Soldiers Home - Literary Analysis
A soldier returning home from war should be a time of celebration and relief. However, not all soldiers feel like they can, or even want to come home again. In his story, Soldiers Home, Ernest Hemingway tells us the tale of a young soldier, Howard Krebs, who reluctantly returns home from World War I. On the surface, Krebs appears to be suffering from the results of a traumatic war time experience. However, this experience is not caused from something attributed to his time on the battlefield. Krebs struggles to stay true to himself and maintain his integrity, while trying to fit in again amongst the townspeople, as well as foster any type of romantic relationship. I believe war changed Krebs by showing him a new world beyond his small mid-western home town.
Upon his return home, Krebs finds that the townspeople are not interested in hearing his stories about the war, but instead, “Krebs found that to be listened to at all he had to lie” (1). For Krebs, lying led him to start rejecting his experience in war as being meaningful. “A distaste for everything that had happened to him in the war set in because of the lies he had told” (1). This indicates that Krebs feels he did something worthwhile and meaningful in the war. Krebs goes on to refer to this as “the one thing, the only thing for a man to do, easily and naturally” (1). Hemingway never tells what that one thing was. However, due to all the lying, the “one thing,” that kept Krebs going through the war was no longer something that held any integrity for him. Many years ago I went through a very traumatic experience in my life similar to Krebs. The more I tried to forget what happen the more I became isolated and withdrawn from life and ...
... middle of paper ...
...shows that Krebs is longing for what he once had, but struggles to find it again back home.
In the story not only does Krebs struggle with his longing for a romantic relationship, but he also struggles to maintain his integrity and hold on to what good he can remember from his time in the war. Hemingway tells us “People seems to think it was rather ridiculous for Krebs to be getting back so late, years after the war was over” (1). Krebs even states “He did not want to come home” (1). With these statements, Hemingway shows that the war changed Krebs from the young man he was, in this small mid-western town where nothing changes, to a more critical and complicated individual. With that change he has developed a taste for the world and how he wants to live in it.
Works Cited
Hemingway, Ernest. “Soldier’s Home.” In Our Time. New York: Scribner, 1925. 67-77. Print.
To Kill a Mockingbird is a classic novel written by Harper Lee. The novel is set in the depths of the Great Depression. A lawyer named Atticus Finch is called to defend a black man named Tom Robinson. The story is told from one of Atticus’s children, the mature Scout’s point of view. Throughout To Kill a Mockingbird, the Finch Family faces many struggles and difficulties. In To Kill a Mockingbird, theme plays an important role during the course of the novel. Theme is a central idea in a work of literature that contains more than one word. It is usually based off an author’s opinion about a subject. The theme innocence should be protected is found in conflicts, characters, and symbols.
Krebs is a detached being who just wants to keep his life as uncomplicated as possible. He doesn't receive the same hearty welcome as his fellow soldiers, thanks to his returning home so much later than the rest. At first he doesn't want to talk about the war, presumably because of the atrocities he experienced there, but when he later feels the need to talk about it, no one w...
Clive Barker, the author of The Thief of Always, writes a fantasy about Harvey(the main character) taken into into a place full of illusions. Soon he finds out that there was this horrible Hood that had taken his precious time and almost has eaten his soul. So, Harvey then tries to destroy this evil Hood who ends up to be the oh so perfect house. Hood is evil and different ways he is evil. There are many things that makes someone or something truly evil. Hood is ultimately evil. These are the things that make him who or what he is. Evil is significant to most stories because that is the major conflict. The antagonist, Hood, does a really good job of being the bad guy. Usually it’s a person who is has some kind of kindness inside,
Hemingway deals with the effects of war on the male desire for women in many of his novels and short stories, notably in his novel, The Sun Also Rises. In this novel, the main character Jake, is impotent because of an injury received in World War I. Jakes situation is reminiscent of our main character Krebs. Both characters have been damaged by World War I; the only difference is Jake’s issue is physical, while Krebs issue is mental. Krebs inwardly cannot handle female companionship. Although Krebs still enjoys watching girls from his porch and he “vaguely wanted a girl but did not want to have to work to get her” (167). Krebs found courting “not worth it” (168). The girls symbolize what World War I stripped from our main character, a desire that is natural for men, the desire for women.
In a country like the United States of America, with a history of every individual having an equal opportunity to reach their dreams, it becomes harder and harder to grasp the reality that equal opportunity is diminishing as the years go on. The book Our Kids by Robert Putnam illustrates this reality and compares life during the 1950’s and today’s society and how it has gradually gotten to a point of inequality. In particular, he goes into two touching stories, one that shows the changes in the communities we live in and another that illustrates the change of family structure. In the end he shows how both stories contribute to the American dream slipping away from our hands.
The Testing, a story by Joelle Charbonneau, is a story about a group of friends who get tested by the government to test how they act and how smart they are.. The plot of this story starts when Malencia Vale graduates high school and gets picked to go to a series of tests created by her government to see if she is smart enough to go to their university, but when she finishes the first test she realizes there is more to it than just being smart it is also about how you act under pressure, then as she goes to the last trial to pass into the university she starts to understand the tests are actually about if you have the skills necessary to be a good leader and if you will do whatever it takes, the story ends when she passes the test and
The main point of “Vagueness and ambiguity in Hemingway’s “Soldier’s Home” two puzzling passages” is to describe what made Ernest Hemingway’s character Krebs such a mysterious dynamic character and how was his influences impacted on who he is. Milton Cohen describes how Hemingway use the “iceberg technique” to enhance readers to figure out the missing idea on what’s being interpreted in Krebs mind. At the beginning of the article Cohen use the word “vagueness” which means to not have a clear sight or any other senses that is recognizable in an indefinite way (Cohen 159). Statements that Cohen have noted about Hemingway’s story being too vague included the two passages that exaggerating his war stories towards others and the idea for Krebs to
The initial reaction I received from reading Soldier's Home, and my feelings about Soldier's Home now are not the same. Initially, I thought Harold Krebs is this soldier who fought for two years, returns home, and is disconnected from society because he is in a childlike state of mind, while everyone else has grown up. I felt that Krebs lost his immature years, late teens to early 20's, because he went from college to the military. I still see him as disconnected from society, because there isn't anyone or anything that can connect him to the simple life that his once before close friends and family are living. He has been through a traumatic experience for the past two years, and he does not have anyone genuinely interested in him enough to take the time to find out what's going on in his mind and heart. Krebs is in a battle after the battle.
The adjustment from years on the frontlines of World War I to the mundane everyday life of a small Oklahoma town can be difficult. Ernest Hemingway’s character Harold Krebs, has a harder time adjusting to home life than most soldiers that had returned home. Krebs returned years after the war was over and was expected to conform back into societies expectations with little time to adapt back to a life not surrounded by war. Women take a prominent role in Krebs’s life and have strong influences on him. In the short story “Soldier’s Home” Hemingway uses the women Krebs interacts with to show Krebs internal struggle of attraction and repulsion to conformity.
First, if there was a point made of the setting what would this story be like? Would Kreb’s be in Paris or Germany still? Would he have come home earlier if he knew it was a more bustling town? Hemmingway made the point of setting this story in a slow Oklahoma town that had no prospects of getting any better. Krebs was out of a Methodist college and went straight to the war (133). Krebs knew the lifestyle that he left behind and what would be expected of him when he returned. His family expected a return to his pre-war state of a young man out of college. The setting in Oklahoma probably did not entice Krebs any longer and he hungered for something better than settling down and becoming a working man. New York City or even Los Angeles might have created a different setting for Kreb’s. Maybe these towns might have offered a more exciting lifestyle for this young man. Hemmingway is maybe trying to portray that Kreb’s was held down by consequences of the war and this Oklahoma town would again have consequences for Kreb’s. Marriage, children, and a steady job were these the consequences Kreb’s spoke of when he mentioned courting the women in this town? Possibly, and he knew that he wasn’t going to live a lie any longer.
Poverty and homelessness are often, intertwined with the idea of gross mentality. illness and innate evil. In urban areas all across the United States, just like that of Seattle. in Sherman Alexie’s New Yorker piece, What You Pawn I Will Redeem, the downtrodden. are stereotyped as vicious addicts who would rob a child of its last penny if it meant a bottle of whiskey.
Ishmael Beah’s memoir A Long Way Gone should stay in Sterling High School’s English 4 curriculum because it teaches the reader that recovering from a horrible situation is possible, also Beah’s complex literal devices he uses to express his situation opens it up to the mind of a more experienced reader.
As a first hand observer of the Civil War, the great American Poet, Walt Whitman once said,"The real war [of the mind] will never get in the books."Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is a horrible mental ailment that afflicts thousands of soldiers every year. Besides the fact that it is emotionally draining for the soldier, it also deeply alters their family and their family dynamics. Ernest Hemingway’s “Soldier's Home” illustrates how this happens. Harold Krebs returns home from World War I. He has to deal with becoming reaccustomed to civilian life along with relearning social norms. He must also learn about his family and their habits. The ramifications of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder have a ripple effect on the lives of not only the victim, but also the friends and family they relate to.
Robin Cochrane Mrs. Schroder AP Literature and Composition 3 January 2018 The Awakening 1999 Prompt In one’s lifetime, he or she may face an internal struggle. Perhaps the struggle lies in a difficult choice between right and wrong. Perhaps it lies in a decision between want and need.
The novel "Soldier's Home" manifests that in order for life to go smoothly with no complications there are solutions with taking the easy path. One way this work proves this point is through a theme. Theme is a central message through the literary work. In the story, Hemingway mentioned, "Vaguely he wanted a girl, but he did not want to work to get her" stating how Krebs wanted to get a girlfriend (Hemingway 2). Also as Krebs discussed with his mother about what he was going to do with his life, Krebs actions were to get a job to please her. He comprehended that getting the job k...