From the Desk of Ernest Hemingway: "But never feel as good as while writing."

FINCA VIGIA: HEMINGWAY'S CUBAN VILLA
WHERE ALL'S ACCUSTOMED, CEREMONIOUS

"And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls;
It tolls for thee." ~ John Donne

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Finca Vigía
pronounced feen-ca vee-hee-a
meaning Lookout Farm
now a museum
once the home of Ernest Hemingway (1899 - 1961)
where he lived off and on between 1939 - 1960
writing segments of For Whom the Bell Tolls (1939 - 40)
and The Old Man and the Sea (1951)
in rural Havana, Cuba
about 15 miles from the City Center

Over the decades, there has been serious concern about the condition of Finca Vigía and the many priceless books and manuscripts housed there. Thanks to joint efforts between Cuba and the United States, the estate is now a living history museum, carefully preserved down to the finest detail. Each room has become a time capsule, seemingly undisturbed since Hemingway's last day there, back in July of 1960. Gerry and I were fortunate to see the Hemingway house / musuem last month, when we were docked in Havana for twenty - four hours as part of a Norweigian Cruise -- before the recently re - instated, travel restrictions severely and unnecessarily curtailed this international opportunity for so many curious Americans.

Still awaiting renovation & water, the elegant pool
at Finca Vigía, on a beautiful spring day:

One room just for writing:

Another just for reading:

Where Hemingway Sat!

Some Reading & Writing
Advice from Hemingway

Books should be about the people you know, that you love and hate, not about the people you study up about. If you write them truly they will have all the economic implications a book can hold.

In the meantime, since it is Christmas, if you want to read a book by a man who knows exactly what he is writing about and has written it marvelously well, read Appointment in Samarra by John O’Hara.

Then when you have more time read another book called War and Peace by Tolstoi and see how you will have to skip the big Political Thought passages, that he undoubtedly thought were the best things in the book when he wrote it, because they are no longer either true or important, if they ever were more than topical, and see how true and lasting and important the people and the action are. Do not let them deceive you about what a book should be because of what is in the fashion now. All good books are alike in that they are truer than if they had really happened and after you are finished reading one you will feel that all that happened to you and afterwards it all belongs to you; the good and the bad, the ecstasy, the remorse, and sorrow, the people and the places and how the weather was. If you can get so that you can give that to people, then you are a writer.

from "Old Newsman Writes: A Letter from Cuba"
in Esquire (December 1934)

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The individual, the great artist when he comes, uses everything that has been discovered or known about his art up to that point, being able to accept or reject in a time so short it seems that the knowledge was born with him, rather than that he takes instantly what it takes the ordinary man a lifetime to know, and then the great artist goes beyond what has been done or known and makes something of his own.

. . . all stories, if continued far enough, end in death, and . . . no true-story teller . . . would keep that from you.

from Chapter 9 of Death in the Afternoon (1932)

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I was always embarrassed by the words sacred, glorious and sacrifice and the expression in vain. We had heard them, sometimes standing in the rain almost out of earshot, so that only the shouted words came through, and had read them, on proclamations that were slapped up by billposters over other proclamations, now for a long time, and I had seen nothing sacred, and the things that were glorious had no glory and the sacrifices were like the stockyards at Chicago if nothing was done with the meat except to bury it.

from Chapter 11 of A Farewell to Arms (1929)

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Click for more Hemingway Quotes
For example:

"My attitude toward punctuation is that
it ought to be as conventional as possible. . . .
You ought to be able to show that you can do it
a good deal better than anyone else with the regular tools
before you have a license to bring in your own improvements."

&

"Do you suffer when you write? I don't at all.
Suffer like a bastard when don't write, or just before,
and feel empty and f----d out afterwards.
But never feel as good as while writing."
SEE YOU IN TWO WEEKS ON MY
Next Fortnightly Post
Friday, June 14th

Between now and then, read
THE QUOTIDIAN KIT
my shorter, almost daily blog posts
www.dailykitticarriker.blogspot.com

Looking for a good book? Try
KITTI'S LIST
my running list of recent reading
www.kittislist.blogspot.com

The Painting's the Thing Wherein

EMBLEMATIC ARTWORKS
WHERE ALL'S ACCUSTOMED, CEREMONIOUS

Nighthawks (1942)
by Edward Hopper (1882 - 1967)

“More relative than this: the play's the thing
Wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king."
― William Shakespeare ~ Hamlet 2, 2, 605-06

Could it also be that the painting's the thing
wherein we'll catch the consciousness of the nation?
I recently heard a speaker designate Edward Hopper's "Nighthawks" (above), along with Grant Wood's "American Gothic," and Andrew Wyeth's "Christina's World" (below) as the most iconic paintings in the United States.

American Gothic (1930)
by Grant Wood (1891 - 1942)

Christina's World (1948)
by Andrew Wyeth (1917 - 2007)

In First Impressions: Andrew Wyeth, biographer Richard Meryman adds two names to the list. According to Meryman, by the mid 1960's, Christina's World joined not only American Gothic but also Whistler's Mother and Gilbert Stuart's Portrait of George Washington -- to become "one of America's four most indelible images."
Arrangement in Grey and Black No.1:
Whistler's Mother (1871)
James McNeill Whistler (1834 - 1903)

Portrait of George Washington (1796)
by Gilbert Stuart (1755 – 1828)

It is not unreasonable that some art critics, scholars, and connoisseurs might modify this group of five in one way or another. Still it's a fair sampling of images that collectively capture the spirit and history of the United States. I spent a few days musing over what favorites or classics I might chose. Looking at this core collection, what might I add or subtract or replace? I see such severity here, and a persistent theme of isolation: in the city, in the country, in infirmity, in old age, even in greatness.

The next thing I knew -- coincidence! -- I came across a short list of British paintings, also intended to speak for the heart and soul of a nation. In Kate Atkinson's novel Life After Life, set in World War II London, a neighborhood bomb shelter has been decorated by kindly neighbors. Perhaps the theme here is "if only we weren't at war":

"Mr. Miller, in an effort to make the cellar 'homely' (something it could never be), had taped some reproductions of 'great English art,' as he called it, against the sandbagged walls. These color plates -- The Haywain, Gainsborough's Mr. and Mrs. Andrews (how smug they looked) and Bubbles (the most sickly Millais possible, in Ursula's opinion) -- looked suspiciously as if they had been pilfered from expensive reference books on art. 'Culture,' Mr. Miller said, nodding sagely. Ursula wondered what she would have chosen to represent 'great English art.' Turner perhaps, the smudged, fugitive content of the late works. Not to the Millers' taste at all, she suspected." (279)

The Hay Wain (1821)
by John Constable (1776 – 1837)

Mr and Mrs Andrews (1750)
by Thomas Gainsborough (1727 - 1788)

Bubbles, originally titled A Child's World (1886)
John Everett Millais (1829 - 1896)

Knowing how popular these artists are, and how easily recognized their paintings, it's not surprising that several have appeared in previous Fortnightlies and Quotidians:

Hopper: Surface Dwellers
Whistler: Post Mother's Day, Raoul & Marguerite
Wood: American / British / Indiana Gothic
Andrew Wyeth: Saving the River Babies
and also his father, N. C. Wyeth: He Said She Said.
John Everett Millais: Sweet Basil, Ancestors, Love Is Not All

Had we but world enough and time, we could look at a thousand different paintings, and then a thousand more. But for today, we have eight representations -- five American standards, three British standards -- of civilization and imagination. What do these classic artworks say about which exterior and interior landscapes have embedded themselves in our memories and why? Do they depict a quest or an ideal just out of reach, a life that we crave; or one that we fear; or a realilty that we readily / resignedly accept as ours? One way or another, the painting's the thing wherein, century after century, we'll catch a glimpse of our dreams, both good and bad.

SEE YOU IN TWO WEEKS ON MY
Next Fortnightly Post
Tuesday, May 28th

Between now and then, read
THE QUOTIDIAN KIT ~ See related post: "Getting to the Truth"
my shorter, almost daily blog posts
www.dailykitticarriker.blogspot.com

Looking for a good book? Try
KITTI'S LIST
my running list of recent reading
www.kittislist.blogspot.com