Great American Novels 2020

The Dust Bowl: What Happened?

As our class is reading The Grapes of Wrath, I wanted to learn more about the Dust Bowl and what it actually was. I knew very little about it before hand; I knew that it was dry, people moved and that people suffered but what I really wanted to know was that were there really giant dust clouds?

Yes. Yes there was.

Like the Joad family many people moved to California during this time, 250,000 in fact and overall 2.5 million people were displaced throughout the Dust Bowl which lasted officially for six years (1930-1936). But why was this? In 1862 the Homestead Act was passed. This allowed anyone to claim 160 acres of land for just the filing fee if they promised to tend to it and farm it. This caused many inexperienced people to move west and begin farming. When World War I began (1914) the need for wheat increased and 100s of millions of acres of healthy grasslands were plowed and used for farming. When WWI came to a close and throughout the 1920’s other crops were planted so the farmers could make money but by the time the drought of 1931 took place the land had been overused and abused long enough that it completely gave out. This drought caused the land to dry up further than it already had and winds picked up the dust and created large clouds that forced people to move and find new and healthier land to work on.

Image result for the dust bowl — *A haunting image of a dust storm in Texas. (1935)*

Migrant Mother

Migrant Mother is an image synonymous with the Great Depression and is seen as the most famous photo of the era. It simply shows a mother with her young family sitting in tattered rags looking worried. You can feel the stress and helplessness resonating off the face of the mother and can imagine the struggle she faces at raising her family.

That woman is Florence Thompson, she is a 32 year old mother of 7. She was an agricultural worker who had been hoping to find work in California. Before the photo was taken, she was travelling with her family but had stopped due to car trouble. They stopped by a group of pea-pickers, who had just been told that their crops had been destroyed. As Florence was getting her car repaired, she got her photo taken.

Like the Joads, Florence Thompson is a migrant looking to make a living. Also like the Joads, she has an intense devotion to her family which is the cause of her moving. She was also an agricultural worker and also faced trouble due to her car breaking. Both she and the Joads represent the struggles of most migrant families in the Depression and Dustbowl.

Short Blog #1

After tasted Hemingway’s “style”, I gained something.

First of all, the emotion matters. Different weather will bring different feelings to the readers: sunny makes people happy, cloudy indicates a mixture of hesitation and worry, snowy means sadness especially the hearts are frozen, rainy always produce a sadness such as crying (dropping tears), and storm brings up people’s madness and violence. In this book, the weather transforms from rain with thunder to light rain. Henry’s “I’m afraid of rain because I can see I will die soon.” reveals his fear of death, one of the characteristics of “Code Hero”, which means if he died, everything is about to end. The “rain” indicates his fragile but strong heart, aiming for all he needs when worrying he may potentially lose it. The rain, the darkness, end, in his mind.

Furthermore, losing something is not horrible, but the attitude on how you will deal with the losing, one of the natural phenomena, is vital. The most important factor, the environment, sometimes can make substantial impact on people. If people live under unpleasant atmosphere such as war (World War I or II), battle (Iran-U, or widespread virus, it’s quite reasonable than they cannot adjust their mood shortly. If people cannot keep away from the negative emotions, they would never have chance to feel the happiness. Losing something is not abnormal, even the thing seems really precious to yourself, but we still have numerous opportunities to obtain it.

You cannot overturn the environment, but you’re capable of changing yourself!

Short Blog #3 (GoW)

This book caused a lot of disputes and arguments since its release in 1989 because they thought that the book was saying offensive things against them, especially in Kern County where the setting was set in the book. As a result of that, the area banned the book from schools and libraries. I, however, am against these critics because from what I can gather in the book so far, the book isn’t offensive. The book instead teleports the reader right into the Dust Bowl era so you feel like you’re a part of the book itself.

Hemingway and WWI

Italy joined World War I in the spring of 1915 by declaring war on Austria-Hungary. With an under-equipped army of 1.2 million, Italy advanced against Austro-Hungarian forces in the Tyrol region of Italy and were met with a stalemate. Two years later, 1917, Germany joined forces with the Austro-Hungarian army and decimated Italy’s army during the Battle of Caporetto where 300,000 Italian soldiers lost their lives. By the end of the war 615,000 Italian soldiers had died and Italy was given a permanent position in the League of Nations.

A Farewell to Arms, written by Ernest Hemingway, follows an American, Frederic Henry, through the years of 1916-1918 in Italy. He serves as an ambulance driver and officer while balancing a secret relationship with an English nurse, Catherine. The story of Frederic is a realistic telling of an Italian soldier’s life during WWI and it parallels Hemingway’s experience in the war.

Hemingway joined the the Red Cross and served as an ambulance driver in Italy and in 1918 he was wounded by mortar; fire much like Frederic. Also just like Frederic, Hemingway recovered in a Milan hospital and fell in love with Agnes von Kurowsky who would later become the inspiration of the character Catherine in the novel A Farewell to Arms.

Catherine Barkley Quote

Throughout the novel A Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway, Catherine throws herself at Frederic Henry—almost to the point where she loses her own identity. One of the quotes that really struck me was when she said to Henry “There isn’t any me. I’m you. Don’t make up a separate me” (99). I think this quote shows the depth of Catherine’s love for Henry and her desire to eliminate herself and think of them as one. In Catherine’s previous relationship, her fiancé died in the war. Afterwords, she was an “emotional wreck” because she felt guilty that she did not put enough into that relationship. I agree with Hemingway when he says that Catherine channeled those thoughts and emotions to her relationship with Henry to try and make up for her past mistakes. As the novel progresses, Catherine becomes more and more like Frederic Henry. She even suggests that she cut her hair short to be like his. It seems to be that her primary goal is to please Henry. Whenever they are apart, she is dreaming of him, and despite the fact that Frederic Henry is not as interested in her, Catherine continues to focus on their relationship and give 100% of herself.

Fredrick Henry’s Immoral Actions

“A Farewell to Arms” by Ernest Hemingway short blog post

In “A Farewell to Arms” by Ernest Hemingway, the reader may look at the actions of the main character Frederic Henry as immoral. While I would agree that Henry’s actions are justifiably considered immoral, I believe that the environment that Henry is in is largely to blame for how he acts. Firstly, Henry himself does not quite understand why he acts immorally. When talking with the priest about why he chose going to whorehouses over the priest’s recommended vacation spot, he states “I myself felt as badly as he did and could not understand why I had not gone” (11). This makes it evident that Henry is not actively aware of the choices he is making and demonstrates that his choices could be affected by outside sources. Secondly, there is evidence throughout the story of Henry’s encouragement to act immorally. When Henry is deciding where to go on vacation the captain states, “He should have fine girls. I will give you the addresses of the places in Naples. Beautiful girls,” (8). This demonstrates the encouragement and peer pressure from the soldiers around Henry to act immorally. There is also the added fact that Henry’s captain was the one pressuring Henry to do this. In the military, one’s higher officers have a large influence over the soldiers they preside. Moreover, a major peer pressured Henry into drinking excessively. After returning from his leave, “The major said he had heard a report that [Henry] could drink, [Henry] denied this,” (33). Even though Henry denied he could drink, Henry ends up in a drinking match against a fellow soldier. Through the evidence stated, it can be seen that while Frederic Henry does act immorally, his actions are influenced from his surroundings.

A Strange Love

Throughout the book “A Farewell to Arms” by Ernest Hemingway, it is well known that Catherine and Frederic are in love. They may display it in different ways, but they are in love. Catherine displays it earlier on in the novel, with her every move being to serve and worship Frederic. Frederic, on the other hand, comes off as being more selfish and therefore this prompts the assumption that he may not love her as much as she loves him. This selfish impression was not his intention at all. I think this because of the quote “everything was gone inside of me” (282) when Catherine is almost dead. This quote shows that even though he may not have shown it or expressed it, he loved Catherine just as much as she loved him. She was every part of him, and he is only truly able to express his true love and feelings when he loses her, and when he realizes the significance of what he has lost. As he grew throughout the novel, he realized that he could indeed love, and his breaking point when he finally knows this as a fact is during Catherine’s death.

Hemingway’s writing style

A Farewell to Arms is the first Hemingway book that I have read. I wasn’t sure what to expect at first, and admittedly, I was a bit lost trying to comprehend what exactly I was reading during the first few chapters due to Hemingway’s unique, journalistic, emotionless style of writing. But after a while I was able to pick it up and flow with it better. I find it amazing how Hemingway is able to include so much meaningless information in the novels without losing the reader. In a similar way, I also find it incredible that hidden within the meaningless information, Hemingway sprinkles important “read-between-the-lines” details that are relevant to advancing the plot. For example, in conversations with the doctor and people on the front lines you can get an understanding of how much they hate the war just through the short conversations that the characters have even with everything else going on around them. I’ve also noticed that Hemingway uses a lot of repetition to build up the character’s traits and personalities. Like in the book how much Hemingway emphasizes Henry’s drinking habits

Introductory Blog

History of War

This Novel is heavily based on World War 1 or the First World War and I found this educational video to share with you. This video explains the history of the war, who took part in the war, the time length of the war, and many more concepts.

Author Background

Ernest Hemingway is the well renowned author of this book A Farewell to Arms. He was known as a classic “American” because of his love for hunting, fishing, and the outdoors. His style of writing is very brief and straight forward. One interesting fact I found from this video was that after high school Hemingway opted to go to Kansas City to work on the newspaper instead of going to college. Some people belief this influenced his brief and straight forward style of writing.