Hey everyone, let's talk about a Moveable
Feast by Ernest Hemingway.
I read the restored Edition from 2009
and not the 1964 Edition, but I'll get to
that later. Let's talk about the book
first, because we did have some struggles.
This is the story of basically Ernest
Hemingway's years in Paris in 1920 - 25
something there. The early half of the
1920s, where he was just beginning his
writing career, living in Paris,
writing and hanging out with a lot of
people. It's more or less short essays
and stories about events and people he
met and stories and experiences he had.
So it's not an ongoing flow of story but
more different parts and scenes
described. It's memoir style. I think
the most problem I had was with the
writing. In the beginning, when I started
the book, I had a huge problem
reconciling the voice of the narrator,
which is Ernest Hemingway, with the
things I had heard about Ernest
Hemingway by others and movies, other
memoirs and things. So I was struggling
there because the voice in the beginning
is very young and very naive and it all
sounds like a love letter to Paris. And
even though that sounds very nice, I
really had a hard time imagining that being Hemingway. Which of course is not fair.
Because all I heard was of course hearsay, how other people saw Hemingway. And this
is how he maybe saw himself at the end
of his life, looking back at the beginning.
So I can't really fault him
for that. Moving on I really enjoyed what
he was talking about. I really got to
liking his enthusiam for
Paris and writing and the time he spent
writing. How he organized his life around
that. His time with his first wife and
the adventures they had. How he portraits
that is rather endearing. Also the other
characters he has interactions with. Like
Gertrude Stein, Fort Madox Ford, Ezra Pound and F. Scott Fitzgerald, all these people
that were also in Paris at that time. And
it is rather interesting to hear from
his point of view. The things he thinks
about them, and about their experiences
and the interactions they had. From that
point of view I really enjoyed this book.
I still have problems saying I've really
loved the book. I think for me it is an
interesting book that could have become
really more interesting if I wanted to
follow him around. He's very descriptive
of where he lives, and where he moves, and
where he goes for drinks. So if you
wanted, you could follow him around and
map out his time in Paris a lot. You
could also look up all the other people
he knew, and what they said about him. So I think it's a book you can't get lost
in researching more, and references and
other characters, to get more out of this.
That, I think, I didn't want. And that's a
thing that I also struggled with, because
alone it was interesting, but it wasn't
captivating for me. And since I didn't
really get along with the writing. Even
later on there was something about the
writing that I really, yeah, it was like a
barrier for me. I didn't get lost in the
writing and I like that when I read memoirs and people telling stories of their
lives, when you can get lost in it. And
you feel like you're there with them.
But often times I didn't feel that here. I
felt him being judgmental, or overly
critical, or mean even though he tried to
present himself as a very good person.
And that's also something you could get
lost in thinking about. But I kind of
didn't want to. So the things I had
problems with I think is not the fault
of the book. What I think the book does
really well is make you curious about
picking up a pen and going to Paris and
just sit in cafes and write. And being part
of that enthusiasm that they all felt at
the beginning of the 1920s. Where they
didn't really have that much money, but
were trying to sell their stories and
were taking their work seriously. And it
really makes you wish you could do that
as well.
And it also makes you think about a lot
of what writing is and the process of
writing. Which I think this edition does
really well. Now here comes the
difference. In 1964 there were a lot of
changes made to the manuscript that
Ernest Hemingway himself prepared,
because it was published posthumously
and no one really knows what his final
edition would have looked like. But this
edition really deals with that.
It includes beginnings for an introduction
that he discarded but has never finished
writing. It also includes lost or not
included chapters in the 1964 edition.
It also addresses changes that were made to the 1964 Edition, which I thought was
very interesting. So if you've already read
the 1964 Edition and really enjoyed that
I highly recommend picking this up as
well. If you want to reread it and
experience the story again I think
getting the restored Edition, with the
extra forward and introduction and the
extra snippets of his writing, will give
you another benefit into looking into
how he wrote, because you can see how he
changed little things and what he tried
with different forms. That's from the
writing perspective super interesting.
And yeah, I highly recommend this edition
for that. I think it's also worth getting
a Moveable Feast for the experience of
being in Paris in the early 20s, with all
the other writers and getting a
perspective that I hadn't heard before,
because I hadn't heard
Hemingway's perspective on those years
before. So for all of that it was a good
read. It wasn't a wonderful read for me, but I do appreciate it and I'm glad I
finally read it. Now I want to hear - I
know of course a lot of people love this
book and I want to hear what you love
about it. Tell me in comments. Tell me if
you read the restored Edition or if you
have read the original version, which is
apparently shorter than this, which is
already short. Anyway. Let's talk in
comments about Hemingway. Thank you for watching. Bye bye.
alright
