"Hemingway": PBS Bio Film 4/5/21

I did like the film adaptation of For Whom the Bell Tolls and Farewell To Arms (saw Rock Hudson version), Snows of Kilimanjaro.
I read Old Man and the Sea as required in high school, far too young as well.
The final part last night was so very disturbing.. I remember reading Dearborn's bio on him and took me a while to stop thinking about his last years.
An upside of the doc is new attention on his works. At my local library the other day a few of his books were taken out. I checked out A Moveable Feast and Nick Adams Stories.

 

Funny. Today I was watching ESPN at the gym and they were showing Hank Aaron talk to a group of kids in the 60's and he said the n-word without being censored by ESPN.

 

Context is everything.

 

"Writing is something you can never do as well as it can be done."

One of the first Hemingway quotes from this American Masters episode on him, which will have to do for now as the PBS site keeps buffering -

 

This is a good article about how his Civil War series seemed to memorialize the Confederates and (inadvertantly?) portray them as tragic heroes:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/hist...war-breonna-taylor-george-floyd-shelby-foote/

I never watched the entire series, and it's been many years since I've seen any of it, so I can't say whether or not I agree.

 

I'll be watching this after we finish This Is A Robbery: The World’s Biggest Art Heist.

 

I have seen that documentary series twice, and I don't recall that being the case. The article you cite seems odd to me on a variety of levels that likely are not appropriate for further discussion here.

 

Not a big fan of how the documentary wrapped up in such a depressing manner:


Hemingway croaks.


And then the whole show just sort of ended, suddenly.

 

Enjoyed it quite a bit. I didn't know he had so many serious head injuries.

 

It's been about a decade since I watched, but I do remember having a general feeling, particularly from Shelby Foote's persuasive commentary (because he seemed so kind and genial and polite) , that the southerners were heroic, very good people valiantly fighting for their lost cause.

 

It's my retro habit to try to watch TV on schedule, so I've only seen the first episode and was very happy with it. Hemingway could impart so much with so few words.

My high school daughter hadn't heard of Gertrude Stein and asked her literature teacher why, which led to a good discussion in which he said he'd try to fit her in. I thought that was a cool, unexpected outcome.

 

That's how one of his novels ends (and I think most stories Ambrose Bierce wrote too).

 

The ending is very apropos. Having been exposed to death in 3 wars, not to mention bullfighting (death is one of the reasons Hemingway was attracted to the sport) the documentary made it clear how he was obsessed with death.

 

I think his deterioration in the 50s was pretty fast. Apparently he wrote Islands in the Stream in '51-'52 or so. It's a great book. So much better than indicated as possible in that mid 50s video interview where he was reading answers to questions and stating the punctuation, like "period" comma" in what he was reading. Very embarrassingly bad stuff right there. Not the same person who wrote Islands a couple years earlier.

 

I think a lot of things about this show Burns was influenced by the new woke perspective. I mean even moreso than usual for Burns. Lots of odd directions too much emphasized.

 

My picture of Lenny disappeared! Here's another.

 

In the Hemmingway documentary?

 

Any examples from the Hemingway documentary?

 

The emphasis that a few times he used horrible words which were used way back then but not OK now. The refusal to show those words. Showing people reacting with shock at the horribleness of those words, and their difficulty with him now. The emphasis on his slight androgyny. The womans reaction that this was a good thing about him. New sorts of stuff like that.

 

Really? Over the course of 6 hours I never really felt that. When he did go into those areas he certainly didn't dwell on them. The point was made, whether I agreed with it or not, and they moved on. I say this as a guy who can barely tolerate the ESPN 30 for 30 series anymore because of the politics. Burns did a nice job. I hope he does as good a job on the upcoming Ali doc.

 

Agreed. I think if they had shown those words or pronounced them, it would have been Burns' last appearance on PBS.
That scathing letter about From Here was very revealing, as I think he knew it would come to light and couldn't care less.
His ego was such that he knew the impact of the words but felt somehow that his hatred of the book would somehow be thought of as important or carry tons of weight.

 

Muhammad Ali? What a great subject for an extensive documentary! The Olympics, the Liston fight, his CO status, losing his crown, regaining his crown, his interactions with Cosell, Frasier and Forman, his Parkinsons . . . and much more I'm sure I'm not aware of. But, again, in the hands of Ken Burns?

 

OK, but one of the first (if not the first) grown-up books I read (circa 1968, when I was 10)? These days, I cannot even tell people the title! It was written by comedian/activist Dick Gregory, if that helps.

 

Thanks for the examples.
I would say using those words are inappropriate and do not reflect well on Hemingway. Androgyny - no problem with it as I can't see it hurting people like the n-word does. And since this is a music forum, here's a great song about it (from the 80s yet):

 

Just starting it tonight from my DVR.