Hemingway: Life in Michigan

Ernest Hemingway was a famous author who had experienced shocking events through his life. These shocking events played a significant role in what he wrote about and the consequences of his story. He experienced many problems on his childhood and this contributed to his individuality and wisdom for his future outcomes. Starting from 1899, after Hemingway’s family bought property near Walden Lake when Hemingway was a few weeks old, he grew up in a strong religion, hard task culture which granted him self determination (Hemingway, 02:05). Being raised in northern Michigan, Hemingway was taught by his father how to hunt and fish while his mother introduced him to church activities. During the summer, his family spent much of their time in the woods of northern Michigan.

It is factual that Hemingway’s life in northern Michigan played a significant role in his writing since it posed a thoughtful effect on the American writers of his life time. Many of his tasks were viewed as the classic of America while some of them have been made into motion portraits. The northern Michigan helped him in his writing as it was a society which was very strict in disciplinarians. He tried as hard as he could to evade the traditions in his society that were forced in him while still young. As it is stated in the documentary that Hemingway was a good observer of people, it helped him observe the world from his own perception which gave him the idea of composing stories (Hemingway, 07:50).

Some of the people that were interviewed in the documentary include Michael R. Federspiel, Ken Marek, James Sanford, and Ernie Mainland among others. The main reason why these people were interviewed is because they knew Hemingway very well and some of them such as Sanford and Mainland were his family members (nephews). Thus, they gave first information regarding what they knew about Hemingway’s story. Some of the books that were quoted in the documentary include “A Farewell to Arms”, “The Old Man and the Sea” and “The Last Good Country”. The reason why these books were quoted is because they were the first books that Hemingway wrote (except “The Last Good Country” which was written by Nick Adams) and some of them contributed significantly in his career.

The story of how Ernest Hemingway grew up to become the great author together with the society he grew in as highlighted in the documentary explains the themes of development and traditional cultures exhibited in the “Indian Camp” story (Hemingway, 30).

Work Cited

Hemingway, Ernest. “Indian Camp.” Reading and Writing about Literature, 2nd ed. Ed. Phillip Sipiora. Boston, MA: Pearson, 2002: 28-31.  Print.

Hemingway: Life in Michigan. Mt. Pleasant, Michigan. WCMU. PBS. 2007. DVD.