Literary Devices and Symbolisms in Ernest Hemingways Big Two-Hearted River

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Literary Devices and Symbolisms in Ernest Hemingway’s Big Two-Hearted River
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October 2, 2016
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Literary Devices in Ernest Hemmingway’s Big-Two Hearted River
It is said that a writer’s identity is very much reflected by the way he structures the words, contextualizes the story, and create meanings and impressions in the hearts of his readers. In order to create this emotional impact, many writers utilize different strategies, methods, and tools. In the case of Ernest Hemingway, these qualities were straightforwardness and simplicity. Being the author of the best known classical novels such as “A farewell to arms” and “The Old man and the Sea”, Hemingway won a Novel Prize and a Pulitzer Prize award (for The Old man and the Sea). Because of his unique way and descriptive way of writing that mostly appeals to the senses of the readers, that particular style was attributed to his name – Hemingway Writing Style. And, as for any other writers out there, it is believed that personal experiences can affect his writing style, in the case of Hemingway, many scholars believed that his occupation and experiences during the World War I paved the way for his technique that is much different from his contemporaries. However, the author of this paper believes that categorizing and describing his writing style into a single genre (Hemingway Writing style) is not enough. He believes that aside from his classical writing style, a more specific kind of “writer’s signature” could be seen from the more specific literary devices that he employed in his novels. Thus, in this article, the author employed one of his famous literary work – Big Two-Hearted River – and gave much focus on the literary devices that could be seen on it. By doing this, the author believes that this article could also she light as to what makes Hemingway’s novels “simple yet powerful”.[Biography.com. Ernest Hemigway - Biography. 9 September 2014. Web. 2 November 2016]
Literary Devices
Allusions
According to LiteraryDevices.com “An allusion is a figure of speech whereby the author refers to a subject matter such as a place, event, or literary work by way of a passing reference.” In other words, these are things which are not put into focus but are used as “side dish” to the main point that the author is trying to make. Allusions are very important because they make any piece of work “richer” by adding ‘embellishments’ on the text. However, because of the fact that allusions are not a part of the main point of the author, interpreting these and making a connection is mainly up for the readers.[LiteraryDevices.com. Allusion. n.d. Web. 2 November 2016.] [Ibid]
In an article written by Stewart entitled “Christian Allusions in ‘Big Two-Hearted River’”, he expounded on the story of the Hopkins, a friend of Nick. Stewart said that a “ritual communion” is being shown in between a “departed friend and hero”. He furthered that the reason why this could be considered as a ritual communion is because that skills Hopkins – being a great coffee master and wood dweller before – is now being re-lived by Nick by living in the woods and in the swamp. Aside from this, it could also be seed that a section of the novel was mainly dedicated towards the attributing, praising, and even criticizing the works and life of Hopkins’s. Such instances include times when he said; “It should be a triumph for Hopkins”, “It should be straight Hopkins all the way”, and times when he even praised Hopkins’s girl (The Blonde Venus). Furthermore, according to Stewart, the “Coffee Making” is also a symbolic way of showing that Hopkins will always be remembered and that there will come a day when they will meet again in the afterlife. However, Stewart did not end his analysis of the allusion here, he furthered by saying that this rite is also based from the Christian belief of “imbibing the principles of the master” that is based on the gospel of Matthew. However, as said earlier, the point of this article is not to define every allusion as seen by different readers since each would vary depending on one’s own interpretation. The main point of citing Stewart’s analysis is to find out that allusions were indeed utilized by Hemingway in this novel.[Stewart, Jack F. ""Christian Allusions In 'Big Two-Hearted River'." ." Studies In Short Fiction 15.2 (1978): 194. Web.] [Ibid page 194] [Ibid Page 195] [Ibid Page 195. Citing how Stewart interpreted the “ritualistic coffee-making” rite and its relationship to Christian beliefs were done by the author to show some of the ways of interpreting allusions in Hemingway’s novel. However, as said in the thesis of the article, the author only wants to prove that certain literary devices exist in the Hemingway’s novels rather than pointing them out one by one.]
Tragedy
Tragedies are mostly the main topics of stories; the idea of a tragic story stimulates readers in to plunging in to the story especially those who can relate and understand being under the same situation. Needless to say tragedies are often based on personal experiences and tragic events the author had encountered.[—. Tragedy. n.d. Web. 2 November 2016. 9 Adair, William. ""`Big Two-Hearted River'; Why The Swamp Is Tragic." ." Journal Of Modern Literature 17.4 (1991): 584. Web.]
Ernest Hemingway created one of the best short stories which were based on his experiences as a war veteran and he used these experiences to create such wonderful stories that would reflect what he underw...