Comparing Soldier's Home And Old Man At The Bridge

With Nihilism and Hopelessness Comes Cynicism and Disillusionment

When you look into Hemingway’s stories, it may seem like they’re all tied together by war time and the aftermath of. While this is true, there are also many themes that bring together and define Hemingway’s style. One aspect that I noticed a lot was the idea of nihilism- the loss of the things that give life meaning, many of his main characters possess this attitude. His characters have developed these attitudes as a result of war and these attitudes are what defines their present life. When looking at Soldier’s Home and Old Man at the Bridge, you can see a lot of similarities despite the fact that one is a 76 year old man displaced by the Spanish civil war and the other is

a young veteran returning home after world war 1.
The young man, Krebs, in Soldier’s Home, is experiencing a feeling that he’s lost everything that he’s ever had in his life prior to war, especially a sense of stability. “He had been badly, sickly frightened all the time. In this way he lost everything.” (page 146) For Krebs to build back up his life it would take a lot of time and emotional effort, just to put on a happy face, and he doesn’t see the worth in it. I think that in a way he’s lost hope for feeling like he has a concrete role and end goal for his life- he’s been moved from home, to war, through war, and back to home without much say in it. He can’t be phased by the petty aspects that make up civilian life. I think that Hemingway writes this character with himself in mind, as with pretty much all of his characters. It’s one of his alter ego’s who experiences essentially only one feeling and emotion, hopelessness. I also think that Hemingway, an outcast throughout his life, was feeling the same problem as Krebs with connecting to the broader society. Krebs doesn’t know how to connect with people and he doesn’t want to try. Friendships and relationships involve explaining himself or lying, and as he puts it, “He [does] not want consequences. He [does] not want any consequences ever again.” (page 147) This touches on a point that can be brought up with any war, the veterans lose the ability to remain connected to society because they experience such a dramatic shift in their view of the world that we all live in. No relationship will ever have emotion that compares with the strength of that which it is felt at war. While I doubt that Hemingway was trying to specifically make a statement about this or make a call to action, it’s still something important to notice when thinking about the themes across his writing.
The nihilistic nature of the young man comes out especially in the way that he's lost the values and beliefs that he once had.

Beliefs make you, you, they make you part of a family and of a bigger outside community of society. One common belief that ties people together is religion. When people come to hardships they often either turn to religion as a way of coping or they turn away from it because they think it has deceived them. In Soldier’s Home, Krebs tells his mother that he is “not in His Kingdom” (page 151) after she tries to tell him that he has a god given meaning to his life. When his mother asks of him, “Now, you pray, Harold”, his only response is “I can’t” (page 152) not I won’t, but I can’t, as if he couldn’t allow himself to, even if that was what he wanted. I thought that this was a clear demonstration of his rejection of beliefs and values that were a part of his life pre-war. This has to do with not seeing a point in withholding one’s faith, it goes along with a common argument against religion that if there were a God, he wouldn’t let thing like this happen, that he wouldn’t let the tragedy of war ensue. This seems to be what Krebs is getting at when he says this to his mother, and although he feels embarrassed that he is going against his upbringing, he does believe it’s true. I think that Hemingway made the choice to include Krebs’ rejection of religion because it’s such a common theme in all tales of war. and it’s a hard point not to be brought up. It’s difficult to accept things without having proof and evidence. This is constant throughout history and is even more true of our modern society, there’s so much conflict in the world that it’s hard for many people to believe that there is any control or reason for things to

happen.
Looking at the old man in Old Man at the Bridge, we see a lot of similar patterns of hopelessness between him and Krebs. The old man used to look after animals in his home town of San Carlos but when he was forced to leave he walked as far as he could, before resting at a bridge part way to Barcelona, where most people were headed. He no longer has any sense of need to maintain his own well-being, he only thinks about what has happened and will happen to the animals. “I am without politics […] I am seventy-six years old. I have come twelve kilometers now and I think now I can go no further.” (page 179) The old man has come to terms with the end of his life, he knows that death in inevitable and he’s old already. Back home, he saw his life as “only taking care of animals” (page 80) and those are gone now too. The old man finds no delight in living and thus is un-phased by the prospect of death it seems that he is ready for it to take him, so he might as well sit back and wait.
The soldier who is speaking to the old man, in Old Man at the Bridge also sees that the old man is bound to die sooner or later, and he seems to feel little empathy for him, stating that- only the lack of planes overhead and “the fact that cats know how to look after themselves was all the good luck that old man would ever have.” (page 80) Even though we know very little about the soldier besides what he says and thinks of the old man, it’s clear that he too, has lost meaning in his life because he doesn’t care to find meaning in this man’s life, it doesn’t make a difference to him. Life is as bleak to him as it is to this purposeless old man. This further illustrates my point that Hemingway’s stories are tied together by the feeling of hopelessness- it’s not just one character in a story who feels this, it’s all of them to some extent.
The young veteran of World War 1 and the old man of the Spanish civil war couldn’t be more different people but they are nearly identical in mind set. They both see nothing of any interest to them in their current life or in the foreseeable future. The long journey has tired the old man to the point of exhaustion and he sees no use in being a burden on someone else or trying to start his life over in a new city that has nothing for him. As I discussed earlier, his past life revolved around the animals he cared for and that’s already gone, so what’s left? Nothing, as he sees it. For the soldier, the past few years have revolved around surviving life or death situations and seeing numerous fatalities we can assume. His life has been much more than the world he grew up in, the “world of already defined alliances and shifting feuds” (page 147) or the world of “the girls that [walked] on the other side of the street.” (page 148) So when he returns to his home, he too is unable to find anything left to care about.
With nihilism and hopelessness comes cynicism and disillusionment. To me these ideas come through strongly in Hemingway’s writing style, not just through the content of his writing. His style is known for being minimalistic and open ended, it leaves you wondering and guessing a little bit. When he’s set up such a dismal atmosphere for many of his short stories it’s really easy to continue on this path as you look more into he story. For the reader, it becomes hard to escape the hopeless mind set just as it is for his characters, and I think that’s exactly what he’s trying to do. It makes you feel like you’re part of the character’s life of nothingness. It’s a really subtle way of drawing the reader in and is also effective in creating a sense of empathy towards a character.
There are a lot of claims that can be made about Hemingway’s stories and his writing style, some more crucial than others. But I think that it’s vital to your understanding to notice patterns and themes in any set of writings, especially Hemingway who has a lot of constants throughout his characters since they often portray himself. The way that he sets up almost each character as an existentialist draws from his personal experience as well as a common experience of many people put in similar situations of hardship. These stories don’t only give a context the authors’ life, they give a meaning to human existence as a whole and can give important insights into our own lives. In the two stories that I compared, both the young war veteran and the old man help us to understand Hemingway’s common view of the war which can easily be translated to the way we look at the emotional aftermath of conflict in our society.