to town, and he had sent me a typewritten letter saying that would be fine and suggesting that I meet his plane at the airport. \u201cl don\u2019t want to see anybody I don\u2019t like, nor have publicity, nor be tied up all the time,\u201d he went on. \u201cWant to go to the Bronx Zoo, Metropolitan Museum, Museum of Modern Art, ditto of Natural History, and see a fight. Want to see the good Breughel at the Met, the one, no two, fine Goyas and Mr. El Greco\u2019s Toledo. Don’t want to go to Toots Shor\u2019s. <\/a>This is a wonderful narrative move; you more or less use his letter to lay out the itinerary for your story. How did you get that idea?<\/span>Nothing\u2019s hidden. It all started with my trying to write a piece about Sidney Franklin, the bullfighter.<\/span><\/span> <\/b>Am going to try to get into town and out without having to shoot my mouth off. I want to give the joints a miss. Not seeing news people is not a pose. It is only to have time to see your friends.” In pencil, he added, “Time is the least thing we have of.”

***

Time did not seem to be pressing Hemingway the day he flew in from Havana. He was to arrive at Idlewild late in the afternoon, and I went to out to meet him. His plane had landed by the time I got there, and I found him standing at a the gate waiting for his luggage and for his wife, who had gone to attend to it. He had one arm around a scuffed, dilapidated briefcase pasted up with travel stickers. He had the other around a wiry little man whose forehead was covered with enormous beads of perspiration. Hemingway was wearing a red plaid wool shirt, a figured wool necktie, a tan wool sweater-vest, a brown tweed jacket tight across the back and with sleeves too short for his arms, gray flannel slacks, Argyle socks, and loafers, and he looked bearish, cordial, and restricted. His hair, which was very long in the back, was gray, except at the temples, where it was white; his mustache was white, and he had a ragged, half-inch full white beard. There was a bump about the size of a walnut over his left eye. He was wearing steel-rimmed spectacles, with a piece of paper under the nosepiece. <\/a>This is an extraordinarily detailed description. Were you taking notes while you met Hemingway at the gate? You once told Susan Morrison, \u201cThe tape recorder is the enemy of writing, really. \u2026 I think your ears can pick up a truth, and the truth of what the person is who\u2019s speaking if you use your own ears and you don\u2019t rely on the machine to do it for you.\u201d<\/span>I always take notes, but mostly I depend on my own ears. I have a very peculiar way of taking notes, that wouldn\u2019t mean anything to anybody. It\u2019s my own shorthand. If you really listen closely to people, you can remember. It\u2019s important that you use your own ears.<\/span><\/span> He was in no hurry to get into Manhattan. He crooked the arm around the briefcase into a tight hug and said that it contained the unfinished manuscript of his new book, “Across the River and into the Trees.\u201d He crooked his arm around the wiry little man, into a tight hug and said he had been his seat companion on the flight. The man’s name, as I got it in a mumbled introduction, was Myers, and he was returning from a business trip to Cuba. Myers made a slight attempt to dislodge himself from the embrace, but Hemingway held on to him affectionately.

\u201cHe read book all way up on plane,\u201d Hemingway said. He spoke with a perceptible Midwestern accent, despite the Indian talk. \u201cHe like book, I think,\u201d he added, giving Myers a little shake and beaming down at him.

\u201cWhew!\u201d said Myers.

\u201cBook too much for him,\u201d Hemingway said. \u201cBook start slow, then increase in pace till it becomes impossible to stand. I bring emotion up to where you can\u2019t stand it, then we level off, so we won\u2019t have to provide oxygen tents for the readers. Book is like engine. We have to slack her off gradually.\u201d

\u201cWhew!\u201d said Myers.

Hemingway released him. \u201cNot trying for no-hit game in book,\u201d he said. \u201cGoing to win maybe twelve to eleven.\u201d

Myers looked puzzled.

\u201cShe\u2019s better book than \u2018Farewell,\u2019\u201d Hemingway said. \u201cI think this is best one, but you are always prejudiced, I guess. Especially if you want to be champion.\u201d He shook Myers\u2019 hand. \u201cMuch thanks for reading book,\u201d he said.

\u201cPleasure,\u201d Myers said, and walked off unsteadily.

Hemingway watched him go, and then turned to me. “After you finish a book, you know, you’re dead,” he said moodily. “But no one knows you’re dead. All they see is the irresponsibility that comes in after the terrible responsibility of writing.\u201d He said he felt tired but was in good shape physically; he had brought his weight down to two hundred and eight, and his blood pressure was down too. He had considerable rewriting to do on his book, and he was determined to keep at it until he was absolutely satisfied. “They can’t yank novelist like they can pitcher,\u201d he said. \u201cNovelist has to go the full nine, even if it kills him.\u201d <\/a>What kind of Hemingway piece did you want to write, and did this piece fulfill your intentions?<\/span>My intention was to just write what I saw and heard. I don\u2019t start out with any intention. I think that\u2019s a mistake that people make.<\/span><\/span>

We were joined by Hemingway\u2019s wife, Mary, a small, energetic, cheerful woman with close-cropped blond hair who was wearing a long, belted mink coat. A porter pushing a cart heaped with luggage followed her. \u201cPapa, everything is here,\u201d she said to Hemingway. \u201cNow we ought to get going, Papa.\u201d He assumed the air of a man who was not going to be rushed. Slowly, he counted the pieces of luggage. There were fourteen, half of them, Mrs. Hemingway told me, extra-large Valpaks designed by her husband and bearing his coat of arms, also designed by him–a geometric design. When Hemingway had finished counting, his wife suggested that he tell the porter where to put the luggage. Hemingway told the porter to stay right there and watch it; then he turned to his wife and said, \u201cLet\u2019s not crowd, honey. Order of the day is to have a drink first.\u201d

\"from<\/a>
From the New Yorker archive, New York Public Library. (Photo by Elon Green)<\/figcaption><\/figure>

We went into the airport cocktail lounge and stood at the bar. Hemingway put his briefcase down on a chromium stool and pulled it close to him. He ordered bourbon and water. Mrs. Hemingway said she would have the same, and I ordered a cup of coffee. <\/a>A question about protocol, because it\u2019s something we all struggle with when we\u2019re out in the field: What was your philosophy on participating in activities with story subjects \u2014 would you have a drink when they did?<\/span>You know, the first time I ever ate caviar was when Mary Hemingway served it in the hotel. That didn\u2019t make me addicted to caviar. It was an interesting experience and I liked it. If they were drinking, I would taste it. It didn\u2019t make a drinker out of me. I also knew Faulkner. He\u2019d come visit me in New York and say he was going into detox. It was never very successful. If he wanted to drink, that was his business.<\/span><\/span> <\/b>Hemingway told the bartender to bring double bourbons. He waited for the drinks with impatience, holding on to the bar with both hands and humming an unrecognizable tune. Mrs. Hemingway said she hoped it wouldn\u2019t be dark by the time they got to New York. Hemingway said it wouldn\u2019t make any difference to him, because New York was a rough town, a phony town, a town that was the same in the dark as it was in the light, and was not exactly overjoyed to be going there anyway. What he was looking forward to, he said, was Venice. \u201cWhere I like it is out West in Wyoming, Montana, and Idaho, and I like Cuba and Paris and around Venice,\u201d he said. \u201cWestport gives me the horrors.\u201d Mrs. Hemingway lit a cigarette and handed me the pack. I passed it along to him, but he said he didn\u2019t smoke. Smoking ruins his sense of smell, a sense he finds completely indispensable for hunting. \u201cCigarettes smell so awful to you when you have a nose that can truly smell,\u201d he said, and laughed, hunching his shoulders and raising the back of his fist to his face, as though he expected somebody to hit him. Then he enumerated elk, deer, possum, and coon as some of the things he can truly smell.

The bartender brought the drinks. Hemingway took several large swallows and said he gets along fine with animals, sometimes better than with human beings. In Montana, once, he lived with a bear, and the bear slept with him, got drunk with him, and was a close friend. <\/a>Was there any attempt to verify this? It seems\u00a0\u2026\u00a0suspect.<\/span>Why be so literal? If that\u2019s the way he remembered it, what does it matter? What\u2019s interesting is the way he tells it \u2014\u00a0that\u2019s what matters. Whether they\u2019re telling the truth or not, who cares?<\/span><\/span>\u00a0He asked me whether there were still bears at the Bronx Zoo, and I said I didn\u2019t know, but I was pretty sure there were bears at the Central Park Zoo. \u201cI always used to go the Bronx Zoo with Granny Rice,\u201d he said. \u201cI love to go to the zoo. But not on Sunday. I don\u2019t like to see the people making fun of the animals, when it should be the other way around.\u201d Mrs. Hemingway took a small notebook out of her purse and opened it; she told me she had made a list of chores she and her husband had to do before their boat sailed. They included buying a hot-water-bottle cover, an elementary Italian grammar, a short history of Italy, and, for Hemingway, four woollen undershirts, four cotton underpants, two woollen underpants, bedroom slippers, a belt, and a coat. \u201cPapa has never had a coat,\u201d she said. \u201cWe\u2019ve got to buy Papa a coat.\u201d Hemingway grunted and leaned against the bar. \u201cA nice, rainproof coat,\u201d Mrs. Hemingway said. \u201cAnd he\u2019s got to get his glasses fixed. He needs some good soft padding for the nosepiece. It cuts him up brutally. He\u2019s had that same piece of paper under the nosepiece for weeks. When he really wants to get cleaned up, he changes to\u00a0the paper.\u201d Hemingway grunted again.

The bartender came up, and Hemingway asked him to bring another round of drinks. Then he said, \u201cFirst thing we do, Mary, as soon as we hit the hotel, is call up the Kraut.\u201d \u201cThe Kraut,\u201d he told me, with that same fist-to-the-face laugh, is his affectionate term for Marlene Dietrich, an old friend, and is part of a large vocabulary of special code terms and speech mannerisms indigenous to the Finca Vigia. \u201cWe have a lot of fun talking a sort of joke language,\u201d he said.

\u201cFirst we call Marlene, and then we order caviar and champagne, Papa,\u201d Mrs. Hemingway said. \u201cI\u2019ve been waiting months for that caviar and champagne.\u201d

\u201cThe Kraut, caviar, and champagne,\u201d Hemingway said slowly, as though he were memorizing a difficult set of military orders. <\/b>He finished his drink and gave the bartender a repeat nod, and then turned to me. \u201cYou want to go with me to buy a coat?\u201d he asked.

\u201cBuy coat and get glasses fixed,\u201d Mrs. Hemingway said.

I said I would be happy to help him do both, and then I reminded him that he had said he wanted to see a fight. The only fight that week, I had learned from a friend who knows about fights, was at the St. Nicholas Arena that night. I said that my friend had four tickets and would like to take all of us. Hemingway wanted to know who was fighting. When I told him, he said they were bums. Bums, Mrs. Hemingway repeated, and added that they had better fighters in Cuba. Hemingway gave me a long, reproachful look. \u201cDaughter, you\u2019ve got to learn that a bad fight is worse than no fight,\u201d he said. We would all go to a fight when he got back from Europe, he said, because it was absolutely necessary to go to several good fights a year. \u201cIf you quit going for too long a time, then you never go near them,\u201d he said. \u201cThat would be very dangerous.\u201d He was interrupted by a brief fit of coughing. \u201cFinally,\u201d he concluded, \u201cyou\u2019ll end up in one room and won\u2019t move.\u201d\u00a0<\/a>Did you have any parameters for this story?<\/span>He gave me no rules. I just used my own common sense, my own morality.<\/span><\/span>

***

After dallying at the bar a while longer, the Hemingways asked me to go along with them to their hotel. Hemingway ordered the luggage loaded into one taxi, and the three of us got into another. It was dark now. As we drove along the boulevard, Hemingway watched the road carefully. Mrs. Hemingway told me that he always watches the road, usually from the front seat. It is a habit he got into during the First World War. I asked them what they planned to do in Europe. They said they were going to stay a week or so in Paris, and then drive to Venice.

\u201cI love to go back to Paris,\u201d Hemingway said, his eyes still fixed on the road. \u201cAm going in the back door and have no interviews and no publicity and never get a haircut, like in the old days. Want to go to caf\u00e9s where I know no one but the waiter and his replacement, see all the new pictures and the old ones, go to the bike races and the fights, and see the new riders and fighters. Find good, cheap restaurants where you can keep your own napkin. Walk all over the town and see where we made our mistakes and where we had our few bright ideas. And learn the form and try and pick winners in the blue, smoky afternoons, and then go out the next day to play them at Auteuil and Enghien.\u201d\u00a0<\/a>Did he really speak so poetically?<\/span>Of course! He talked the way he talked. He had fun.<\/span><\/span>

\u201cPapa is a good handicapper,\u201d Mrs. Hemingway said.

\u201cWhen I know the form,\u201d he said.

We were crossing the Queensboro Bridge, and we had a good view of the Manhattan skyline. The lights were on in the tall office buildings. Hemingway did not seem impressed. \u201cThis ain\u2019t my town,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s a town you come to for a short time. It\u2019s murder.\u201d Paris is like another home to him, he said. \u201cI am as lonesome and as happy as I can be in that town we lived in and worked and learned and grew up in, and then fought our way back into.\u201d Venice is another of his home towns. The last time he and his wife were in Italy, they lived for four months in Venice and the Cortina Valley, and he went hunting, and now he had put the locale and some of the people in the book he was writing. \u201cItaly was so damned wonderful,\u201d he said. \u201cIt was sort of like having died and gone to Heaven, a place you\u2019d figured never to see.\u201d

Mrs. Hemingway said that she had broken her right ankle skiing there but that she planned to go skiing there again. Hemingway was hospitalized in Padua with an eye infection, which developed into erysipelas, but he wanted to go back to Italy and wanted to see his many good friends there. He was looking forward to seeing the gondoliers on a windy day, the Gritti Palace hotel, where they stayed during their last visit, and the Locanda Cipriani, an old inn on Torcello, and island in the lagoon northeast of Venice on which some of the original Venetians lived before they built Venice. About seventy people live in Torcello, and the men are professional duck hunters. While there, Hemingway went duck-hunting a lot with the gardener of the old inn. \u201cWe\u2019d go around through the canals and jump-shoot, and I\u2019d walk the prairies at low tide for snipe,\u201d he said. \u201cIt was a big fly route for ducks that came all the way down from the Pripet Marshes. I shot good and thus became a respected local character. They have some sort of little bird that comes through, after eating grapes in the north, on his way to eat grapes in the south. The local characters sometimes shot them sitting, and I occasionally shot them flying. Once, I shot two high doubles, rights and lefts, in a row, and the gardener cried with emotion. Coming home, I shot a high duck against the rising moon and dropped him in the canal. That\u00a0precipitated an emotional crisis I thought I would never get him out of but did, with about a pint of Chianti. We each took a pint out with us. I drank mine to keep warm coming home. He drank his when overcome with emotion.\u201d We were silent for a while, and then Hemingway said, \u201cVenice was lovely.\u201d

***

The Hemingways were stopping at<\/span>\u00a0<\/span>the Sherry-Netherland. Hemingway registered and told the room clerk that he did not want any announcement made of his arrival and did not want any visitors, or any telephone calls either, except from Miss Dietrich. Then we went up to the suite\u2014living room, bedroom, and serving pantry\u2014that had been reserved for them. Hemingway paused at the entrance and scouted the living room. It was large, decorated in garish colors, and furnished with imitation Chippendale furniture and an imitation fireplace containing imitation coals.\u00a0<\/a>This is a weird place to think of it but I love the lack of exposition in the piece. There’s no call for it; exposition is the enemy of narrative, it’s been said, and it would’ve killed the momentum here.<\/span>I didn’t need it. Who am I to add exposition? I don’t write that way.<\/span><\/span>

\u201cJoint looks O.K.,\u201d he said. \u201cGuess they call this the Chinese Gothic Room.\u201d He moved in and took the room.

Mrs. Hemingway went over to a bookcase and held up a sample of its contents. \u201cLook, Papa,\u201d she said. \u201cThey\u2019re phony. They\u2019re pasteboard backs, Papa. They\u2019re not real books.\u201d

Hemingway put his briefcase down on a bright-red couch and advanced on the bookcase, then slowly, with expression, read the titles aloud–\u201dElementary Economics,\u201d \u201cGovernment of the United States,\u201d \u201cSweden, the Land and the People,\u201d and \u201cSleep in Peace,\u201d by Phyllis Bentley. \u201cI think we are an outfit headed for extinction,\u201d he said, starting to take off his necktie.\u00a0<\/a>To what extent was Hemingway performing for you?<\/span>None. You’re bringing up this\u00a0clich\u00e9 that’s been said about him. Forget that. Rely on your own interests and curiosity. I don’t judge. There was one Hemingway, one and only. Just as there was only one J.D. Salinger. I was\u00a0privileged\u00a0to know both men, and to\u00a0eventually\u00a0write about both of them. And\u00a0they became friends. There is no such thing as quote unquote subjects. These men are just themselves. I love and respect that. Everything they said was of interest to me, and a joy.<\/span><\/span>
<\/span><\/b>

After getting his necktie off, and then his jacket, Hemingway handed them to his wife, who went into the bedroom, saying she was going to unpack. He unbuttoned his collar and went over to the telephone. \u201cGot to call the Kraut,\u201d he said. He telephoned the Plaza and asked for Miss Dietrich. She was out, and he left word for her to come over for supper. Then he called room service and order caviar and a couple of bottles of Perrier-Jou\u00ebt, brut.<\/i>

Hemingway went back to the bookcase and stood there stiffly, as though he could not decide what to do with himself. He looked at the pasteboard backs again and said, \u201cPhony, just like the town.\u201d I said that there was a tremendous amount of talk about him these days in literary circles–that the critics seemed to be talking and writing definitively not only about the work he had done but about the work he was going to do. He said that of all the people he did not wish to see in New York, the people he wished least to see were the critics. \u201cThey are like those people who go to ball games and can\u2019t tell the players without a score card,\u201d he said. \u201cI am not worried about what anybody I do not like might do. What the hell! If they can do you harm, let them do it. It is like being a third baseman and protesting because they hit line drives to you. Line drives are regrettable, but to be expected.\u201d The closest competitors of the critics among those he wished least to see, he said, were certain writers who wrote books about the war when they had not seen anything of war at first hand. \u201cThey are just like an outfielder who will drop a fly on you when you have pitched to have the batter hit a high fly to that outfielder, or when they\u2019re pitching they try to strike everybody out.\u201d When he pitched, he said, he never struck out anybody, except under extreme necessity. \u201cI knew I had only so many fast balls in that arm,\u201d he said. \u201cWould make them pop to short instead, or fly out, or hit it on the ground, bouncing.\u201d

A waiter arrived with the caviar and champagne, and Hemingway told him to open one of the bottles. Mrs. Hemingway came in from the bedroom and said she couldn\u2019t find his toothbrush. He said that he didn\u2019t know where it was but that he could easily buy another. Mrs. Hemingway said all right, and went back into the bedroom. Hemingway poured two glasses of champagne, gave one to me, and picked up the other one and took a sip. The waiter watched him anxiously. Hemingway hunched his shoulders and said something in Spanish to the waiter. They both laughed, and the waiter left. Hemingway took his glass over to the red couch and sat down, and I sat in the chair opposite him.

\u201cI can remember feeling so awful about the first war that I couldn\u2019t write about it for ten years,\u201d he said, suddenly very angry. \u201cThe wound combat makes in you, as a writer, is a very slow-healing one. I wrote three stories about it in the old days–\u2019In Another Country,\u2019 \u2018A Way You\u2019ll Never Be,\u2019 and \u2018Now I Lay Me.\u2019\u201d He mentioned a war writer who, he said, was apparently thinking of himself as Tolstoy, but who\u2019d be able to play Tolstoy only on the Bryn Mawr field-hockey team. \u201cHe never hears a shot fired in anger, and he sets out to beat who? Tolstoy, an artillery officer who fought at Sevastopol, who knew his stuff, who was a hell of a man anywhere you put him–bed, bar, in an empty room where he had to think. I started out very quiet and I beat Mr. Turgenev. Then I trained hard and I beat Mr. de Maupassant. I\u2019ve fought two draws with Mr. Stendhal, and I think I had an edge in the last one. But nobody\u2019s going to get me in any ring with Mr. Tolstoy unless I\u2019m crazy or I keep getting better.\u201d

He began his new book as a short story. \u201cThen I couldn\u2019t stop it. It went straight on into a novel,\u201d he said. \u201cThat\u2019s the way all my novels got started. When I was twenty-five, I read novels by Somersault Maugham and Stephen St. Vixen Ben\u00e9t.\u201d He laughed hoarsely. \u201cThey had written novels, and I was ashamed because I had not written any novels. So I wrote \u2018The Sun\u2019 when I was twenty-seven, and I wrote it in six weeks, starting on my birthday, July 21st, in Valencia, and finishing it September 6th, in Paris. But it was really lousy and the rewriting took nearly five months. Maybe that will encourage young writers so they won\u2019t have to go get advice from their psychoanalysts. Analyst once wrote me, What did I learn from psychoanalysts? I answered, Very little but hope they had learned as much as they were able to understand from my published works. You never saw a counter-puncher who was punchy. Never lead against a hitter unless you can outhit him. Crowd a boxer, and take everything he has, to get inside. Duck a swing. Block a hook. And counter a jab with everything you own. Papa\u2019s delivery of hard-learned facts of life.\u201d

Hemingway poured himself another glass of champagne. He always wrote in longhand, he said, but he recently bought a tape recorder and was trying to get up the courage to use it. \u201cI\u2019d like to learn talk machine,\u201d he said. \u201cYou just tell talk machine anything you want and get secretary to type it out.\u201d He writes without facility, except for dialogue. \u201cWhen the people are talking, I can hardly write it fast enough or keep up with it, but with an almost unbearable high manifold pleasure. I put more inches on than she will take, and then fly her as near as I know to how she should be flown, only flying as crazy as really good pilots fly crazy themselves. Most of the time flying conservatively but with an awfully fast airplane that makes up for the conservatism. That way, you live longer. I mean your writing lives longer. How do you like it now, gentlemen?\u201d The question seemed to have some special significance for him, but he did not bother to explain it.

I wanted to know whether, in his opinion, the new book was different from his others, and he gave me another long, reproachful look. \u201cWhat do you think?\u201d he said after a moment. \u201cYou don\u2019t expect me to write \u2018The Farewell to Arms Boys in Addis Ababa,\u2019 do you? Or \u2018The Farewell to Arms Boys Take a Gunboat\u2019?\u201d The book is about the command level in the Second World War. \u201cI am not interested in the G.I. who wasn\u2019t one,\u201d he said, suddenly angry again. \u201cOr the injustices done to me<\/i>, with a capital \u2018M.\u2019 I am interested in the goddamn sad science of war.\u201d The new novel has a good deal of profanity in it. \u201cThat\u2019s because in war they talk profane, although I always try to talk gently,\u201d he said, sounding like a man who is trying to believe what he is saying. \u201cI think I\u2019ve got \u2018Farewell\u2019 beat in this one,\u201d he went on. He touched his briefcase. \u201cIt hasn\u2019t got the youth and the ignorance.\u201d Then he asked wearily, \u201cHow do you like it now, gentlemen?\u201d <\/a>Was it your idea to use that line as the title?<\/span> don\u2019t remember. Bill Shawn edited most of my work, and always came up with creative ideas. It was just something he\u2019d say for fun.<\/span>What was the editing process like back then?<\/span> Oh, that\u2019s ridiculous. It\u2019s The New Yorker<\/i> and Bill Shawn\u2019s editing was wonderful. Everything that a writer needed is what he would give. You need someone who is supportive, encouraging and complimentary.<\/span><\/span>

***

There was a knock at the door, and Hemingway got up quickly and opened it. It was Miss Dietrich. <\/a>Were you starstruck?<\/span>I don\u2019t know \u2014 she was a star! I liked her, but I was watching her with Hemingway. She loved him, loved kidding around with him. I found it very endearing. They were human beings and I was watching them.<\/span><\/span>\u00a0<\/b>Their reunion was a happy one. Mrs. Hemingway came out of the bedroom and greeted the guest enthusiastically. Miss Dietrich stood back from Hemingway and looked at him with approval. \u201cPapa, you look wonderful,\u201d she said slowly.

\u201cI sure missed you, daughter,\u201d said Hemingway. He raised his fist to his face, and his shoulders shook as he laughed silently.

Miss Dietrich was wearing a mink coat. She sighed loudly, took off the coat, and handed it to Mrs. Hemingway. Then she sighed again and sat down in an overstuffed chair. Hemingway poured a glass of champagne, brought it to her, and refilled the other glasses.

\u201cThe Kraut\u2019s the best that ever came into the ring,\u201d he said as he handed me my glass. Then he pulled a chair up beside Miss Dietrich\u2019s, and they compared notes on friends and on themselves. They talked about theatre and motion-picture people, one of whom, a man, Hemingway referred to as a \u201csea heel.\u201d

Miss Dietrich wanted to know what a \u201csea heel\u201d was.

\u201cThe sea is bigger than the land,\u201d he told her.

Mrs. Hemingway went into the serving pantry and came out in a few minutes with caviar spread on toast.

\u201cMary, I am telling Papa how I have to behave because I am a grandmother,\u201d Miss Dietrich said, taking a piece of toast. \u201cI have to think always of the children. You know, Papa?\u201d

Hemingway gave a sympathetic grunt, and Miss Dietrich took from her purse some snapshots of her grandson and passed them around. He was eighteen months old, she told us. Hemingway said he looked like a winner, and that he would be proud to own a piece of him if he ever got into the ring.

Miss Dietrich said that her daughter was going to have another child soon. \u201cI\u2019ll be a grandmother again<\/i>, Papa,\u201d she said.

Hemingway gave her a bleak look. \u201cI\u2019m going to be a grandfather in a few months,\u201d he said. \u201cMy son Bumby\u2019s wife.\u201d

Mrs. Hemingway told me that Bumby is the nickname of her husband\u2019s eldest son, John, an Army captain stationed in Berlin. His two other sons, she said, are Patrick, known as Mouse, who is a twenty-one-year-old sophomore at Harvard, and is planning to get married in June, and Gregory, known as Gigi, who is eighteen and a freshman at St. John\u2019s, at Annapolis. In addition to the present Mrs. Hemingway, Patrick is going to invite to his wedding his and Gigi\u2019s mother Pauline Pfeiffer, who was Hemingway\u2019s second wife. Bumby\u2019s mother and Hemingway\u2019s first wife was Hadley Richardson, who is now Mrs. Paul Scott Mowrer, and Hemingway\u2019s third wife was Martha Gellhorn.

\u201cEverything you do, you do for the sake of the children,\u201d Miss Dietrich said.

\u201cEverything for the children,\u201d Hemingway said. He refilled Mrs. Dietrich\u2019s glass.

\u201cThank you, Papa,\u201d she said, and sighed. She lives at the Plaza, she told him, but spends a good deal of her time at the apartment of her daughter, who lives on Third Avenue. \u201cPapa, you should see me when they go out,\u201d she said, and took a sip of champagne. \u201cI\u2019m the baby-sitter. As soon as they leave the house, I go around and look in all the corners and straighten the drawers and clean up. I can\u2019t stand a house that isn\u2019t neat and clean. I go around in all the corners with towels I bring with me from the Plaza, and I clean up the whole house. Then they come home at one or two in the morning, and I take the dirty towels and some of the baby\u2019s things that need washing, and, with my bundle over my shoulder, I go out and get a taxi, and the driver, he thinks I am this old washerwoman from Third Avenue, and he takes me in the taxi and talks to me with sympathy, so I am afraid to let him take me to the Plaza. I get out a block away from the Plaza and I walk home with my bundle and I wash the baby\u2019s things, and then I go to sleep.\u201d

\u201cDaughter, you\u2019re hitting them with the bases loaded,\u201d Hemingway said earnestly.

There was a ring at the door, and a bellboy brought in a florist\u2019s box. Mrs. Hemingway opened it and took out some green orchids and read the card: \u201cLove from Adeline.\u201d \u201cWho the hell is Adeline?\u201d she asked. Nobody knew. Mrs. Hemingway put the flowers in a vase and said it was time to order supper.

As we ate, the Hemingways and Miss Dietrich talked about the war. All three had seen it at first hand. Mrs. Hemingway, who, as Mary Welsh, was a Time <\/i>correspondent in London, met Hemingway there during the war, and both saw a good deal of Miss Dietrich there and, later on, in Paris. Miss Dietrich was a U.S.O. entertainer, and performed on almost every front in the European theatre. She grew a little sad as she talked about the war. She had loved entertaining the troops, and the spirit overseas, she said, was the best she had ever found in people anywhere. \u201cEverybody was the way people should be all the time,\u201d she continued. \u201cNot mean and afraid but good to each other.\u201d

Hemingway raised his glass in a toast to her.

\u201cI\u2019ve finally figured out why Papa sometimes gets mean now that the war is over,\u201d Mrs. Hemingway said. \u201cIt\u2019s because there is no occasion for him to be valorous in peacetime.\u201d

\u201cIt was different in the war,\u201d Miss Dietrich said. \u201cPeople were not so selfish and they helped each other.\u201d

Hemingway asked her about some recordings she had made, during the war, of popular American songs with lyrics translated into German, and said he\u2019d like to have them. \u201cI\u2019ll give you manuscript of new book for recordings if you want to trade even, daughter,\u201d he told her.

\u201cPapa, I don\u2019t trade with you. I love you,\u201d said Miss Dietrich.

\u201cYou\u2019re the best that ever came into the ring,\u201d Hemingway said.

Mrs. Hemingway said, \u201cWho the hell is Adeline?\u201d

***

Late the next morning, I was awakened by a telephone call from Hemingway, who asked me to come right over to the hotel. He sounded urgent. I had a fast cup of coffee, and when I turned up at the suite, I found the door open and walked in. Hemingway was talking on the telephone. He was wearing an orange plaid bathrobe that looked too small for him and he had a glass of champagne in one hand. His beard looked more scraggly than it had the day before. \u201cMy boy Patrick is coming down from Harvard and I\u2019d like to reserve a room for him,\u201d he was saying into the telephone. \u201c\u2019P,\u2019 as in \u2018Patrick.\u2019\u201d He paused and took a sip of champagne. \u201cMuch obliged. He\u2019ll be down from Harvard.\u201d

Hemingway hung up, and from his bathrobe pocket took a box of pills. He shook two of them into the palm of his hand, and downed them with a mouthful of champagne. He told me that he had been up since six, that his wife was still asleep, and that he had done enough work for that morning and wanted to talk, an activity he finds relaxing. <\/b>He always wakes at daybreak, he explains, because his eyelids are especially thin and his eyes especially sensitive to light. \u201cI have seen all the sunrises there have been in my life, and that\u2019s half a hundred years,\u201d he said. He had done considerable revision that morning on the manuscript. \u201cI wake up in the morning and my mind starts making sentences, and I have to get rid of them fast\u2014talk them or write them down,\u201d he said. \u201cHow did you like the Kraut?\u201d

Very much, I said.

\u201cI love the Kraut and I love Ingrid,\u201d he said. \u201cIf I weren\u2019t married to Miss Mary and didn\u2019t love Miss Mary, I would try to hook up with either of them. Each one has what the other hasn\u2019t. And what each has, I love very much.\u201d For a moment, he looked bewildered, and then he said quickly, \u201cWould never marry an actress, on account they have their careers and they work bad hours.\u201d

I asked him whether he still wanted to buy a coat, and he said sure but he didn\u2019t want to be rushed or crowded and it was cold outside. He went over to the vase of green orchids and looked at the card, which was still attached to them. Adeline, he said, was the name of nobody he knew or would ever know, if he could help it. On a serving table near the couch were two champagne coolers, each containing ice and a bottle. He carried his glass over there and held up one of the bottles and squinted at it. It was empty. He put it back in the cooler, head down. Then he opened the other bottle, and as he poured some champagne into his glass, he sang, \u201c\u2019So feed me am-mu-nition, keep me in the Third Division, your dog-face soldier boy\u2019s O.K.\u2019\u201d Breaking off, he said, \u201cSong of the Third Infantry Division. I like this song when I need music inside myself to go on. I love all music, even opera. But I have no talent for it and cannot sing. I have a perfect goddam ear for music but I can\u2019t play any instrument by ear, not even the piano. My mother used to make me play the cello. She took me out of school one year to learn the cello, when I wanted to be out in the fresh air playing football. She wanted to have chamber music in the house.\u201d\u00a0<\/a>What was Hemingway’s singing voice like?<\/span> don’t know how to duplicate it. There’s no way to describe it. If it had mattered to me, I would have put it in.<\/span><\/span>

His briefcase was lying open on a chair near the desk, and the manuscript pages were protruding from it; someone seemed to have stuffed them into the briefcase without much care. Hemingway told me that he had been cutting the manuscript. \u201cThe test of a book is how much good stuff you can throw away,\u201d he said. \u201cWhen I\u2019m writing it, I\u2019m just as proud as a goddam lion. I use the oldest words in the English language. People think I\u2019m an ignorant bastard who doesn\u2019t know<\/span> the ten-dollar words. I know the ten-dollar words. There are older and better words which if you arrange them<\/span><\/span>\u00a0in the proper combination you make it stick. Remember, anybody who pulls his erudition or education on you hasn\u2019t any. Also, daughter, remember that I never carried Teddy bears to bed with me since I was four. Now, with seventy-eight-year-old grandmothers taking advantage of loopholes in the G.I. Bill of Rights whereby a gold-star mother can receive her son\u2019s education, I thought of establishing a scholarship and sending myself to Harvard, because my Aunt Arabelle has always felt very bad that I am the only Hemingway boy that never went to college. But I have been so busy I have not got around to it. I only went to high school and a couple of military cram courses, and never took French. I began to learn to read French by reading the A.P. story in the French paper after reading the American A.P. story, and finally learned to read it by reading accounts of things I had seen\u2014les evenements sportifs<\/i>\u2014and from that and les crimes <\/i>it was only a jump to Dr. de Maupassant, who wrote about things I had seen or could understand. Dumas, Daudet, Stendhal, who when I read him I knew that was the way I wanted to be able to write. Mr. Flaubert, who always threw them perfectly straight, hard, high, and inside. Then Mr. Baudelaire, that I learned my knuckle ball from, and Mr. Rimbaud, who never threw a fast ball in his life. Mr. Gide and Mr. Valery I couldn\u2019t learn from. I think Mr. Valery was too smart for me. Like Jack Britton and Benny Leonard.\u201d

Jack Britton, he continued, was a fighter he admired very much. \u201cJack Britton kept on his toes and moved around and never let them hit him solid,\u201d he said. \u201cI like to keep on my toes and never let them hit me solid. Never lead against a hitter unless you can outhit him. Crowd a boxer,\u201d he said, assuming a boxing stance and holding his right hand, which was grasping the champagne glass, close to his chest. With his left hand, he punched at the air, saying, \u201cRemember. Duck a swing. Block a hook. And counter a jab with everything you own.\u201d He straightened up and looked thoughtfully at his glass. Then he said, \u201cOne time, I asked Jack, speaking of a fight with Benny Leonard, \u2018How did you handle Benny so easy, Jack?\u2019 \u2018Ernie,\u2019 he said, \u2018Benny is an awfully smart boxer. All the time he\u2019s boxing, he\u2019s thinking. All the time he was thinking, I was hitting him.\u2019\u201d Hemingway gave a hoarse laugh, as though he had heard the story for the first time. \u201cJack moved very geometrically pure, never one-hundredth of an inch too much. No one ever got a solid shot at him. Wasn\u2019t anybody he couldn\u2019t hit any time he wanted to.\u201d He laughed again. \u201c\u2019All the time he was thinking, I was hitting him.\u2019\u201d The anecdote, he told me, had been in the original version of his short story \u201cFifty Grand,\u201d but Scott Fitzgerald had persuaded him to take it out. \u201cScott thought everybody knew about it, when only Jack Britton and I knew about it, because Jack told it to me,\u201d he said. \u201cSo Scott told me to take it out. I didn\u2019t want to, but Scott was a successful writer and a writer I respected, so I listened to him and took it out.\u201d

Hemingway sat down on the couch and nodded his head up and down sharply a couple of times to get my attention. \u201cAs you get older, it is harder to have heroes, but it is sort of necessary,\u201d he said. \u201cI have a cat named Boise, who wants to be a human being,\u201d he went on slowly, lowering his voice to a kind of grumble. \u201cSo Boise eats everything that human beings eat. He chews Vitamin B Complex capsules, which are as bitter as aloes. He thinks I am holding out on him because I won\u2019t give him blood-pressure tablets, and because I let him go to sleep without Seconal.\u201d He gave a short, rumbling laugh. \u201cI am a strange old man,\u201d he said. \u201cHow do you like it now, gentlemen?\u201d

Fifty, Hemingway said, on reconsideration, is not supposed to be old. \u201cIt is sort of fun to be fifty and feel you are going to defend the title again,\u201d he said. \u201cI won it in the twenties and defended it in the thirties and the forties, and I don\u2019t mind at all defending it in the fifties.\u201d

After a while, Mrs. Hemingway came into the room. She was wearing gray flannel slacks and a white blouse, and she said she felt wonderful, because she had had her first hot bath in six months. She walked over to the green orchids and looked at the card. \u201cWho is <\/i>Adeline?\u201d she asked. Then she abandoned the problem and said she was going out to do her errands, and suggested that Hemingway get dressed and go out and do his. He said that it was lunchtime and that if they went out then, they would have to stop someplace for lunch, whereas if they had lunch sent up to the room, they might save time. Mrs. Hemingway said she would order lunch while he got dressed. Still holding his glass, he reluctantly got up from the couch. Then he finished his drink and went into the bedroom. <\/a>As portrayed, she\u2019s a relatively passive character. Was she really like that, or did you intend to limit her presence and personality in the story?<\/span>What do want from the poor woman? Anyone who marries a writer, man or woman, hasn\u2019t married the bookkeeper next door. A writer is a writer.<\/span><\/span> <\/b>By the time he came out\u2014wearing the same outfit as the day before, except for a blue shirt with a button-down collar\u2014a waiter had set the table for our lunch. We couldn\u2019t have lunch without a bottle of Tavel, Hemingway said, and we waited until the water had brought it before starting to eat.

Hemingway began with oysters, and he chewed each one very thoroughly. \u201cEat good and digest good,\u201d he told us.

\u201cPapa, please get glasses fixed,\u201d Mrs. Hemingway said.

He nodded. Then he nodded a few times at me\u2014a repetition of the sign for attention. \u201cWhat I want to be when I am old is a wise old man who won\u2019t bore,\u201d he said, then paused while the waiter set a plate of asparagus and an artichoke before him and poured the Tavel. Hemingway tasted the wine and gave the waiter a nod. \u201cI\u2019d like to see all the new fighters, horses, ballets, bike riders, dames, bullfighters, painters, airplanes, sons of bitches, caf\u00e9 characters, big international whores, restaurants, years of wine, newsreels, and never have to write a line about any of it,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019d like to write lots of letters to my friends and get back letters. Would like to be able to make love good until I was eighty-five, the way Clemenceau could. And what I would like to be is not Bernie Baruch. I wouldn\u2019t sit on park benches, although I might go around the park once in a while to feed the pigeons, and also I wouldn\u2019t have any long beard, so there could be an old man didn\u2019t look like Shaw.\u201d He stopped and ran the back of his hand along his beard, and looked around the room reflectively. \u201cHave never met Mr. Shaw,\u201d he said. \u201cNever been to Niagara Falls, either. Anyway, I would take up harness racing. You aren\u2019t up near the top at that until you\u2019re over seventy-five. Then I could get me a good young ball club, maybe like Mr. Mack. Only I wouldn\u2019t signal with a program\u2014so as to break the pattern. Haven\u2019t figured out yet what I would signal with. And when that\u2019s over, I\u2019ll make the prettiest corpse since Pretty Boy Floyd. Only suckers worry about saving their souls. Who the hell should care about saving his soul when it is a man\u2019s duty to lose it intelligently, the way you would sell a position you were defending, if you could not hold it, as expensively as possible, trying to make it the most expensive position that was ever sold. It isn\u2019t hard to die.\u201d He opened his mouth and laughed, at first soundlessly and then loudly. \u201cNo more worries,\u201d he said. With his fingers, he picked up a long spear of asparagus and looked at it without enthusiasm. \u201cIt takes a pretty good man to make any sense when he\u2019s dying,\u201d he said.

Mrs. Hemingway had finished eating, and she quickly finished her wine. Hemingway slowly finished his. I looked at my wristwatch, and found that it was almost three. The waiter started clearing the table, and we all got up. Hemingway stood looking sadly at the bottle of champagne, which was not yet empty. Mrs. Hemingway put on her coat, and I put on mine.

\u201cThe half bottle of champagne is the enemy of man,\u201d Hemingway said. We all sat down again.\u00a0<\/a>I’m curious about the reporting: Did you limit your reporting to the observed experience with Hemingway over this three-day period, or did you also make outside calls and research, for background context?<\/span>No.<\/span><\/span>

\u201cIf I have any money, I can\u2019t think of any better way of spending money than on champagne,\u201d Hemingway said, pouring some.

When the champagne was gone, we left the suite. Downstairs, Mrs. Hemingway told us to remember to get glasses fixed, and scooted away.

***

Hemingway balked for a moment in front of the hotel. It was a cool, cloudy day. This was not good weather for him to be out in, he said sulkily, adding that his throat felt kind of sore. I asked him if he wanted to see a doctor. He said no. \u201cI never trust a doctor I have to pay,\u201d he said, and started across Fifth Avenue. A flock of pigeons flew by. He stopped, looked up, and aimed an imaginary rifle at them. He pulled the trigger, and then looked disappointed. \u201cVery difficult shot,\u201d he said. He turned quickly and pretended to shoot again. \u201cEasy shot,\u201d he said. \u201cLook!\u201d He pointed to a spot on the pavement. He seemed to be feeling better, but not much better.

I asked him if he wanted to stop first at his optician\u2019s. He said no. I mentioned the coat. He shrugged. Mrs. Hemingway had suggested that he look for a coat at Abercrombie & Fitch, so I mentioned Abercrombie & Fitch. He shrugged again and lumbered slowly over to a taxi, and we started down Fifth Avenue in the afternoon traffic. At the corner of Fifty-fourth, we stopped on a signal from the traffic cop. Hemingway growled. \u201cI love to see an Irish cop being cold,\u201d he said. \u201cGive you eight to one he was an M.P. in the war. Very skillful cop. Feints and fakes good. Cops are not like they are in the Hellinger movies. Only once in a while.\u201d We started up again, and he showed me where he once walked across Fifth Avenue with Scott Fitzgerald. \u201cScott wasn\u2019t at Princeton any more, but he was still talking football,\u201d he said, without animation. \u201cThe ambition of Scott\u2019s life was to be on the football team. I said, \u2018Scott, why don\u2019t you cut out this football?\u2019 I said, \u2018Come on, boy.\u2019 He said, \u2018You\u2019re crazy.\u2019 That\u2019s the end of that story. If you can\u2019t get through traffic, how the hell are you gonna get through the line? But I am not Thomas Mann,\u201d he added. \u201cGet another opinion.\u201d

By the time we reached Abercrombie\u2019s, Hemingway was moody again. He got out of the taxi reluctantly and reluctantly entered the store. I asked him whether he wanted to look at a coat first or something else.

\u201cCoat,\u201d he said unhappily.

In the elevator, Hemingway looked even bigger and bulkier than he had before, and his face had the expression of a man who is being forcibly subjected to the worst kind of misery. A middle-aged woman standing next to him stared at his scraggly white beard with obvious alarm and disapproval. \u201cGood Christ!\u201d Hemingway said suddenly, in the silence of the elevator, and the middle-aged woman looked down at her feet.

The doors opened at our floor, and we got out and headed for a rack of topcoats. A tall, dapper clerk approached us, and Hemingway shoved his hands into his pants pocket and crouched forward. \u201cI think I still have credit in this joint,\u201d he said to the clerk.

The clerk cleared his throat. \u201cYes, sir,\u201d he said.

\u201cWant to see the coat,\u201d Hemingway said menacingly.

\u201cYes, sir,\u201d said the clerk. \u201cWhat kind of coat did you wish to see, sir?\u201d

\u201cThat one.\u201d He pointed to a straight-hanging, beltless tan gabardine coat on the rack. The clerk helped him into it, and gently drew him over to a full-length mirror. \u201cHangs like a shroud,\u201d Hemingway said, tearing the coat off. \u201cI\u2019m tall on top. Got any other coat?\u201d he asked, as though he expected the answer to be no. He edged impatiently toward the elevators. <\/b>

\u201cHow about this one, sir, with a removable lining, sir?\u201d the clerk said. This one had a belt. Hemingway tried it on, studied himself in the mirror, and then raised his arms as though he were aiming a rifle. \u201cYou going to use it for shooting<\/i>, sir?\u201d the clerk asked. Hemingway grunted, and said he would take the coat. He gave the clerk his name, and the clerk snapped his fingers. \u201cOf course!\u201d he said. \u201cThere was something<\/i>\u2014\u201c Hemingway looked embarrassed and said to send the coat to him at the Sherry-Netherland, and then he said he\u2019d like to look at a belt.\u00a0<\/a>Did people around you tend to recognize Hemingway? Very little of story focuses on how people reacted to him.<\/span>No, not particularly. He didn’t ask to be noticed. He wasn’t exactly George Clooney. People read his books and had an idea of what he looked like.<\/span><\/span>

\u201cWhat kind of belt, Mr. Hemingway?\u201d the clerk asked.

\u201cGuess a brown one,\u201d Hemingway said.

We moved over to the belt counter, and another clerk appeared.

\u201cWill you show Mr. Hemingway a belt?\u201d the first clerk said, and stepped back and thoughtfully watched Hemingway.

The second clerk took a tape measure from his pocket, saying he thought Hemingway was a size 44 or 46.

\u201cWanta bet?\u201d Hemingway asked. He took the clerk\u2019s hand and punched himself in the stomach with it.

\u201cGee, he\u2019s got a hard tummy,\u201d the belt clerk said. He measured Hemingway\u2019s waistline. \u201cThirty-eight!\u201d he reported. \u201cSmall waist for your size. What do you do\u2014a lot of exercise?\u201d

Hemingway hunched his shoulders, feinted, laughed, and looked happy for the first time since we\u2019d left the hotel. He punched himself in the stomach with his own fist.

\u201cWhere you going\u2014to Spain again?\u201d the belt clerk asked.

\u201cTo Italy,\u201d Hemingway said, and punched himself in the stomach again. After Hemingway had decided on a brown calf belt, the clerk asked him whether he wanted a money belt. He said no\u2014he kept the money in a checkbook.

Our next stop was the shoe department, and there Hemingway asked a clerk for some folding bedroom slippers.

\u201cPullman slippers,\u201d the clerk said. \u201cWhat size?\u201d

\u201c\u2019Levens,\u201d Hemingway said bashfully. <\/b>The slippers were produced, and he told the clerk he would take them. \u201cI\u2019ll just put them in my pocket,\u201d he said. \u201cJust mark them, so they won\u2019t think I\u2019m a shoplifter.\u201d

\u201cYou\u2019d be surprised what\u2019s taken from the store,\u201d said the clerk, who was very small and very old. \u201cWhy, the other morning, someone on the first floor went off with a big roulette wheel. Just picked it up and\u2014\u201c\u00a0<\/a>I love that–the\u00a0repetition\u00a0of ‘very’. How much time did you spend on the writing process? Was it agonizing or did it come easy?<\/span>No, not agonizing at all. It’s fun! I enjoy it!<\/span><\/span>

Hemingway was not listening. \u201cWolfie!\u201d he shouted at a man who seemed almost seven feet tall and whose back was to us.

The man turned around. He had a big, square red face, and at the sight of Hemingway it registered extreme joy. \u201cPapa!\u201d he shouted.

The big man and Hemingway embraced and pounded each other on the back for quite some time. It was Winston Guest. Mr. Guest told us he was going upstairs to pick up a gun and proposed that we come along. Hemingway asked what kind of gun, and Guest said a ten-gauge magnum.

\u201cBeautiful gun,\u201d Hemingway said, taking his bedroom slippers from the clerk and stuffing them into his pocket.

In the elevator, Hemingway and Guest checked with each other on how much weight they had lost. Guest said he was now down to two hundred and thirty-five, after a good deal of galloping around on polo ponies. Hemingway said he was down to two hundred and eight, after shooting ducks in Cuba and working on his book.

\u201cHow\u2019s the book now, Papa?\u201d Guest asked, as we got out of the elevator.

Hemingway gave his fist-to-the-face laugh and said he was going to defend the title once more. \u201cWolfie, all of a sudden I found I could write wonderful again, instead of just biting on the nail,\u201d he said slowly. \u201cI think it took a while for my head to get rebuilt inside. You should not, ideally, break a writer\u2019s head open or give him seven concussions in two years or break six ribs on him when he is forty-seven or push a rear-view-mirror support through the front of his skull opposite the pituitary gland or, really, shoot at him too much. On the other hand, Wolfie, leave the sons of bitches alone and they are liable to start crawling back into the womb or somewhere if you drop a porkpie hat.\u201d He exploded into laughter.

Guest\u2019s huge frame shook with almost uncontrollable laughter. \u201cGod, Papa!\u201d he said. \u201cI still have your shooting clothes out at the island. When are you coming out to shoot, Papa?\u201d

Hemingway laughed again and pounded him on the back. \u201cWolfie, you\u2019re so damn big!\u201d he said.

Guest arranged to have his gun delivered, and then we all got into the elevator, the two of them talking about a man who caught a black marlin last year that weighed a thousand and six pounds.

\u201cHow do you like it now, gentlemen?\u201d Hemingway asked.

\u201cGod, Papa!\u201d said Guest.

On the ground floor, Guest pointed to a mounted elephant head on the wall. \u201cPygmy elephant, Papa,\u201d he said.

\u201cMiserable elephants,\u201d said Hemingway.

Their arms around each other, they went into the street. I said that I had to leave, and Hemingway told me to be sure to come over to the hotel early the next morning so that I could go with him and Patrick to the Metropolitan Museum. As I walked off, I heard Guest say, \u201cGod, Papa, I\u2019m not ashamed of anything I\u2019ve ever done.\u201d

\u201cNor, oddly enough, am I,\u201d said Hemingway.

I looked around. They were punching each other in the stomach and laughing raucously.

***

The following morning, the door of the Hemingway suite was opened for me by Patrick, a shy young man of medium height, with large eyes and a sensitive face. He was wearing gray flannel slacks, a white shirt open at the collar, Argyle socks, and loafers. Mrs. Hemingway was writing a letter at the desk. <\/b>As I came in, she looked up and said, \u201cAs soon as Papa has finished dressing, we\u2019re going to look at pictures.\u201d She went back to her letter.

Patrick told me that he\u2019d just as soon spend the whole day looking at pictures, and that he had done a bit of painting himself. \u201cPapa has to be back here for lunch with Mr. Scribner,\u201d he said, and added that he himself was going to stay in town until the next morning, when the Hemingways sailed. The telephone rang and he answered it. \u201cPapa, I think it\u2019s Gigi calling you!\u201d he shouted to the bedroom.

Hemingway emerged, in shirtsleeves, and went to the phone. \u201cHow are you, kid?\u201d he said into it, then asked Gigi to come down to the Finca for his next vacation. \u201cYou\u2019re welcome down there, Gigi,\u201d he said. \u201cYou know that cat you liked? The one you named Smelly? We renamed him Ecstasy. Every one of our cats knows his own name.\u201d After hanging up, he told me that Gigi was a wonderful shot\u2014that when he was eleven he had won second place in the shoot championship of Cuba. \u201cIsn\u2019t that the true gen, Mouse?\u201d he asked.

\u201cThat\u2019s right, Papa,\u201d said Patrick.

I wanted to know what \u201ctrue gen\u201d means, and Hemingway explained that it is British slang for \u201cinformation,\u201d from \u201cintelligence.\u201d \u201cIt\u2019s divided into three classes\u2014gen; the true gen, which is as true as you can state it; and the really true gen, which you can operate on,\u201d he said. He looked at the green orchids and asked whether anybody had found out who Adeline was.

\u201cI forgot to tell you, Papa,\u201d said Mrs. Hemingway. “It\u2019s Mother. Adeline is Mother<\/i>.\u201d She turned to me and said that her mother and father are in their late seventies and that they live in Chicago, and that they always remember to do exactly the right thing at the right time.

\u201cMy mother never sent me <\/i>any flowers,\u201d Hemingway said. His mother is now about eighty, he said, and lives in River Forest, Illinois. His father, who was a physician, has been dead for many years; he shot himself when Ernest was a boy. \u201cLet\u2019s get going if we\u2019re going to see the pictures,\u201d he said. \u201cI told Charlie Scribner to meet me here at one. Excuse me while I wash. In big city, I guess you wash your neck.\u201d He went back into the bedroom. While he was gone, Mrs. Hemingway told me that Ernest was the second of six children\u2014Marcelline, then Ernest, Ursula, Madelaine, Carol, and the youngest, his only brother, Leicester. All the sisters were named after saints. Every one of the children is married now; Leicester is living in Bogota, Colombia, where he is attached to the U.S. Embassy.\u00a0<\/a>There’s very little of the standard biographical details found in magazine profiles. Was that because Hemingway was so famous it simply wasn’t necessary?<\/span>Well, I wasn’t writing a biography.<\/span><\/span>

Hemingway came out in a little while, wearing his new coat. Mrs. Hemingway and Patrick put on their coats, and we went downstairs. It was raining, and we hurried into a taxi. On the way to the Metropolitan, Hemingway said very little; he just hummed to himself and watched the street. Mrs. Hemingway told me that he was usually unhappy in taxis, because he could not sit in the front seat to watch the road ahead. He looked out the window and pointed to a flock of birds flying across the sky. \u201cIn this town, birds fly, but they\u2019re not serious about it,\u201d he said. \u201cNew York birds don\u2019t climb.\u201d

When we drew up at the Museum entrance, a line of school children was moving in slowly. Hemingway impatiently led us past them. <\/b>In the lobby, he paused, pulled a silver flask from one of his coat pockets, unscrewed its top, and took a long drink. Putting the flask back in his pocket, he asked Mrs. Hemingway whether she wanted to see the Goyas first or the Breughels. She said the Breughels.

\u201cI learned to write by looking at paintings in the Luxembourg Museum in Paris,\u201d he said. \u201cI never went past high school. When you\u2019ve got a hungry gut and the museum is free, you go to the museum. Look,\u201d he said, stopping before \u201cPortrait of a Man,\u201d which has been attributed to both Titian and Giorgione. \u201cThey were old Venice boys, too.\u201d

\u201cHere\u2019s what I like, Papa,\u201d Patrick said, and Hemingway joined his son in front of \u201cPortrait of Federigo Gonzaga (1500-1540),\u201d by Francesco Francia. It shows, against a landscape, a small boy with long hair and a cloak.

\u201cThis is what we try to do when we write, Mousie,\u201d Hemingway said, pointing to the trees in the background. \u201cWe always have this in when we write.\u201d

Mrs. Hemingway called to us. She was looking at \u201cPortrait of the Artist,\u201d by Van Dyck. Hemingway looked at it, nodded approval, and said, \u201cIn Spain, we had a fighter pilot named Whitey Dahl, so Whitey came to me one time and said, \u2018Mr. Hemingway, is Van Dyck a good painter?\u2019 I said, \u2018Yes, he is.\u2019 He said, \u2018Well, I\u2019m glad, because I have one in my room and I like it very much, and I\u2019m glad he\u2019s a good painter because I like him.\u2019 The next day, Whitey was shot down.\u201d

We all walked over to Rubens\u2019 \u201cThe Triumph of Christ Over Sin and Death.\u201d Christ is shown surrounded by snakes and angels and is being watched by a figure in a cloud. Mrs. Hemingway and Patrick said they thought it didn\u2019t look like the usual Rubens.

\u201cYeah, he did that all right,\u201d Hemingway said authoritatively. \u201cYou can tell the real just as a bird dog can tell. Smell them. Or from having lived with very poor but very good painters.\u201d

That settled that, and we went on to the Breughel room. It was closed, we discovered. The door bore a sign that read, \u201cNOW UNDERTAKING REPAIRS.\u201d

\u201cThey have our indulgence,\u201d Hemingway said, and took another drink from his flask. \u201cI sure miss the good Breughel,\u201d he said as we moved along. \u201cIt\u2019s the great one, of the harvesters. It is a lot of people cutting grain, but he uses the grain geometrically, to make an emotion that is so strong for me I can hardly take it.\u201d We came to El Greco\u2019s green \u201cView of Toledo\u201d and stood looking at it a long time. \u201cThis is the best picture in the Museum for me, and Christ knows there are some lovely ones,\u201d Hemingway said.

Patrick admired several paintings Hemingway didn\u2019t approve of. Every time this happened, Hemingway got into an involved, technical discussion with his son about it. Patrick would shake his head and laugh and say he respected Hemingway\u2019s opinions. He didn\u2019t argue much. \u201cWhat the hell!\u201d Hemingway said suddenly. \u201cI don\u2019t want to be an art critic. I just want to look at pictures and be happy with them and learn from them. Now, this for me is a damn good picture.\u201d He stood back and peered at a Reynolds entitled \u201cColonel George Coussmaker,\u201d which shows the Colonel leaning against a tree and holding his horse\u2019s bridle. \u201cNow, this Colonel is a son of a bitch who was willing to pay money to the best portrait painter of his day just to have himself painted,\u201d Hemingway said, and gave a short laugh. \u201cLook at the man\u2019s arrogance and the strength in the neck of the horse and the way the man\u2019s legs hang. He\u2019s so arrogant he can afford to lean against a tree.\u201d

We separated for a while and looked at paintings individually, and then Hemingway called us over and pointed to a picture labelled, in large letters, \u201cCatharine Lorillard Wolfe\u201d and, in small ones, \u201cBy Cabanel.\u201d \u201cThis is where I got confused as a kid, in Chicago,\u201d he said. \u201cMy favorite painters for a long time were Bunte and Ryerson, two of the biggest and wealthiest families in Chicago. I always thought the names in big letters were the painters.\u201d

After we reached the C\u00e9zannes and Degases and the other Impressionists, Hemingway became more and more excited, and discoursed on what each artist could do and how and what he had learned from each. Patrick listened respectfully and didn\u2019t seem to want to talk about painting techniques any more. Hemingway spent several minutes looking at C\u00e9zanne\u2019s \u201cRocks\u2014Forest of Fontainebleau.\u201d \u201cThis is what we try to do in writing, this and this, and the woods, and the rocks we have to climb over,\u201d he said. \u201cC\u00e9zanne is my painter, after the early painters. Wonder, wonder painter. Degas was another wonder painter. I\u2019ve never seen a bad Degas. You know what he did with the bad Degases? He burned them.\u201d

Hemingway took another long drink from his flask. We came to Manet\u2019s pastel portrait of Mlle. Valtesse de la Bigne, a young woman with blond hair coiled on top of her head. Hemingway was silent for a while, looking at it; finally he turned away. \u201cManet could show the bloom people have when they\u2019re still innocent and before they\u2019ve been disillusioned,\u201d he said.

As we walked along, Hemingway said to me, \u201cI can make a landscape like Mr. Paul C\u00e9zanne. I learned how to make a landscape from Mr. Paul C\u00e9zanne by walking through the Luxembourg Museum a thousand times with an empty gut, and I am pretty sure that if Mr. Paul was around, he would like the way I make them and be happy that I learned it from him.\u201d He had learned a lot from Mr. Johann Sebastian Bach, too. \u201cIn the first paragraphs of \u2018Farewell,\u2019 I used the word \u2018and\u2019 consciously over and over the way Mr. Johann Sebastian Bach used a note in music when he was emitting counterpoint. I can almost write like Mr. Johann sometimes\u2014or, anyway, so he would like it. <\/b>All such people are easy to deal with, because we all know you have to learn.\u201d

\u201cPapa, look at this,\u201d Patrick said. He was looking at \u201cMeditation on the Passion,\u201d by Carpaccio. Patrick said it had a lot of strange animals in it for a religious painting.

\u201cHuh!\u201d Hemingway said. \u201cThose painters always put the sacred scenes in the part of Italy they liked the best or where they came from or where their girls came from. They made their girls the Madonnas. This is supposed to be Palestine, and Palestine is a long way off, he figures. So he puts in a red parrot, and he puts in a deer and a leopard. And then he thinks, This is the Far East, and it\u2019s far away. So he puts in the Moors, the traditional enemy of the Venetians.\u201d He paused and looked to see what else the painter had put in his picture. \u201cThen he gets hungry, so he puts in rabbits,\u201d he said. \u201cGoddam, Mouse, we saw a lot of good pictures. Mouse, don\u2019t you think two hours is a long time looking at pictures?\u201d

Everybody agreed that two hours was a long time looking at pictures, so Hemingway said that we would skip the Goyas, and that we would all go to the Museum again when they returned from Europe.

It was still raining when we came out of the Museum. \u201cGoddam, I hate to go out in the rain,\u201d Hemingway said. \u201cGoddam, I hate to get wet.\u201d

***

Charles Scribner was waiting in the lobby of the hotel. \u201cErnest,\u201d he said, shaking Hemingway\u2019s hand. He is a dignified, solemn, slow-speaking gentlemen with silvery hair.\u00a0<\/a>Did Scribner or anyone else involved have any concerns about your presence?<\/span>Everyone knew I was there to write about him. <\/span><\/span>

\u201cWe\u2019ve been looking at pictures, Charlie,\u201d Hemingway said as we went up in the elevator. \u201cThey have some pretty good pictures now, Charlie.\u201d

Scribner nodded and said, \u201cYuh, yuh.\u201d

\u201cWas fun for country boy like me,\u201d Hemingway said.

\u201cYuh, yuh,\u201d said Scribner.

We went into the suite and took off our coats, and Hemingway said we would have lunch right there. He called room service and Mrs. Hemingway sat down at the desk to finish her letter. Hemingway sat down on the couch with Mr. Scribner and began telling him that he had been jamming, like a rider in a six-day bike race, and Patrick sat quietly in a corner and watched his father. The waiter came in and passed out menus. Scribner said he was going to order the most expensive item on the menu, because Hemingway was paying for it. He laughed tentatively, and Patrick laughed to keep him company. The waiter retired with our orders, and Scribner and Hemingway talked business for a while. Scribner wanted to know whether Hemingway had the letters he had written to him.

Hemingway said, \u201cI carry them every place I go, Charlie, together with a copy of the poems of Robert Browning.\u201d

Scribner nodded, and from the inner pocket of his jacket took some papers\u2014copies of the contract for the new book, he said. The contract provided for an advance of twenty-five thousand dollars against royalties, beginning at fifteen per cent.

Hemingway signed the contract, and got up from the couch. Then he said, \u201cNever ran as no genius, but I\u2019ll defend the title again against all the good young new ones.\u201d He lowered his head, put his left foot forward, and jabbed at the air with a left and a right. \u201cNever let them hit you solid,\u201d he said.

Scribner wanted to know where Hemingway could be reached in Europe. Care of the Guaranty Trust Company in Paris, Hemingway told him. \u201cWhen we took Paris, I tried to take that bank and got smacked back,\u201d he said, and laughed a shy laugh. \u201cI thought it would be awfully nice if I could take my own bank.\u201d

\u201cYuh, yuh,\u201d Scribner said. \u201cWhat are you planning to do in Italy, Ernest?\u201d

Hemingway said he would work in the mornings and see his Italian friends and go duck-hunting in the afternoons. \u201cWe shot three hundred and thirty-one ducks to six guns there one afternoon,\u201d he said. \u201cMary shot good, too.\u201d

Mrs. Hemingway looked up. \u201cAny girl who marries Papa has to learn how to carry a gun,\u201d she said, and returned to her letter-writing.\u00a0<\/a>It’s hard to be in a room without being drawn into the conversation. How did you “blend in”?<\/span> don’t blend in. I’m just there to write about them. I’m not interested in burdening them with my preferences for a flavor of ice cream or whatever. I’m not there to bother them.<\/span><\/span>

\u201cI went hunting once in Suffolk, England,\u201d Scribner said. Everyone waited politely for him to continue. \u201cI remember they gave me goose eggs to eat for breakfast in Suffolk. Then we went out to shoot. I didn\u2019t know how to get my gun off safety.\u201d

\u201cHunting is a good sort of a life,\u201d Hemingway said. \u201cBetter than Westport or Bronxville, I think.\u201d

\u201cAfter I learned how to get my gun off safety, I couldn\u2019t hit anything,\u201d Scribner said.

\u201cI\u2019d like to make the big Monte Carlo shoot and the Championship of the World at San Remo,\u201d Hemingway said. \u201cI\u2019m in pretty good shape to shoot either one. It\u2019s not a spectator sport at all. But exciting to do and wonderful to manage. I used to handle Wolfie in big shoots. He is a great shot. It was like handling a great horse.\u201d

\u201cI finally got one,\u201d Scribner said timidly.

\u201cGot what?\u201d asked Hemingway.

\u201cA rabbit,\u201d Scribner said. \u201cI shot this rabbit.\u201d

\u201cThey haven\u2019t held the big Monte Carlo shoot since 1939,\u201d Hemingway said. <\/b>\u201cOnly two Americans ever won it in seventy-four years. Shooting gives me a good feeling. A lot of it is being together and friendly instead of feeling you are in some place where everybody hates you and wishes you ill. It is faster than baseball, and you are out on one strike.\u201d

The telephone rang, and Hemingway picked it up, listened, said a few words, and then turned to us and said that an outfit called Endorsements, Inc., had offered him four thousand dollars to pose as a Man of Distinction. \u201cI told them I wouldn\u2019t drink the stuff for four thousand dollars,\u201d he said. \u201cI told them I was a champagne man. Am trying to be a good guy, but it\u2019s a difficult trade. What you win in Boston, you lose in Chicago.\u201d\u00a0<\/a>You once said, “In choosing to write and to be a reporter, life is too short to waste on being with people you don’t like.” As a writer, how are you able to make this call before spending time with someone?<\/span>I have an idea, if I look at someone or his work. If I like the person, I want to write about him. I am not there to write catty, negative, destructive things. I don’t have any motives. I’m just\u00a0interested.<\/span><\/span>

For more installments of Annotation Tuesday! go here<\/a>.<\/em>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s easy, now, to see Lillian Ross\u2019s 1950 New Yorker Profile of Ernest Hemingway for what it is: a masterpiece. But 63 years ago, this wasn\u2019t so obvious. Ross, as one Hemingway biographer put it, was seen by her critics as \u201ca journalistic Delilah\u201d who had written a \u201chatchet job.\u201d In truth, her sin was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4636,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"topics":[],"authors":[136],"issue":[],"class_list":["post-1129","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-annotation-tuesday","authors-elon-green"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nAnnotation Tuesday! 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