Reflection on Hemingway’s “In Another Country”

While reading Ernest Hemingway’s “In Another Country,” I was impressed with the unique viewpoint taken in the story. Not only is the point of view of a soldier, it is also a perspective of a man who is out of place even with men of his own kind who have been wounded just as the narrator had been. The idea that the narrator really has no one whom he can truly relate to emphasizes the rather gloomy mood of the story: “I was a friend, but I was never really one of them after they had read the citations, because it had been different with them and they had done very different things” (734). I that the foreign soldier’s seclusion and air of hopelessness helped to emphasize the cynical mood of the story that was characteristic to the modernism time period.

As I read through “In Another Country,” I was also impressed with the symbolism Hemingway used in the machines to deepen the mood of hopelessness. The machines were viewed as objects meant as hope yet only really deepened despair and hopelessness. This fall of hope to despondency reflected the era of writing at that time. The hope that the doctor brought was shattered by the realities the soldiers faced. I was most impressed with the feelings of Hemingway during his war years being connected to the feelings of the hopeless and despondent soldier in the story. I believe Hemingway did a splendid job in reflecting the uncertainty he perhaps felt during the war in the foreign soldier’s character. The Modernistic period of writing was reflected well in a story that I felt was worth my time reading.