A Farewell to Arms
Author: Ernest Hemingway
Published in 1929
Setting and Background: World War I battlefield in the North of Italy
Synopsis: from "York Notes on Farewell to Arms" by Adele King - Longman Literature Guides (Longman York Press)
Frederic Henry, an American serving as an ambulance driver with the Italian army during the First World War, meets Catherine Barkley, an English nursing aide whose fiancé was killed in the war in France. At first he considers their relationship a game; after he is badly injured and taken to Milan for surgery he falls deeply in love with Catherine. Catherine becomes pregnant, but they are unable to get married in wartime Italy. Frederic returns to the front, where he takes part in the retreat of the Italian army from Caporetto, in which there is much confusion and demoralisation. Separated from his unit, Frederic is arrested by a military patrol and about to be shot for desertion as an officer when he escapes by jumping into a river. Realising that the war no longer matters to him, he rejoins Catherine; to avoid arrest, they escape to neutral Switzerland in a small boat. After living happily together in the mountains for several months, they move to Lausanne before Catherine is to deliver their child. She has serious difficulty in labour. The child, delivered by a Caesarean section, dies; shortly afterwards Catherine dies. Frederic is left alone, with the realisation that one is always 'trapped', that his search for happiness has been doomed by the nature of life.
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Selections of Students' Writing
C - Photo of Soldiers Departing contrasted with words about the reality of War
Q - In your own words describe Hemingway's experience at the front.
Other Works by Hemingway
Film Study Notes
World War I Links