A Moveable Feast

“Maybe away from Paris I could write about Paris as in Paris I could write about Michigan. I did not know it was too early for that because I did not know Paris well enough.”

Hemingway ponders if one must leave Paris to be able to look back upon it with a critical eye, reflecting his ongoing relationship with Paris as a muse throughout his writing career. This quote foreshadows the fact that it takes him many trips to Paris before he finishes his first novel, which takes place in Paris, as well as the fact that he wouldn’t write A Moveable Feast until years later when he was away from Paris and an established writer.

“‘It’s good,’ she said. ‘That’s not the question at all. But it is inaccrochable. That means it is like a picture that a painter paints and then he cannot hang it when he has a show and nobody will buy it because they cannot hang it either.’”

The value of a book is debated throughout the novel. In this quote, Stein asserts her main criteria for judging a work as valuable. For something to be inaccrochable is to make a work of art that cannot be sold or shown to anyone. This critique foreshadows Fitzgerald’s destruction as he adjusts his stories to fit a more sellable formula. Hemingway disagrees with both of these writing philosophies, believing that one should write in the way that tells the particular story the best and not the way that sells the best.

“…and I thought, I will do my best to serve her and see she gets justice for the good work she had done as long as I can, so help me God and Mike Ney. But the hell with her lost-generation talk and all the dirty, easy labels.”

Stein calls Hemingway’s generation, ‘Une Generation Perdue,’ or The Lost Generation, a label he decides to dismiss. This highlights the tension between Hemingway’s frustrations and challenges with his own experiences and Stein’s rigid views and projections. Labels go against Hemingway’s understanding of experience; he does not believe that any person should be limited or condemned by the subjective experience of another.

“‘No,’ she said. ‘They are all thrown away. That is why one knows they have no value.’ ‘Friends give them to them to read on boats.’ ‘Doubtless,’ she said. ‘They must leave many on the boats.’ ‘They do,’ I said. ‘The line keeps them and binds them and they become the ships’ libraries.’ ‘That’s intelligent,’ she said. ‘At least they are properly bound then. Now a book like that would have value.’”

Hemingway’s juxtaposition of Shakespeare and Company and the book stalls on the Seine illustrates the question of literary value. While Sylvia Beach loves all books, regardless of the author’s nationality or how the book is bound, aesthetics play a crucial role to the public on the Seine. The books from the Seine are thrown away if they are not bought that day, as profitability is the only marker that determines their value.

“Standing there I wondered how much of what we had felt on the bridge was just hunger. I asked my wife and she said, ‘I don’t know, Tatie. There are so many sorts of hunger. In the spring there are more. But that’s gone now. Memory is hunger.”

A Moveable Feast is filled with Hemingway’s own memories of his time in Paris. In this particular scene, he and Hadley are engaged in a false spring, meaning that they are living as if it is spring before spring has actually arrived. In this moment, memory is equated with hunger and presented as a yearning for the past that cannot be satiated.

“It was a wonderful meal at Michaud’s after we got in; but when we had finished and there was no question of hunger any more, the feeling that had been like hunger when we were on the bridge was still there when we caught the bus home. It was there when we came in the room and after we had gone to bed and made love in the dark, it was there. When I woke with the windows open and the moonlight on the roofs of the tall houses, it was there.”

Hemingway sees hunger all over Paris, a hunger that symbolizes both the cities desire to embrace spring and his own desire to live limitlessly in Paris. He is forced to confront this hunger and must instead embrace a simple life of work and family. Paris is depicted as pregnant with possibilities that one can easily become engrossed in.

“When I stopped working on the races I was glad but it left an emptiness. By then I knew that everything good and bad left an emptiness when it stopped. But if it was bad, the emptiness filled up by itself. If it was good you could only fill it by finding something better. I put the racing capital back into the general funds and I felt relaxed and good.”

Betting at horseraces is one of Hemingway’s major vices in the memoir. Desiring a more comfortable life for himself and Hadley, he is lured to the races by the promise of excitement and quick money. He soon realizes the detrimental aspects of the races, as he neglects both his work and his wife. A feeling of emptiness returns, but he knows it’s pointing him in a better direction.

“There you could always go into Luxembourg Museum and all the paintings were sharpened and clearer and more beautiful if you were belly-empty, hollow-hungry. I learned to understand Cezanne much better and to see truly how he made landscapes when I was hungry. I used to wonder if he were hungry too when he painted; but I thought possibly it was only that he had forgotten to eat. It was one of those unsound but illuminating thoughts you have when you have been sleepless or hungry. Later I thought Cezanne was probably hungry in a different way.”

Hemingway turns to fasting, believing it to sharpen the senses and make him more receptive to art. He makes a distinction between physical hunger and the hunger to paint and create art, which he suspects is what Cezanne felt. The notion of sustaining a lack also connects to Hemingway’s own literary philosophy of purposeful omission as a way to enhance meaning.

“It was a very simple story called Out of Season and I had omitted the real end of it which was that the old man hanged himself. This was omitted on my new theory that you could omit anything if you knew that you omitted and the omitted part would strengthen the story and make people feel something more than they understand.”

Hemingway elaborates on his Iceberg Theory of omission in writing, asserting a less-is-more philosophy that emphasizes feeling in the reader more than a spoon-fed narrative. This also highlights one of the many differences between Hemingway and Fitzgerald, who writes and changes details deliberately to suit his audience.

“It is necessary to handle yourself better when you have to cut down on food so you will not get too much hunger-thinking. Hunger is good discipline and you learn from it. And as long as they do not understand it you are ahead of them. Oh sure, I thought, I’m so far ahead of them now that I can’t afford to eat regularly. It would not be bad if they caught up a little.”

To have “too much hunger-thinking” seems to mean the giving in to temptation and desire. To learn how to sit with one’s hunger while still keeping a clear mind is what Hemingway calls discipline. Hemingway comments that as long as others do not understand the enlightening acquired from sustaining a lack of some sort, that they will always be in awe of his work. He somewhat backtracks on this grandiose sentiment, ultimately wishing that others understood his books enough to buy them so that he could actually eat.

“These people made it a comfortable café since they were all interested in each other and in their drinks or coffees, or infusions, and in the papers and periodicals which were fastened to rods, and no one was on exhibition.”

Cafés are perfect writing spots for Hemingway. He enjoys the combination of observing the behavior of others while still being able to work on his writing without disruption. Human nature is touched on many times in the novel, and cafés serve as a social arena full of diverse characters. Hemingway likes that not one person is “on exhibition” but rather, each individual dissolves into the café environment.

“In those days you did not really need anything, not even the rabbit’s foot, but it was good to feel it in your pocket.”

Hemingway is superstitious about his writing, believing that he must carry a rabbit’s foot with him in order to write well. He used to believe that all conditions must be perfect in order to produce stories, but he learns that external influences do not determine what or how he writes. Instead, he becomes confident that he possesses the ability to write regardless of the pens, papers, or lucky charms in his possession.

“The people in the principal cafes might do the same thing or they might just sit and drink and talk and love to be seen by others. The people that I liked and had not met went to the big cafes because they were lost in them and no one noticed them and they could be alone in them and be together. The big cafes were cheap then too, and all had good beer and the aperitifs cost reasonable prices that were clearly marked on the saucers that were served with them.”

The cafés of Paris are social environments. Different cafés attract different customers, and Hemingway enjoys the big cafés and the people who frequent them. Hemingway states that people who enjoy the big, principal cafés care more about quality company solitude than being noticed by others.

“They say the seeds of what we will do are in all of us, but it always seemed to me that in those who make jokes in life the seeds are covered with better soil and with a higher grade of manure.”

Hemingway reflects on Pascin, a fun-loving and brash painter who lives a hedonistic lifestyle but ultimately dies by suicide. Hemingway comments on how no one can avoid their respective fates and plights in life. But for some, their deepest nature and hidden tragedies are buried under jokes and extravagance, or rather, “covered with better soil.”

“In such cases I would explain to my friends that this was all beside the point. Either you had Bel Esprit or you did not have it. If you had it you would subscribe to get the Major out of the bank. If you didn’t it was too bad. Didn’t they understand the significance of the small Greek temple? No? I thought so. Too bad, Mac. Keep your money. We wouldn’t touch it.”

Bel Esprit is the fundraising program created by Ezra Pound to help T.S. Eliot leave his job at the bank and write poetry full time. The interconnection between fact and fiction comes to the forefront, as Eliot had severance from the war and technically may not have needed assistance. But Hemingway fully commits to the spirit of Bel Esprit, reflecting the bold optimism and strength of community held by the creative circles in Paris.

“There is not much future in men being friends with great women although it can be pleasant enough before it gets better or worse, and there is usually even less future with truly ambitious women writers.”

Gender is lightly touched on in A Moveable Feast, most notably with Gertrude Stein. Portrayed as adhering to her own gender roles, Stein only engages with Hemingway and not Hadley, his wife. Her ambition marks her with more traditionally masculine traits which necessarily collide with the men around her. Yet, it is the realization that she is ultimately human and flawed that shakes Hemingway to his core; after overhearing a very hostile argument between Miss Stein and her partner, Hemingway can never reconcile the friendship.

“‘No. You’re marked for Life.’ He capitalized the word.”

Ernest Walsh is an Irish poet who does not live up to the morals his first name implies. Hemingway says he is marked for death insofar as he is a con man who will eventually do penance for his wrong doings. Despite the two sharing the same first name, they are polarized representations of being Ernest and being “earnest.” While Walsh is pretending to be “Ernest,” Hemingway truly is “Ernest.” This quote further emphasizes their polarity, since Hemingway sees him as marked for death, Walsh ironically tells Hemingway he is marked for Life.

“He started to talk about my writing and I stopped listening. It made me feel sick for people to talk about my writing to my face, and I looked at him and his marked-for-death look and I thought, you con man conning me with your con. I've seen a battalion in the dust on the road, a third of them for" death or worse and no special marks on them, the dust for all, and you and your marked-for-death look, you con man, making a living out of your death.”

Hemingway is speaking of Walsh and how his words of flattery mean nothing. He understands that Walsh is coning him and thus not acting in “earnest” at all. This is the flip side of Walsh’s comment to Hemingway that he is “marked for Life.”

“‘I’ve been wondering about Dostoevsky,’ I said. ‘How can a man write so badly, so unbelievably badly, and make you feel so deeply?’”

Hemingway speaks with Evan Shipman about Dostoevsky and the two contemplate how no one can read Dostoevsky twice. They discuss how he conflates fantasy and reality in his work, and though it produces profound emotion, they consider the writing itself to be poor. This reflection on Dostoevsky represents Hemingway’s own inner plight, as he has been told before that his stories, while good, are not written well. He ponders what it means to be a writer.

“I only know that Ezra tried to be kind to Dunning as he was kind to so many people and I always hoped Dunning was as fine a poet as Ezra believed him to be. For a poet he threw a very accurate milk bottle. But Ezra, who was a very great poet, played a good game of tennis too. Evan Shipman, who was a very fine poet and who truly did not care if his poems were ever published, felt that it should remain a mystery.”

Hemingway and Shipman speak about the mystery of Dunning himself. Shipman finds it interesting that Dunning had been on the roof of the sawmill and believes that it should remain a mystery where the jar of opium went. Lack is apparent her again, yet neither Hemingway and Shipman know what exactly has been omitted from this particular story. Themes of hunger come to the forefront as Dunning starves himself routinely. Shipman declares that the world needs more mystery, but that it is a paradoxical need due to the problem of sustenance.

“His talent was a natural as the pattern that was made by the dust on a butterfly’s wings. At one time he understood it no more than the butterfly did and he did not know when it was brushed or marred. Later he became conscious of his damaged wings and of their construction and he learned to think and could not fly any more because the love of flight was gone and he could only remember when it had been effortless.”

Hemingway opens the chapter on Scott Fitzgerald with this paragraph in italics. He depicts a butterfly that is unaware of the dust patterns on his wings and so he flies effortlessly. Yet, he soon becomes aware of his wings and forgets how to fly. This quote is representative of Fitzgerald’s plight, as he continuously overthinks and changes his stories to fit a more sellable mold. As such, he does not write in the best way for a particular story to be told, but in the best way for it to be sold. This method corrupts his writing. The above quote serves as a foreshadowing of Fitzgerald’s eventual fading out of relevance.

“We both touched wood on the café table and the waiter came to see what it was we wanted. But what we wanted he, nor anyone else, nor knocking on wood or on marble, as this café table-top was, could ever bring us. But we did not know it that night and we were very happy.”

Hemingway has just returned from his trip with Fitzgerald and is having a meal with his wife. He says that one must never travel with someone they do not love. The two fantasize about traveling to Madrid and Valencia. They remark that they are awfully lucky and knock on wood. He knows that knocking on wood will not secure their future, but in this moment, they were happy.

“Zelda had hawk’s eyes and a thin mouth and deep-south manners and accent. Watching her race, you could see her mind leave the table and go to the night’s party and return with her eyes blank as a cat’s and then pleased, and the pleasure would show along the thin lines of her lips and then be gone.”

Zelda, Fitzgerald’s wife, is the ultimate cause of his downfall, as she is jealous of his writing and pressures him to drink. She also manipulates Fitzgerald, telling him that he will never please another woman and that he is a killjoy. Hemingway describes her as having hawk eyes, equating her to a bird that stalks prey. In the chapter’s title, Hemingway affirms that “hawks do not share” at all. Instead, they hunt and strive to dominate others.