A Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway - Essay Example

A Farewell to Arms A romantic saga is incomplete without an emotionally vulnerable couple with a passionate, exotic and sensuous heroine. Catherine Barkley, the better half of Fredric Henry is crafted with passion, myth and an extreme stoicism which is very rare to trace in the character portrayal of heroines in literature. Critics contend that Catherine is an expression of Hemingway’s misogynist side but it would be sheer injustice to the portrayal of a character as strong and firm as Catherine, if she is perceived with the notion that she was framed to quench the hatred of the novelist.

Catherine Barkley, like the season of mist and monsoon, has two faces on a single paradigm. At one plane, she is enough voluptuous to quench the desire of a man and satisfy his fantasies. And on the other plane, she is independent, smart, and strong women who not only shows the capacity to melt a stone like Henry but evolves out with the progression of the novel, as a peer to Henry in all his struggles and troubles. Hardly any female character would give such unconventional dialogue in discovering the fact that she is pregnant as Catherine gives in ‘A Farewell to Arms’, “I’ll try and not make trouble for you.

I know I’ve made trouble now. But haven’t I always been a good girl until now?” (Hemingway, “A Farewell to Arms”, Pg - 128). Critics rightly claim that Catherine Barkley is the real hero of the novel. Her desperation to love Henry with all that she has, transports her claim for Henry above all the limitations of conventionalities. “There isn’t any me. I’m you. Don’t make up a separate me” (Hemingway, “A Farewell to Arms”, Pg - 107) indicates that she is above any ordinary woman to be titled as mere fantasy of a man.

She is courageous, stoic and deity of fortitude. She is the real hero of the novel.Works CitedHemingway, Ernest. A Farewell to Arms. Simon and Schuster, 1997.