A good example of this is Ernest Hemingway’s A Farewell to Arms.
Many people find Hemingway as an extremely dry prose writer, because he writes enough (or too much, if you are, per se, the “average reader”) detail to actually place the reader inside his story. In the beginning of the book, Hemingway chooses to present his story with a particularly harsh fertility that promotes the concepts of death and destruction. Hemingway, at the very beginning of his novel, is already showing the concept of the title A Farewell to Arms.
The rain, a very prestigious symbol in this story, is what foreshadows the theme of bleak horror for the upcoming characters. You may ask, “What is the most obvious way that a relatively intuitive reader can consider the concept of symbolism with the weather?” The rain brings cholera. (But, in all attempts to acrimoniously and caustically debrief his anti-war beliefs, it only kills 7,000 men.)
In only the first two pages, Hemingway has already brought up a theme, which resonates throughout the entire novel. In only the first two pages, a majority of readers will not grasp the concept and truly realize, and understand, the beauty and acumen that it takes to even consider writing an acceptable piece of literature, such as this.
The themes are the most important and typically most overlooked parts of this novel—though some are more obvious than others. However, regardless of whether or not one is more “evident,” each theme adds an exceptionally large contribution to the effort that Hemingway put into the story.
One of the most obvious themes that Hemingway used was how love was a response to all of the horrors and all of the catastrophes that war brought, that the world brought. Henry and Catherine have a blissfully ignorant relationship that thrives off of overlooking the apparent flaws, be it from Henry’s injury to, the most prominent, Catherine’s death. Both Henry and Catherine use love as a diversion to reality: Henry not wishing to think of the war; Catherine desperately seeking a rebound for her dead fiancé. They constantly tell each other not to think about anything else, other than them—because, the world is too awful, too painful, to bear.
The most prevalent dilemma that neither Henry, nor Catherine, realize is the obscure consequences of using love as an escapism from the painful world outside. It is pointed out by various characters throughout the entire novel that no one seems to fully grasp the side-effects, or “stakes,” of love, especially when you lose it. In the end of this book, when Catherine dies, Henry recognizes that he has just lost the one thing in the world that was helping him survive. The reader also recognizes that there is an almost definite acclamation that Henry will not recover from this horrific loss.
Another prominent thematic gesture in this novel is Henry’s journalistic narration. Just like in Albert Camus’ “The Stranger,” the book is narrated with a very indifferent, detached perspective. With this simplistic nature, Hemingway is able to emphasize the disinterest Henry has towards his involvement in both the war and the world. Contrary to popular belief of the typical “reader,” this distant, typically stoic, perspective accentuates the generally concealed emotions that Henry is composed of.
Now after seeing only some of the themes, symbols, and even writing-style that Hemingway has produced within this novel, we are shown one of the most important and distinguished features that is featured within A Farewell to Arms. This, of course, is the title itself. The title is a representation of two completely different things. Chronologically speaking, the first “farewell to arms” is when Henry deserts the army. This is showing how isolated Henry has always emotionally been from the war itself; as well as, how apathetic he is towards his involvement in the war and the world. The second interpretation we can deduce from the title is at the moment of Catherine’s death. In this scene, Henry now must say goodbye to his lover’s arms—the only thing that means anything to him. The title proves to show how effective Hemingway’s thought-process is: Henry must bid farewell to something he is completely apathetic towards, and he must bid farewell to something he utterly loves.
In each of these partings, Hemingway also carefully nurtures an irony and a parallelism. In Henry’s departure from the Italian Army, he is greeted with welcoming, open arms into the loving embrace of Catherine. In Henry’s loss of Catherine, we see the parallel of the ambulance scene that Henry had once been so phlegmatic towards with Catherine’s death scene. When Frederic was transported into the ambulance, the wounded soldier above him has “hemorrhaged,” due to the wounds he attained from battle in the war, and the blood slowly, continually, drips on him; when Catherine dies, she “hemorrhages” due to the wounds of her battle with childbirth.
Though many readers may not actually take into consideration the excruciatingly painful work that authors must put into their novels, it is there. Regardless of whether or not the themes, the motifs, or the symbols are subtle, they are there. Everything an author does—No, it is not coincidence—it is intentional; it is exceptional. All of these small things that many people overlook are what cause us, the avid readers that have a gluttonous desire for knowledge, to appreciate a true piece of literature. We do not solely seek the introduction of characters, the building up of a plot line, the climax, the after-effects, and the conclusion; we seek more. And, when we find this "more," the hidden themes, all of the prevalent symbolism, the parallels and the irony, our appetites are satiated; and, we are appeased.
