Quotes and anectdotes from the wise to the foolish, and the courageous to the drunk
Ernest Hemingway Novelist
Gender: Male
Citizenship: United States
Born: Jul 21, 1899
Died: Jul 2, 1961
Ernest Miller Hemingway was an American author and journalist. His economical and understated style had a strong influence on 20th-century fiction, while his life of adventure and his public image influenced later generations. Hemingway produced most of his work between the mid-1920s and the mid-1950s, and won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1954. He published seven novels, six short story collections, and two non-fiction works. Additional works, including three novels, four short story collections, and three non-fiction works, were published posthumously. Many of his works are considered classics of American literature.
Hemingway was raised in Oak Park, Illinois. After high school he reported for a few months for The Kansas City Star, before leaving for the Italian front to enlist with the World War I ambulance drivers. In 1918, he was seriously wounded and returned home. His wartime experiences formed the basis for his novel A Farewell to Arms.
In 1921, he married Hadley Richardson, the first of his four wives.
Madame, all stories, if continued far enough, end in death, and he is no true-story teller who would keep that from you.
death
A man's got to take a lot of punishment to write a really funny book.
funny
For a war to be just three conditions are necessary - public authority, just cause, right motive.
war
An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools.
intelligence & time
Never think that war, no matter how necessary, nor how justified, is not a crime.
war
The world breaks everyone, and afterward, some are strong at the broken places.
strength
Never go on trips with anyone you do not love.
love & travel
That terrible mood of depression of whether it's any good or not is what is known as The Artist's Reward.
good
I don't like to write like God. It is only because you never do it, though, that the critics think you can't do it.
God
Why should anybody be interested in some old man who was a failure?
failure
I know only that what is moral is what you feel good after and what is immoral is what you feel bad after.
good
Fear of death increases in exact proportion to increase in wealth.
death & fear
Prose is architecture, not interior decoration, and the Baroque is over.
architecture
Every man's life ends the same way. It is only the details of how he lived and how he died that distinguish one man from another.
life
What is moral is what you feel good after, and what is immoral is what you feel bad after.
good
Writing and travel broaden your ass if not your mind and I like to write standing up.
travel
Cowardice... is almost always simply a lack of ability to suspend functioning of the imagination.
imagination
In modern war... you will die like a dog for no good reason.
good & war
It's none of their business that you have to learn how to write. Let them think you were born that way.
business