Seasonal Changes

Ernest Hemingway does an excellent job in using the seasons to provoke the type of tone he wants to portray throughout the classic novel, A Farewell to Arms. He uses the summer season in Book 2 of the novel to romanticize Catherine and Frederic's love in during their time together while Frederic is in the hospital. On page 112, Hemingway really romanticizes the whole feel of the summer and also Frederic and Catherine’s relationship. This is passage is almost too fantasy like by using they descriptions of what Catherine and Frederic do such as: riding a carriage in the park and going to romantic dinners (blah blah blah).  Many girls in the modern era think about a perfect romantic setting with carriage rides and candlelit dinners during summer months when there are few worries. He uses these common romantic notions to describe Catherine and Frederic’s love. Summer is often characterized to show youthfulness and excitement which gives their love a new and young feel. Using Frederic’s thoughts he says, “If we let our hands touch…we were excited” (112).  Frederic and Catherine are acting as adolescents in this passage because of the excitement they get when they show a little bit of affection and intimateness (a little childish and ridiculous if you ask me). They act as if there is not a war going on and that their love is the only thing that matters.

A main part of the book is the big retreat from the Austrians that Frederic and his fellow army men take during the end of October. The atmosphere of this fall in Italy is rainy and muddy to cause a very dramatized melancholy mood. This is depicted after Frederic and his mates have broken down their ambulances and left the main part of the group; he says that “along the river bank there was nothing and no one but the wet brush and muddy ground” (207). This shows the uncleanliness of the conditions they are walking in and the continuous draining of their moods (because mud is icky!).  One can tell that the men on this retreat are starting to get worn down by the long walk to Udine. Then, Frederic says that “finally we saw the railway bridge” (207). This is slight hope that getting through this retreat is a real possibility. With all of his mates still alive (excluding the two sergeants that Frederic shot—but they don’t count cause they weren’t his friends), things are beginning to look up until they eventually see the German soldiers on the bridge.  As you can see, the season of fall gives more of an impact on the reading of this passage than most would believe.