Claimed by critics as one of the greatest love and war stories of
all time, A Farewell To Arms is Ernest Hemingway's intense yet
simple take of two young lovers who meet during the chaos of W.W.I
and the relationship that endures until it's tragic end. A Farewell To
Arms effected society as a whole, as well as being widely known as a
very significant part of the literary canon. This assertion is proven
by the opinions of celebrated authors and professors throughout the
Society was effected greatly by this book. The main way was
that it gave the mothers, wives, and children of the men that had
gone to war in the 1920's a chance to read about what it might have
been like for their loved ones as they were fighting. "This novel
remains one of Hemingway's best works just of it's descriptions of
army life..." (Geismar). Never before had the people who stayed on
the home front realized the magnitude of fighting in the war,
whether it was on the front line, or like Henry, as an ambulance
driver. In a time period where the luxury of a camera wasn't
available, Hemingway took readers to a new place that hadn't been
visited before. "All the descriptions of life at the front and in the
hospitals, the talk of the officers, privates, and doctors, are crisply
natural and make a convincing narrative" (Cape). Another theme
that was prominent through out, along with the theme of war was
the idea of love lasting through war. A Farewell To Arms gave
readers not just a look at war, but a look at the challenge that Henry
and his lover Catherine were facing: trying to make love last through
the dire consequences of war. This gave readers, especially the wives
of the soldiers, something to strongly relate to.
The love of Lieutenant Henry for the nurse Catherine
Barkley... could only have come in the war and out
...